Chairs Report for 2004 Tony Walentowicz

Summary

A good year for the club with lots going on and lots of new faces. Our links with Writtle have grown and injected new life into club activity. On the down side we have not produced any newsletters - new year resolutions from us all required.

Meetings (and members activity)

Difficult to report everything (probably quite a bit of stuff I don’t know about) but I hope to briefly cover the main events. In due course it would be nice to see some of it written up for early 2005 newsletters.

There was a February trip to Scotland with some activity on the Ben and a visit to the Ice Factor.

Our three club hut-booking trips were judged a success. An April Tremadog trip saw some early rock routes being done but was slightly marred by wet weather.

The Lakes received an overdue bank holiday visit from the club and benefited from fine weather. Some very enjoyable climbing was had by all.

The annual North Wales dinner trip turned out to be quite eventful. Poor weather with snow, two members getting ropes snagged and helicopter rescue followed. A write-up from different members could be interesting. We can all learn from such events.

Three members visited bouldering mecca, Fontainbleu in the summer. Would like to hear views – article for newsletter perhaps? A future club trip too, perhaps?

The much talked about ‘Piers and Chris ‘Grimble’ trip to Chamonix happened and both returned safely.

Other members have been out doing stuff with friends and family. I know of visits to, Austria Slovenia and Thailand. Like much of the above it would be good if members could write up and share their experiences.

The most significant achievement by a club member was Wyn’s magnificent achievement on Cho Oyu. More on this later.

I’ve not heard of much member interest in the sandstone in 2004. I think we often overlook this, our nearest natural rock climbing – a good venue, for a club day or weekend out – with a camp site too!

There was an Alan Hinkes talk in Chelmsford and I believe some members went. Once again, would be nice to see a newsletter article.

Walls

Great news here – the much-awaited Writtle Wall has now become available and been very successful. A series of ‘try-and-see’ weekly sessions is being negotiated at the moment. More on this later.

I am aware of members still visiting both Mile End and The Castle.

To maintain club interest and keep travel costs down, when visiting London walls it is always worth emailing the group to see if anyone else would like to go.

Newsletters/communications

As I keep mentioning we didn’t produce in 2004. I managed one ‘Chairs Ramblings’ (attached as you probably didn’t see it).

We have no shortage of stuff and I know we’re all capable – so, must do better this year. Perhaps copy deadlines are needed? Could we make effort to get stuff to Paul Winder by the end of February (earlier even better) for first newsletter?

We’re going to try a yahoo users group for information and mailing to see how it works. More on this from Graham.

And finally:

my thanks to you all for contributing to club activity. 2004 has been good, lets make 2005 even better.