September 2008 the climbing wall in Trinity was stripped bare and professionals were brought in from the UK to set all new routes.

A guide list crudely written in chunky black marker was taped to the side of a locker showing the approximate gradings for the routes. The list was later removed, possibly vandalised giving me an extra push to type up the following list.

Please note, gradings are subjective^[1]. Wall A is the route nearest the entrance, and wall N is the slab routes at the far corner of the room.

Wall A
Grey 5+
Orange 6B
Green 6B+

Wall B
Blue 6B
Red 6A

Wall C^[2]
White 6B
Grey 7A+
Green 6A+

Wall D
Yellow 6C
Red 6B+

Wall E
Green 6A+
Orange 7B

Wall F
Blue 6A+
Red 6C+
Grey 7A

Wall G
White 6A
Green 6C
Blue 6B

Wall H
Black 5+
Orange 6C+

Wall I
White 6A
Yellow 6B+

Wall J
Green 6C
Black 6B
Blue 7A

Wall K
White 6A
Red 6B
Orange 6B+

Wall L
Yellow 6B
Green 6A+
Grey 6B+

Wall M^[3]
Red 5+
Blue 5+
White 4+

Wall N
Yellow 5
Orange 5
Grey 6B+


[1] The red route on Wall B seems unusually easy for a 6A but perhaps not easy enough to consider it as 5, hard to know.
[2] Additional black holds have been added to allow for bouldering practice on Wall C.
[3] To help build stamina climb the Red, White, and Blue consecutively. This wall has been sometimes called The French Connection Part 2. Before the routes were reset there was also another section of wall with Red, White, and Blue routes which were dubbed The French Connection, I'm not sure who came up with the name but it was Brendan Holland who first mentioned it to me.


Climb safely.

Climbing trip report in twenty words*.

Trinity. Mournes. Soup. Drink.
Flooding. Fire brigade. Four dinners. Mulled wine. Drink.
Pidgeon Rock. Climbing! Hot Ribena. Orange Monster. Drink. Porterhouse. Home.

* twenty unique words is close enough.

The weather wasn't in our favour. Just as I left the house I said I hoped the weather would hold it changed from sunshine to rain. By the time we got to Dalkey things had improved but we did get another brief shower and things were generally overcast so things finished up earlier than they could have done enough if the brilliant sunshine of the morning had only lasted into the evening but we still did pretty well. The long days make it a great time of year for climbing if you can get adequate weather otherwise.

As we were gathering we passed John Mehegan who headed much more quickly to the quarry to climb with friends. Jenny, Rachel, Lena, Hamish, and Brian still wearing a sharp suit (and a pink striped tie) formed a separate group. Soon as he finished off work Luke was hot on our heels, and arrived not too long after us.
Although there was talk of climbing Thrust, a route on the upper cliffs, we ended up at Paradise Lost or "base camp" as Brian called it as so many climbing days begin there. Rachel started to lead Levitation, and Brian joked he would race her. Despite Rachel taking an early lead Brian was soon speeding the adjacent route Mahjongg.

Waiting around Alan (me) did some basic climbing and traversing not much more than a metre from the ground, but it felt good to be out there and getting some climbing done again. I probably should have lead Paradise Lost but I was disinterested in leading it again, still convinced it would be much more enjoyable to solo the route with no rope at all and without the hassle and weight of a rack of gear. Alternatively I might have had time to climbing Levitation before Luke arrived had I been a bit more enthusiastic.
Luke soloed Paradise Lost as a quick warm up, then lead a climb nearby to the left called Fragile. Fragile is so close to Paradise Lost it was at times hard to know if we were really climbing a different. Alan seconded Fragile, making a conspicuous effort to keep left, deliberately avoiding the easy line in an attempt to make it a little more challenging but for the most part it was really wasn't difficult.
After a pondering our options and asking for suggestions Luke decided to tackle E-route. The clouds had dissipated enough let through a little sunshine and light the upper half of the route. As Alan began the climb a gentle drip drip of rain began. This brief shower was more than a little off putting, but Alan was able to get started thanks to suggestions from Philip and Dennis and the rest of the climb was good fun from there.

Enthusiasm and energy varied and it would have been so much better to go out earlier on my day off but it was a good evenings climbing and I'm glad I made the effort to get out there and just do it.

Climbing in Dalkey Quarry with Jack, Jenny, Luke, Colin, Ursula, and Alan.

Routes climbed: Paradise Lost, and F Route
(and an icy scramble down a corner of the quarry)

Jack was not attacked by a ravenous mountain goat but a gremlin did steal his crabs (aka carabiner).
Coly was hugged by all. Not because anyone likes him, just because his legendary blue jacket is so warm.
Luke went back and reclimbed Paradise Lost successfully completing his first outdoor lead climb.
Alan "milkbottle" got (more) sun burnt, in Ireland in February, with frost, snow, and ice, on the ground.

Luke, Colin, Ursula, went to 'casa de Alan' (as Coly put it) and enjoyed a meal of Chili con Carne.
Many laughs were had, good climbing, excellent day.

Summary:
Trinity Climbers trip to Glendalough, County Wicklow, 2nd, 3rd, 4th, February, 2007.
Another excellent trip, made especially pleasant by the blessing of fine weather.
Saturday: Acorn Buttress. Three routes. From right to left, Fascilis Descendus (HS 4b), Provo (VS 4c), and one other route (most likely Inferno).
Sunday: Expectancy. Two routes. An abseil route to the right us was also put to use by our group and several others passing by.

( Much more detailed description follows... )

A gallery of photos from the Irish Blouldering League (IBL) was posted on the Climbing.ie website. These things are always more fun with captions which unfortunately the site doesn't allow so instead I will add a few comments of my own and point out some of the photos which may be of more interest to Trinity climbers.

I will only link directly to one image, as it not polite to hot link other peoples images. I should also warn that because it is an outside link it could easily break or be changed and I cannot take any responsibility for any of the links breaking or images looking any more horrific than they already do. Other links will be normal links to the Climbing.ie website.

Call the Exorcist: Paddy Clarke Possesed.
Paddy Clarke climbing in a snowstorm. Maybe it wasn't snowing indoors and there was just chalk everywhere but I like my explaination better. Paddy starts from sitting, watched by Brian and Tanja.

Watching and waiting. Crowds of climbers await there turn and puzzle out how to approach the problems. Hamish can be seen in his orange/red top with Brian standing beside him, and Heather on the right at the middle. Katriona can be seen back centre wearing her pink top and Tanja is on right wearing a blue top. Heather climbing problem 11 jamming foot hard in the corner. Hamish watches Heather scoring, I mean keeping score, clipboard in hand.
You can tell by the shirt it is Brian, if that is in fact his real name! Brian and Brian again.
Photos of peoples backs are not particularly interesting and it can be difficult to tell who is who, I only recognised my own photo by the hoodie I was wearing. Not the guy climbing, but on the left Alan (me) can be seen trying to figure out climbing problem 14, the one with the odd stickey outey bit. Got quite close and I know I could have done it on a good day but couldn't get it in the required three attempts.
Katriona climbing in her pink cardigan. Tanja stands up to start on problem 9. Looks like Leena.

Message scrawled on the grey masking tape on the wall instucts climbers to start from a seated position. It is not a suggestion to wear your own ass for a hat, easy misunderstanding to make. The climber reaches for the first bonus point on problem 9.