The small print: Cookies

What this site sets

One cookie, to count visits. It holds a random code that tells one visitor from another, so that somebody who looks at three pages is counted once and not three times. It is set by our own server, no other website can read it, and it identifies nobody. The privacy page says what the counting records.

The law allows a cookie like this without asking first, as long as you are told about it and can switch it off. The switch is at the top of this page, under Count my visits.

Your answer to the cookie banner is kept in a cookie too, so that you are not asked on every page, and the booking portal reads it so that it can follow the same answer. None of these identifies anybody:

• •bs_vid tells one visitor from another, for our own counting. It lasts 13 months.
• •bs_ab is set only on a page we are trying in two versions, so that you are shown the same version each time. It lasts 90 days.
• •bs_consent remembers your answer to the cookie banner. It lasts 6 months, and then you are asked again.
• •bs_optout is set only if you switch counting off, to remember that you did. It lasts 13 months.
• •bs_staff is set only on Boulder Shack’s own phones and computers, so that staff visits are left out of the numbers. It lasts 2 years.
• •bs_debug is set only while somebody at Boulder Shack is testing the site. It lasts until the browser is closed.

Only if you say yes

These are set by the scripts of Google, Meta and Microsoft, and only after you say yes to the cookie banner or switch Optional cookies on at the top of this page. Saying no, or switching it off later, stops their scripts loading on this site and deletes these:

• •_ga and _ga_J1XHJY9YM7 are Google Analytics’, to tell one visitor from another and keep the pages of a visit together. Google sets them for 2 years, and some browsers keep them for less.
• •_gcl_au is the Google Ads tag’s, to connect a visit to an advert somebody saw. It lasts 90 days.
• •_fbp is Meta’s, to connect a visit to an advert on Facebook or Instagram. It lasts 90 days. Arriving from one of those adverts also sets _fbc, for the same time.
• •_clck and _clsk are Microsoft Clarity’s, to join the pages of a visit into one recording. _clck lasts a year and _clsk a day.
• •Google, Meta and Microsoft may also set cookies on their own websites’ addresses, under their own policies. This site cannot read those.

What your browser stores anyway

Your browser caches images and fonts so pages load faster on your next visit. That is a normal part of how the web works and it is not a cookie, is not readable by us, and identifies nobody.

The booking portal

When you book, you go to the Redpoint portal at portal.bouldershack.co.uk. It sets cookies of its own, because it has to remember your basket and keep you signed in, and its own policy covers those.

It follows your answer to the banner. With a yes, Google Analytics and the Meta Pixel work there too, and set the cookies above. With a no, or no answer, Meta’s is not loaded, and Google’s tag is told not to use cookies before it starts, so it sets none.

Third party embeds

The booking buttons on this site load a small script from the Redpoint portal so the booking window can open without you leaving the page. If that script is blocked, the buttons still work as ordinary links.

The contact page shows a Google map in a frame, to everyone, whatever your answer to the banner, because it is how people find us. Google may set cookies of its own inside that frame, on Google’s own addresses and under its own policy, and saying no to the banner does not stop them. This site cannot read them. No other page has the map.

The contact form on the same page is loaded from PeerVantage, the system our team answers enquiries from.