We're talking Shark’s Fin Soup (1986; 6m, once HS 4c, currently HVS 4c), Burbage North, Peak District, here. Someone's recently climbed the relatively trivial Shark's Fin on a boulder somewhere in the Himalaya, but this thread is about 'Soup' (as it's known by the cogniscenti) and where it might actually go. One other person, at least, is interested.
Here’s a tale of history being made, unmade, falsely recorded, then falsehood becoming reality, possibly a mistaken reality at that. Even Joseph Stalin would have been impressed, if it wasn’t so completely trivial.
Shark’s Fin Soup (1986; 6m, HS 4c). It was my first new route.
Now, if you've ever had the misfortune to be involved in writing a guidebook or guidebook chapter, you'll know that most new route descriptions (scribbled in the New Route Book in the caff, online at Peak New Routes, wherever) are terrible. Some are just a bit crap, but most are really, really crap. You’re lucky if you can find the start of the route, let alone where it’s supposed to go. Plus, all new-route descriptions, without exception, feature the word ‘obvious’, however obscure, featureless and eliminate the route might be. Sometimes someone knows the name of the first ascentionist (their mate met them in a pub in Pembroke in 1963), sometimes you track down a phone number and found they moved out years ago. Even if you manage to locate them they usually can’t remember a thing, except why their amusing name was so brilliant. In the end you have to go back to first principles: here’s a crag, here’s a list of routes that may or may not be all the same, ignore the word ‘obvious’, and be sceptical of the given grade on the basis that, until proved otherwise, no single human being can grade more accurately than any other.
Shark’s Fin Soup. I was so pleased with myself, and so eager to write it up in the Stoney Café route book I forgot to take note of where it actually was. I think I described it as being half-way between Mutiny Crack and Long Tall Sally, which is a pretty accurate description of where it ended up in the Froggatt guide of 1991.
In fact the route had been done about a year before by Steve Bancroft, as Barry Manilow (VS 5a), and its right next to a whole bunch of other routes that are easy to find and describe. Like The Knight’s Move, for instance. I was surprised. Did no-one check these things? I felt quite guilty for a bit, but what do you do? Then, as now, there is no process for undoing new routes that have made their way into the annals of guidebook immortality. Rather than mess with history, I decided to see if there was potential for a route in the place where the description went. There was, just. I found a crappy little buttress, climbed an arête, and made the guidebook true again (except this was 1992 or so). It seemed to be a reasonable way to restore personal honour and guidebook accuracy at a single stroke.
Trouble was, even on this occasion (which might accurately be termed a ‘retro-first ascent’), I was still a new-route newbie, and I didn't make any notes. So I’m not certain where Shark’s Fin Soup (1992) goes, but I do remember it was a bit easier than Barry Manilow, at about Severe. Then again, no single human being can grade accurately from one decade to the next.
Anyway, I was surprised to see Sharks Fin Soup (sic) in the 2005 Burbage guide (at an astonishing HVS 4c) with an admission of semi-bafflement from the crag writer David Musgrove, who describes it thus: ‘presumably takes the bold and reachy overhang direct on good but suspect holds, about 25m left of Gargoyle Buttress'. Despite having done the first ascent twice already, my name has (disappointingly, I feel) disappeared from the first-ascent list.
Sharks Fin Soup 2005. Where does it go? I’ve no idea, but I plan to go and find it again, wherever it is, and re-live a second rush of retro-first-ascent glory. And I don’t feel guilty any more, in fact I think it’s all rather amusing. Since 2002 I’ve done loads of completely insignificant, obscure, featureless and eliminate new routes, and I don’t mind if Sharks Fin Soup (sic) remains a bit enigmatic.
I do worry about the missing apostrophe though, and even if it was in the right place to begin with. Could it be that the transience and mutability of the apostrophe were destined to reflect the qualities of the elusive route itself? Could it also be that Sharks Fin Soup is Dave Musgrove’s, and Shark’s fin Soup is mine, and they are completely different routes? We may never know.
Finally, has anyone noticed the unlikely symmetry between sharks’ fins and Barry Manilow’s nose? Convergent evolution or mere random biological similarity? As ecological disasters, noses and soup seldom get the discussion they deserve. Barry certainly has the bigger nostrils. Nose Soup – now there’s a brilliant route name.
