Cosmique’s Arete
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- Down climbing a snow slope on the Cosmiques arete
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- Pat Starts initial snow slope
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- Pat Wigglesworth on the cosmiques arete just before the final chimmney pitches
Robbie spend 5 thouroughly enjoyable days climbing with Pat Wigglesworth last week. With 1 weeks climbing in Ireland with Bren Whelan (www.mountaintraining.ie) under his belt Pat came to Chamonix to learn more.
They started off with some multipitch climbing in Vallorcine, then headed up high to experience some snow, and altitude with an ascent of from the Torino Refuge of a very enjoyable little peak called the Aiguille du Toule 3534m. Day 3 saw rain here in Chamonix so through the Mt Blanc tunnel they went to the sunny Italian side. Here Pat did his first lead climbs on some lovely bolted granite. The highlight to the week was to be an ascent of the classic Cosmiques Arete. The mountain was clagged in with cloud but the climbing conditions were great.
Altogether a very enjoyable trip and we look forward to more climbing with Pat in the not too distant future!
Thanks Pat!
Robbies Account
This 5 day trip was a very interesting way to open the Summer season of 2009. Pat the builder from Dublin was an excellent companion and full of great stories of building jobs during the now defunct celtic tiger era.
It was fascinating to hear descriptions of what it was actually like to get swept up in the building boom of the 1990s and early 2000s. Tales of hard work and long hours and also lucky breaks. But also of tribunals, greed and bad planning. The cast of characters included corrupt council officials, overworked city planners, and certain well known politicians. It seems that the rumours of that we read in the newspapers were actual real life occourances.
On our first days climbing Pat described a formative mountaineering trip that he had with an instructor from Tiglin Adventure Centre ( now deceased – the centre not the instructor).
As a teenage venture scout he and some of his friends spent several days in the Wicklow mountains climbing and camping. One of his most vivid memories of this trip was been woken early one morning as the bunk bed was being turned over by the aformentioned instructor ( who later apologised for this rude awakening).
Despite the initial rough treatment they had an amazing trip including an ascent of Lugnaquilla which had made such a big impression on Pat that over 30 years later he wanted to make a return to the mountains. As I sat there at the bottom of the cliff listening, I had already guessed the name of the mountaineering instructor that had made such a big impression on the young Pat Wigglesworth. It was none other than my Uncle ( and in many ways my childhood hero) Paddy O Leary.
Now 35 years later here was Pat again with the Nephew, the same age as his uncle had been on Pats previous Mountain adventure. Who Says Kharma doesnt exist!
