I have made good progress with the Gap of Dunloe chapter of Rock Climbing in Ireland and hope to make a preliminary version available in advance of the Gap Meet on the 16-18th of May. I need to get some better (sunnier!) topo shots and more consensus on the route selection.
To get the ball rolling on this – I won’t be ready to distribute the PDF for another week – I have listed below the routes I have included. I’m very keen to get feedback on this from both regular and occasional Gap climbers.
The Gap is one of the few premier climbing areas in Ireland that hasn’t been covered by a modern guide (and I use the term loosely), Richard Stack’s guide from 1995 featured rather nice hand drawn topos and is something of a collectors item. More recently Richard Creagh has done a great job creating an updated PDF version of the guide. Download it here.
The Gap is a tricky prospect for a non-definitive guide as the best routes seem to be scattered across over a dozen crags. There isn’t one ‘best’ area with a high density of routes. This means that it requires a little more space to cover. But I think the Gap deserves pretty comprehensive coverage as it’s a great climbing area, there is no existing print guide (or realistic prospect of one) and there isn’t a massive amount of other climbing in that corner of Ireland.
Here is the list
Bothán
Agent Orange HS 4b
Private Investigations VS 4c
Ljubljana E1 5c
Disco Legs E3 5c
Raven VS 4b
Céim
For this crag and the following one I have only give very shot descriptions and indicated a few other routes on the topos as well.
Moondance VS 4c
The Great War HVS 5a
Titanic VS 4b
Brennan’s Leap
Cronin’s Crack HS 4b
Daffodils VS 4c
Rush Hour HVS 5b
Carraig Ceannan
Diving For Pearls E2 5c
Cuchulainn HVS 5a
Ferdia HVS 5a
Rescue Rock
Free at Last HVS 5a
Umbongo Severe
Quartz Movement VS 4c
Mother Of Prague E1 5b
Willie Wonka E2 6a
The Main Face
P’U E2 5b
Out Of My Reach HVS (4c, 5a)
The Overlap E3 6a
Demasiado E1 5b
Póirse Gully
Life In Windy Weather E1 5b
The Stoop E2 5c
Air Time E4/5 6a/b
Echo Beach E1 4c, 5c
Sun Dogs E1 (5b, 5c)
Peregrine VS 4c
Thank You Ivan, Thank You Lord HVS 5b
The High Buttress
Jamaica Plain HVS (5a,5a,4b,5a)
Seventh Heaven E1 (4c,5b)
The Unforgettable Fire HVS (4c,5a,5a,4b)
Scairbhin E1 (5b,5b,4b)
Faill Ceoil
The Sign E5 6a (or E2 5b, A2, 5c)
Meltdown HVS (5a, 5b)
Kudos VS (4c, 4c)
Bosch E1 (5b, 4c)
Just to say that this list is by no means final and I’m very keen to get feedback.