The first meet of the year, my first proper meet as captain. It started quite well actually. Out of a 49 seat coach we had 47 paid people and 2 to pay on the day. Jim and Lally were going down early with Amy and would pick up Brad on the way. This would be the forward party to set up the ropes. This party did have a slight issue the night before when we couldn't get in contact with Josh to tell him the pick-up location and time but that was sorted early morning with a text to say he was ill. Kinda sucks but we managed to make do and hopefully he would have a 'good day'.
Ollie and I went down to the Charles Wilson building early with helmets and the harness bag. We found Harry and Jack there. The waiting started. About half past - when the bus was set to leave, we had just about got 20 or so people. Not the best start. Then the bus just didn't show. We started phoning round to make sure people weren't coming. Harry phoned the singular Mary Gee fresher to let them know the situation about the bus. He responded that he had got on the bus.....
So the bus had gone to Mary Gee first. Then Beaumont before we managed to get it to come back and pick the rest of us up at uni. A bit odd but I found out later that the driver’s sheet did not have the uni as a pick-up point. He was just scheduled to pick up at Mary Gee and Beaumont.
So only a bit later than intended we left Beaumont after picking up the last few people. Overall the journey was pretty uneventful until we got to the peak district. We made a wrong turn and started heading for Sheffield so we had to turn around. It was as the bus turned around that our second 'epic' happened. When reversing we heard a massive crunch. Once the driver had reversed out and turned around we saw the extent of the damage. A flower/tree path-side pot for want of a better description was completely destroyed on one side. After we go off the bus we saw the extent of the damage to the bus though. One of the front right panels was completely mangled. Needless to say we had a new coach for the return leg.
The actual climbing part of the day seemed at least in my eyes to go quite well. Once the groups were actually sorted the climbing started to occur on the easy routes with people attempting the harder ones in the corner. Some freshers unfortunately managed to not pack a lunch so Amy bless her made the 3 mile or so walk to Hathersage to get food. This seemed to help everyone overall as hunger started to set in. Still as we neared the end of the day climbing everyone started getting a bit bored of what we had which can't really be helped so an hour or so earlier than anticipated, we sent some groups to the pub to relax. The clean-up crew included myself, Lally, Jim and Cole. After we sorted out the ropes we ran to Gingerbread slab to look at an E1 Jim had been eyeing up. Pretty much unprotected we would be looking at a solo. Without pads. Even so both Jim and I were psyched so we shoe-d up and got on with it. Jim made it look like nothing by quickly and cleanly dispatching it despite a slight shake on a crux. Spotting was interesting with the lack of pads and the serious fall to us. Still .. he did it so props to him on his first E1 and first E1 solo. My attempt was not so good however as I just didn't like the look of the moves. More annoyingly I climbed through the first crux before bailing at the second. At half height :(. Next time around I shall have the grit trust.
The pub.
It didn't start amazingly well with us arriving 20 people short. They weren't that happy but we managed to get it sorted out and probably saved money while still allowing everyone a massive serving if they wanted :P. The meal itself was awesome as usual though :). Being me sucked due to eating last but it made everything easier.
Once the lovely food had been eaten we got the circle going for introductions and a few games. At least for me it seemed more awkward than normal but we got through the circle and started 1up 1down. Sergeant was definitely a better moderator than me but then people were awkward to judge.
After we had let the food settle the rest of the fun started with the clothes through the rope race and the big sit down which we actually managed :D .... cue first photo in the blog ever :D
The rest of the games went of relatively without a hitch unless you count a slight lack of enthusiasm for the games - we had very few volunteers. Some impressive chair bouldering and human pyramids were demonstrated, along with good teamwork on reaching past a line :P. Before too long we were packing up and getting back on the bus to return home.
Barring a quick detour to Loughborough to drop someone off the journey back was pretty uneventful and boring. Many many people fell asleep but that's to be expected given the day we had :P
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