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Neil powering round the initial crux section of Pigeon Crack 7A! Photos: Si Panton


…and on the highball finish.


Neil clinging to the slopey aręte on the crux of The Secret 7B


The great roof crack project photographed last year.


…and as it looks now!

Just prior to leaving (perhaps forever) to Canada, Ormes legend, Neil Dyer fired off one last classic problem down on the Pigeon's Cave boulders.

Pigeon Crack 7A! is a very striking line which can be found on the first cluster of boulders about 50m from the edge of the cave bay.

Powerful laybacking with poor footholds, on the lip of the chest high roof, allowed Neil to boost up and latch a good hold in the groove. From here easier climbing lead to a slightly tricky, but ultimately okay, highball finish.

Also of note in this area is The Secret 7B, a little known and previously unreported line on the right face of the same big block. This tenuous problem tackles the diagonal aręte feature from a sds in the low break on the right. It was first climbed by both Neil and Sam Cattell back in 2004. NB. Neil didn’t manage to repeat the line on the day of the photo – so if anybody else does repeat this line, please get in touch with a grade assessment.

Until this winter the same area boasted a very impressive project line, namely the huge offset roof crack/groove halfway along the back wall roof section. This looked likely to give a top quality 7C/8Aish problem, but unfortunately the left hand side of the crack (a massive chunk of limestone!) parted company with the crag during the winter storms and now lies on the wave cut platform. It would have made quite a mess if someone had been hanging on to it at the time of breakage…

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