Johnny Dawes and Paul Pritchard climb the Rainbow Slab

This short film leaves its mark. Friendship, courage, determination and many other aspects, both negative and positive, of our lives are all packed into this emotional film starring two of the Britain's best trad climbers during the 1980's and '90s, Johnny Dawes and Paul Pritchard.

Dawes is the genius, having established routes everywhere across Britain but in particular on gritstone, the mountains and sea cliffs in Wales, and the slate quarries above Llanberis. Paul Pritchard is courage. A Lancashire climber, his formative years were spent in Wales before moving on to the world's harder rock faces. An accident in 1998 on the Totem Pole in Tasmania almost cost him his life and as a result of his injuries he is partially paralysed.

The video documents these two old friends enjoying a day at the crag, at Rainbow Slab in the abandoned quarries high above Llanberis where both left there mark years back: Paul with the audacious The Cure for a Sick Mind E7 7a, Johnny with the hyper technical The Very Big and The Very Small 8c.

In this clip the two climb one of the easiest routes up the slab, but we're certain that the experience - for both - was very profound indeed. Enjoy.

Johnny Dawes and Paul Pritchard, taken from the film Welsh Connections


- RAINBOW SLAB, LLANBERIS, WALES