Stag Do's, Stag Do's

Brother Adam in the Cow suit

Me and Adam ( Adam in Croc suit )

Wow, the last 3 months have been crazy. It all started with my brothers Stag do in Bad Gastein in Austria. 20 lads including my Dad and his mate Dave headed to the mountains for four days of skiing, snowboarding and drinking!! I opted to stay in a small B&B rather than staying in the YHA dorm with 15 other lads ( you can imagine the scene!). The four days were great fun with Adam having to wear all kinds of ridiculous outfits on and off the slopes. The highlight of the trip was one night where we consumed 100's of bottles of jegermaster, yes it was a messy night with everyone feeling worse for wear the next day.

Adam on the Jeger's

Me and Dad ( his 1st time on a board )

Powder day!!

Brothers!

With only three days to recover and re-group! I was off again on a flight to Geneva to go my mate Bozer's Stag do. This time there was 20 lads living in a swarve chalet just outside Chamonix. The Chalet was comlpete with outdoor hot tub, sauna and walking distance to the nearest ski lift Bravant. I snowbarded for the first few days and had one of the best powder days ive ever had. 3-4 hours of fresh tracks off the back of the Grand Montets, awesome!

Bozer dressed for action on the Grand Montets

Party boys

Probably the best bar in the world

The next few days I borrowed some ski's off Gus to try and get my eye back in bit as we had made plans to go and ski the Valley Blanch. I had heard that it was grim on a snow board and better on ski's. I felt confident skiing on the slopes but there was no powder left to practice my off piste skills. We pushed on and set off to do the Vally Blanch, 13 lads got ready to go up on the cable car none of us really knowing where we were going. Moments later a good friend of ours / mountain guide ( Jon Bracey) turned up to ski with us for the day! we all felt a lot better as visability disapeared at the top station! and we couldnt see 5 meters in front of us!!! lucky Jon was there. After a bit of a sketchey decent we skied down over some ice fields and into powder! I was falling over everywhere, I wished I was on my board! Skiing in powder is loads harder than on the slopes. Oh well it was a good experiance and I feel a bit more confident on ski's now.
We had some great party's in the Chalet as there was four techno Dj's all well psyched to get on the decks. We played quality tunes all night and day, had competitive Sauna sessions and played drinking games in the Hot tub. All in all it was a great week and thanks to Bozer and Mike for arranging such  an awesome trip.

Mike enjoying fresh tracks

Hot Tub!!

DJ Gallop on The Rig...

Time for a detox! I spent the next few weeks training and trying to get fit again. Time was against me! Lucinda and I had arranged a week in Kalymnos with some good friends and I felt like I needed another month to detox. As I didn't feel like I was that fit I was not intending on competing at the CWIF (Climbing works International festival). With a week to go before CWIF Graeme and Percy informed me that a member of TEAM WAD ( climbing works team) had dropped out, neeeding myself to man up! I climbed ok in the Qualifiers and scraped into the Semi finals in 20th place. The semi's took place on the Sunday afternoon and I felt I climbed alot better and got close to a couple of problems. I finished overall in 9th.

CWIF Final

Semi Final - 5 mins rest! Phew

Problem 3!!

Problem 3 again

Two weeks later we quested off to Kalymnos for what turned out to be an awesome week of Sun, Sea and Long pumpy routes littered with jugs. Last time I was on Kalymnos I was attending a prAna sales meet and ended up going on boat for 3 days looking for the ultimate deep water solo with Chris Sharma. It was a trip of a life time and it was great to be back. Lu and I climbed 5 out of our 6 days and onsighted up to 7c. It was great no stress holiday but a shame that we were not there any longer.

Me and Lu on the boat to kalymnos

Party boat

The reason we could not stay longer in Kalymnos was that we had the wedding of my younger brother Adam and his finance Emma to go to. The wedding and reception was all at one venue in  Seften Park nr Liverpool. The spectacular Victorian building was full of  plants and trees and was really atmospheric and magical. They both had a lovely day as did Lu and I and all of our family crew.

Getting ready with the best man Chris