The Island

Taking inspiration from Pylon King and his

secret crag list, I have compiled a list of all

my secret Somerset sends on SlackMap..

As the lines were solo rigged so I have no pictures
of people walking them so over the next 6 months 

I will be re-rigging and collecting all the pictures 

and then relocating them to the true location of each line.. 

Until then it's a secret..

Spacenet #5.. White Net 2 The Redux

After building the Illumineti and giving it a 

test rig between some tree's I quickly realised 

the net was too loose and it would need to have 

static rope inside it to give it more strength and less sag.

Like a sadist I went to work unpicking every single knot,

it took forever but it was a good way to stay busy during

the winter months and it meant I could start again fresh.

For this new project I wanted to remove the glowing cord
 and instead just build a plain white net, but after building it
I decided to use the scraps from my other projects to create
a sacred geometry inspired icosahedron net instead.
I found this image and planned out the amount of
cord needed for a simple interpretation of this design
and luckily I had just enough to make a couple of shapes.

After about a week of overhand knots I have almost
reached a point where I am happy with what I have created..

The next plan is to rig the first uk spacenet 'float-line'
either at the hollow or possibly at a new unrigged location.

Spacenet #4.. THE ILLUMINETI

For a long time I have been sitting on 60m of

glow-in-the-dark paracord, I had purchased it for 

a big spacenet project that I never found the time to start..

I chose to give up on the larger project for now and focus on 

building another triangle spacenet, this way I can rig a float-line 

between them and that's something I have been planning for awhile..

I started off putting 2 stakes in the ground and a hanger onto my shed and

created a triangle with edges around 6m apart, I connected 6x 2.5m spansets

together to create 5m edges which will be replaced with a permanent outer

material as soon as I decide between Amsteel or 5m spansets..

I girth-hitched my paracord along the bottom edge about 5" apart and 

started off by weaving the corners towards the middle, It was the first 

time I have not used a loom and by the half way point I realised i was going

to run out of cord. I pulled the net downwards and managed to save it

but the weave had to change pattern and i was still a meter short..

To fill in the gap in the top point I used 350 glow-in-the-dark paracord,

I also had some unrated glow-cord and with the remaining 350 cord

I created an Illuminati inspired pyramid eye in the center of the net..

This is my 'ILLUMINETI'
And I am unhappy with it so its getting remade immediately..

Island Hunter

For a long time I have known about a possible highline on an island,
and on this island is a sea spire that dreams are made of..

Last year I had almost finalised plans to rig this line but
everything was a bit rushed and unfortunately it all fell
through at the last minute, this year I have more time to plan
this project so hopefully 2017 will be the year.. fingers crossed.

Spacenet #3.. Salvage

The past year I have been slowly picking apart the knots
in my first Spacenet, I planned on using the scraps to weave
something slightly bigger with a hole in the center..

I started off with 2.5m spansets for outers and used a spare
piece of 11mm static rope to create my inner edging for the hole,
I girth hitched all my strands to the center and weaved backwards
into each corner, now I have an exit for a rope swing..

I'm pretty happy with the final result and it was a good chance
 to practice some new knots..

On to the next one..

Industrial Dreams

After spending the last 2 years hunting quarries 

and being out in nature I have felt the urge to rig

something urban, living far from cities makes this

quite a difficult task and as result I am always on the 

lookout for something that can be rigged.. like this beauty.

Hidden in the corner of an Industrial estate and awaiting

demolition are these 5 petroleum tanks on an abandoned site,

sitting dormant for the past 4 years this site is due to be cleared

and I had to get in to see if the tanks could be rigged..

After jumping a 7ft razor wire fence I was confronted with

years of overgrowth and lots of standing water, 

but it didn't take much to get in and around them and apart 

from some rust everything looks in pretty good condition..

At the back of the site I walked up the steps of the tank

and had a look around on top,

there's plenty of rigging options and everything looks

pretty strong so it might actually be possible..

The gap is 14m and the tanks are probably 7m high or more,

its full of obstacles and it could be a dangerous rig so might 

have to get a second opinion on this one but it was fun looking..

Hollow Hunter #3

Waiting for the weather to improve is boring

so although it was raining I rigged this new

69m long midline up the hollow..

'2long2low'
69m>12m^

Click here for SlackMap

Quarry Hunter

When you have no mountains, how do you highline?

You start by getting all the OS maps for your local area
and begin hunting for disused quarry sites..

For the last 2 years I have spent a lot of time researching
the Mendip Hills area and seizing every opportunity I can to jump in
the car and explore the possible locations I have found, I really want to
try and develop the Somerset area by finding as many highline spots as
possible and hopefully establish some beautiful lines in the process..

Here are some photo's of a few places I have been hunting,
all lengths and heights are estimates for now..

Location #1

30m> 15m^

 25m> 15m^

 Location #2

180-200m> 40-50m^

90m> 20m^

Location #3

25m> 30m^

25m> 30m^
50m> 45m^

 125m> 45m^

Location #4

34m> 15m^

30m> 15m^

Location #5

 50-60m> ?^

Location #6

85m> 40m^

Location #7

40m>17m^

80m>30m^

Location #8

100m>30m^

Location #9

80m>25m^

Location #10

50m>20m^

Location #11

30m>10m^

Location #12

20m>15m^

Location #13

I still have more place's to search but all ready I am feeling
really positive that this year (2017) will see some great lines established
and as always new lines create new adventures..

(Original post 01/11/2015, Updated 11/02/2017)

Ham Hill Midline #2

An hour of clearing brambles and ivy vines

and I was rewarded with the second Ham Hill midline,

Sitting nicely to the right of the first line this new line is 

a few meters shorter but the same height and a lot easier to rig..

Whilst clearing I possibly discovered a new line rigged higher

in the quarry, hopefully spend a day clearing and rigging soon

and will see if it can work..

Hollow Hunter #2

When I first started to look for new lines up the Hollow 

I was quite happy with the new line but after a second rig

I realized that a couple of tree's are too close and the 

line needed to be moved, this was an unwelcome feeling

as this seemed perfect to start with but a whipper into those

tree's might have a bad outcome..

I had intended to use this new line to improve my 32m P.B

but I got distracted with spacenets and quarry hunting so I 

didn't find time to hunt for a new spot for a 40m+ line.. until now

This line is about 40m long (I hope) and has really good exposure,

you can mount safely around 2m out each side and walk-offs are easy

so I'm really stoked to get some training on the go locally so I can start

rigging some quarries in the spring..

'About time'
40m>12m^

Click here for SlackMap

Spacenet #2.. Fun²

'Life doesn't care about your plans'

This is a life lesson 2015 has taught me time after time,

 when I first built the psychedelic spacenet I didn't anticipate it 

taking 5 months to actually find the time to rig it..

Braddy Hollow wasn't my first choice when choosing a location

but its somewhere I know well and its an easy place to rig lines quickly,

but even with all our confidence it still took 3 hours to get the line walkable..

I could claim a send on the 8m red leg that Jon is tied into (above) but 

the main line I really wanted to walk was a 35m long white leg you can

see in the photo below, I managed a few steps on the beast but this was only 

my first few attempts and it was nice to just enjoy being outside having fun..

Hopefully there will be more space net fun coming soon :)

Bristol Harbourside Festival

This year Jacob HiHo invited me to perform a little

demo for Cirque Bijou,

Also managed to win the Bristol Slack Jam competition..

The Psychedelic Spacenet

After the first Spacenet I rigged and walked I wanted to create
something bigger and with the Moab Monkeys providing all 
the inspiration I could need I started planning the next one,
To start with I knew I wanted to use 2.5m roundslings for the 
outer edges so after some persuasion I manged to get 4 brand new
black slings for free from Maverick Slacklines..
Next I purchased 500ft of 550 Paracord from Wild Elk and built a 
large wooden frame to weave on, I find it easier to solo weave a net
using a frame as I can move it around and leaning over a horizontal
net quickly hurts my neck and back..

It still needs some final adjustments but it's 98% ready and as soon
as I can it's getting rigged over a coastal highline with 25m legs, 
hopefully I can get it up over water in the next few weeks too..