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The
Growlersworld Interviews is an ongoing quest, bringing you closer to
successful and creative people in all walks of life.
Rawle
Austin presents...
A
conversation with Nick Hirst - Climbing to New Heights
Nick
Hirst has a passion for rock climbing and has travelled through
South East Asia. I spoke to him to find out more.
Rawle
Austin: Could you introduce yourself to Growlersworld.com readers?
Nick
Hirst: Hi, my name's Nick Hirst. I moved to London
a year ago from Sheffield and find myself working as a civil
servant with the Growler himself at present.
RA: How and when did you first get into rock climbing?
NH:
The how was simply by going to an introductory course at a nearby
indoor climbing wall - about three years ago now.
As
it was winter I hardly climbed outdoors until next Spring.
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By
then I knew a few climbers, and we had about enough equipment between
us to do the local crags, so started heading out to them.
RA: Why does it appeal to you?
NH:
When I started I think I just felt like trying something new. I wanted
to do something that excited me.
I
hadn't previously thought about climbing much and if I had thought
it looked like a brute mixture of fear and hard work and not much
like fun!
It
was reading an interview with a writer who I'd just got into,
actually, who turned out to have been a climber, which made me
think there might be more to it.
Something
to the effect of how alive it had made him feel.
I
realised there was more to it than doing pull-ups in the outdoors
and thought I'd give it a go.
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Obviously,
as I'm still doing it, I found out I liked it. There are a lot of reasons.
For
one thing, the actual movement is fun, being more to do with balance
and technique than strength.
The
being high above the ground thing can be really exhilarating or on occasion
reduce you (well, me, anyway) to a state of abject terror, but even
that is kind of bracing!
The
head games that occur when your instinct is telling you to get
back down to the bloody ground or just cling on where you are
until someone rescues you, but something else is telling you to
keep going up, are quite interesting.
I
like it when you commit to doing a hard move and find yourself
just doing it, very much 'in the moment', very focused. It's good
for clearing the head.
Around
all that, you get out into some beautiful places with a bunch
of other misguided souls putting their lives in each others hands,
forget about daily life for a bit and get to do something just
for the fun of it.
Having
said all that, I should point out that I'm very much a novice
climber, still, having climbed 'on and off' since I started doing
it - lest anyone get any ideas that I'm going for some hardcore
risk taker image.
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Or
that I'm good at it. I do the routes that, for the top climbers, are
presumably about as hard as climbing a ladder. And I have no desire
to get killed doing them!
But
for me they can be pretty intense.
RA:
What has been your best rock climbling experience (favourite place)
to date?
NH:
There is no single best experience, but there are a
few good climbs which stand out. And days out which are great
fun, regardless of whether you climb well or do some classic
route or not.
Most
of them are. At my level, it's as much a day out with your mates
involving a bit of climbing as it is a day sacrificed to achieving
a particular climb.
Nor
have I climbed in enough locations to really name a favourite
- far more than any other place I've climbed in the Peak District,
so I suppose that's my favourite for now. Stanage Edge is probably
my favourite cliff.
Predictable,
as it's the most popular crag in the country, and as busy as
Tottenham Court Road at weekends, but there is a reason for
that.
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RA:
What's your ultimate rock climbing ambition and why?
NH:
I wouldn't say I have an ultimate ambition, to be honest. I prefer to
take it step by step. I do want to get better, and I want to climb harder
stuff, and get out into some more large scale venues than I yet have.
The
main thing is to keep enjoying it. My ambition at the moment though
is just to get out climbing more often.
RA:
What advice would you give to someone eager to start rock climbing?
NH:
Take it easy, stay safe, remember it's basically a daft pastime
and not to be taken too seriously. Indoor climbing walls are good
for starting out, but you should be looking to get out to the
real thing as soon as you can.
Join
a club if your mates don't climb. Climbers, in my experience,
are very friendly and are happy to introduce newcomers to the
field.
RA:
Who inspires you in the rock climbing field?
NH:
I don't really follow the scene, so I suppose the people who inspire
me are my own climbing partners, especially when they climb better
than me (or is that just jealousy?).
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I
find the people who started it all off, without guidebooks, anything
worthwhile in the way of equipment, or, apparently, much idea of what
they were letting themselves in for, pretty amazing.
RA:
You've travelled extensively through South East Asia, what is it about
that part of the world that fascinates you?
NH:
I just wanted to travel! South East Asia was as good a place as any
to go. I bought a one way ticket to Bangkok and thought I'd make it
up from there.
It
wasn't a question of that part of the world having particularly
fascinated me previously.
It
was easy enough to get to yet far enough away to seem a good place
to start.
I
was going to do a round the world trip but couldn't afford it.
I'm
glad I didn't try to fit too much in, and had a bit of time to
spend in the places I went to.
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RA:
Which Asian countries have you visited to date?
NH:
Thailand, Laos, Cambodia, Vietnam, Nepal, Tibet, Singapore and Malaysia.
RA:
What was your most memorable experience?
NH:
That's difficult. There are too many to name just one.
I
think the privilege of being able to travel like that is that
you see such a breadth of things and go to such diverse places
that you are constantly being surprised or amazed by what's around
you: nothing becomes stale or predictable, and you notice things
that would just be background noise if you'd been there a long
time.
It's
a great privilege too to get a glimpse of how other people live,
and try to peer round the edge of your own culture.
It
brought a great sense of freedom as well. I would go to any of
those places again.
Vietnam
or Nepal would probably be first on the list.
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RA:
Where would you most like to visit next and why?
NH:
I've been meaning to get to North Wales to do some climbing there for
ages, but it hasn't happened this year.
If
I was to do another big trip, I think I would want to see something
of South America. Something else I have to do is get out to the Himalayas
again, and be a bit more adventurous this time.
RA:
And finally, any last words of wisdom you'd like to leave us with?
NH:
Hmmm, wisdom? Not my forte I'm afraid. Rock on!
All
photos used above © Nick Hirst.
Paul
Cowdell - The Prince of Folklore!>
<Darren
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