Road Tripping to the Wolgan

Doing home renovations can be a real “time” trap, not unlike project work. Long days seem to roll one into the next, and before you know it you have worked for two weeks straight. Matt had also been pretty busy with the start up of his new business Abseil Access, so a climbing trip to the Wolgan Valley was hard to refuse for both of us.

We headed up to the Coke Ovens on our first day. I got about 5 metres up the first pitch of Mirror Man and started to struggle. After much swearing and bloody knuckles I decided to lower off and let Matt lead for a while. I hadn’t done any lead or multi-pitch climbing since Christmas, and was feeling very rusty (how do you place cams???). Matt cruised through the layback / jam pitch (and the rest of the route for that matter) to the mid section of the Coke Ovens cliff, separating the Lower and Upper walls.

Most cliffs in the Wolgan Valley comprise two layers of sandstone rock, separated by a middle layer of shale. The shale layer is basically dirt strewn with loose blocks of shale and sandstone, and trees. The Sandstone layers have amazing crack, corner and face climbs ranging in length from 30 to 100 metres. However the rock is not always perfect – it ranges from smooth cracks and ironstone edges to deadly loose, esky sized crumbly blocks.

At the Coke Ovens Upper, we decided to chance the incoming rain and Matt started up the first pitch of Dr Freeze (22). It was an amazing onsight lead – consistent moves for the grade with few rests over a very long 42 metres. Needless to say I dogged my way up to the belay, and felt totally spanked afterwards. Where were my jumars???

We decided to rap back to our bags after the first pitch – rain was looking more likely and I wasn’t keen to struggle up two more pitches of grade 21 climbing. The rain did arrive about 2 minutes after I started up Death Bed Confessions (13), a cruisy slab route. Not the best conditions for rusty climbers, however I worked through the “oxidation” to the belay, thankful I was wearing my shell jacket.

It was still raining the next morning when I crawled out of Matt’s van. We had a cooked brekkie and read the guide book for a while, before deciding to walk up to the Coke Ovens.

The theory was that the rain will clear during the 1 hour walk. And it did. Keen to consolidate on my previous days climbing [sarcasm], I racked up for a route called Organ Grinder (14). The climb was very old school, with an off width section mid way up the first pitch. At the off width I looked around for the “secret” holds that would enable me to do the section gracefully, and found nothing but a smooth flaring crack at the back. On attempt #1 I opened my previous days knuckle scabs before retreating back to a rest stance. Bugger. On attempt #2 and #3 I made some new knuckle scrapes. “Not going too well” I thought.

On attempt #4 Matt called out “chicken wing” as I was struggling my way upward. The advice threw me, and I again retreated back to the rest stance.

Attempt #5 saw the chicken wing employed successfully, however I couldn’t get any friction for my right foot for the final move past the off width. Back to the trusty rest stance to look for a decent foot hold.

Armed with a re-learned technique, a good right foot hold, half a dozen new knuckle scrapes and a case of the shits I finally got myself up the off width, and then on to the belay. Matt came up, and led the next pitch, before we rapped back down. It was the longest warm-up route either of us had every climbed, time wise anyway.

Later that day Matt climbed Sizzler (19). It is one of the three “must do” cracks at Coke Ovens Lower, and the last for Matt’s trilogy. We had rapped down the route the day before, and I was blown away by the line. I opted not to second him, saving the route for another day.

There is another cruisy slab route right of Death Bed Confessions called Dan the Bulldog. The first pitch goes at around grade 14. I lead this without incident, and without rain, for a nice finish to a good days climbing.

For our final day in the Wolgan, we opted for the Coal mines. This cliff has mainly single pitch routes, around 30 metres long, established on the Lower section.

We started the day with a corner crack called Absolutely Sweet Marie (14). The lead felt good, in control, and fluid. I “stitched it up”, placing cams or wires every few metres. Fortunately I was now selecting the right size cam or wire for each placement, which made things a bit easier.

We both had a few leads that day, the highlights being Matt’s onsight of a finger crack route called Tranzistor (21) and my onsight of Helzapopping (17). After a quick wash in the creek we made the drive back to civilisation, take out food and cold beer.

The “responsibilities and commitments” of civilisation didn’t take long to catch up with us. The following days climbing was to be cut short as Matt had to take a trip into Sydney. Matt, Brendon and I set off early in the morning for Heathcliff, to have a look at a new route Matt was developing. The first two pitches are face climbing, followed by a crux crack final pitch. It goes at around 19-20, 18-19 and a difficult 24.

Brendon got the first pitch clean, with no problems. I started out OK on the second pitch, but got a little psyched out by friable holds and loose rock, and took a sit just before the next belay. The third pitch starts off with a few easy moves up to a roof, then follows a finger to fist sized crack to a small cave, which is easily passed to the belay. Brendon had a go at the third pitch, going for the onsight and naming rights to the climb. However a sit at the roof and a spectacular fall at the crack section put paid to that.

For my final day in the Blue Mountains, we headed to Mt Piddington for some rock mileage. I was keen to put a few more easy leads under my belt, and Matt was happy to drop down a few grades and perform belay duties. We climbed a number of crack and corner routes, before arriving at Flake Crack (17).

It’s a stellar line - a 10 metre lay-back flake start, followed by a right rising finger crack, leading to a fist crack and roof finish. I managed to successfully open all the scabs on my knuckles, during a thoroughly enjoyable lead. Definitely a three star finish to my trip.