Finding a drug that would stick was akin to climbing a sheer cliff with no cracks.

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The tiny hamlet of Elantxobe, with its colourful houses clasping to an almost sheer cliff face, is undeniably one of the most attractive spots along the entire coast.

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Unlike the heroes of the book, however, Miss Lovett did not scale a sheer cliff and dispatch her enemies with skilful swordsmanship in order to win what was rightfully hers.

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On day three, after about 60km of riding, we crossed the 3, 900m-high Tosor Pass, where a sheer cliff of ice and snow gave way to a narrow corridor with the shimmering Kerege-Tash Valley below.

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That, at any rate, is the belief of the Faeroese hardy and tenacious folk whose favourite delicacy, puffin chicks, can only be procured by dangling on a rope hundreds of feet below a sheer cliff-top and robbing the nests of unfortunate seabirds.

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It is a relatively straightforward 10.9km hike, taking around three days round trip, but there is a great range of scenery to enjoy, from dense forests of dark fir to mustard coloured grassy slopes to sheer cliff walls with crinkled boxfold rock formations.

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On one side of this huge rock is a sheer 200-foot cliff.

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Paraparaumu has hosted the New Zealand Open 12 times and Kauri Cliffs is one of the best in the world with six cliff-top holes that sheer off into the Pacific Ocean.

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But in recent years knots of people often gathered there to watch an odder creature creeping, by feet and hands alone, across the high sheer face of boulder, buttress or cliff.

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