Skeleton Ridge – The Needles on the Isle of Wight

I suspect quite a few of you folks will have visited the Isle of Wight and especially the iconic chalk Needles by Totland Bay in the past. So here’s a short climbing film I made about a recent trip for a sortie on one of the greatest UK “Adventure” climbing routes called “Skeleton Ridge” on the Needles themselves. First climbed by the legendary Mick Fowler in November 1984, this 5 star HVS esoteric but “chalky delight” has gained cult classic status over the years and comprises about 160 metres of climbing over 6 pitches with some of the most outrageously face melting exposure you will ever find in the UK.
So on Saturday 28th of May at 8.15am, my partners in crime and I did a short ab into the Battery Moat just to access the abseil stake, followed by a 90 metre chalky and chossy rap into Scratchell Bay. Unsurprisingly chalk is rather a strange medium to climb and I thought it would be a bit like climbing feta cheese! However it is remarkably hard and solid (for chalk!) although there is always a wee nagging doubt that a hold or ledge may explode at anytime. Once established on the route, a rollercoaster ride of buttock-clenching ridge featuring amazeballs arêtes and fantastic fins of à cheval awesomeness on the edge of nothing are clambered whilst gaining around 90 metres in height all the way up to the Old Battery where we topped out just over 3 hours later at around 12 noon.

Anyway the entertainment was duly recorded so for anyone interested in viewing a short video featuring kestrels, time lapses, chalky shenanigans, gargantuan exposure on steroids plus some aerial drone footage then this is the story of our trip.

View video …

All constructive feedback welcome, please feel free to share and hopefully it will inspire a few of you lovely people to hop on a ferry to visit the Isle of Wight and climb on one of the great adventure routes of the UK!

Cheers and happy climbing! 🙂 Dave Linnett

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