Mental Challenges

Route: Classic Hits and Memories - 3+, III (which is a Darrans winter grade)
Location: MacPherson Cirque, the Darrans
Fun Factor: Intense cerebral mind f#ck for the first pitch, 5 out of 5 for the second pitch
Photo: Pete Amos

This was an amazing experience - we were buzzing wildly afterwards.

My reward for working out a sequence past the first 5 metres of protectionless off-width, was being in an un-retreatable position with no gear to lower myself down to safety.

Pitons and stubbie ice screws dangled uselessly at my harness as I got acquainted with the small blobs of frozen turf and edges of the slab, hidden somewhere under the dusting of snow. Having come to the realisation that the clarity and focus climbers experience in difficult situations wasn't going to happen, and the voices in my head were not going to shut up, I decided to take things one move at a time towards the thin ice out right.

Pete provided just the right amount of belayer encouragement - I guess he realised the seriousness of my predicament.

Around 12 metres off the deck, I pulled away a few loose pieces of rock from a protrusion from the slab, hoping to find a crack solid enough for a knifeblade. It went in, but way to easily, and it was still a few more body lengths to the ice. Bugger. I clipped it with a screamer and just kept on moving right, managing to find a better blade placement on the way.

Once on the ice, I felt great relief. It was thin, steep and offered only one stubbie screw and an ice thread for the rest of the pitch, but my tool placements were bomber. The voices in my head quietened. It was all smiles from there.

Recipe for a Darrans Winter Climbing Meet

Ingredients
20 climbers
20 pairs of cramp-ons
40 ice tools
Skis and one snowboard
An assortment of screws, pitons, wires and cams


In Homer hut, roughly combine all ingredients. Stir furiously with nationalistic taunts, practical jokes and a good splash of "taking the piss".

When thoroughly melded apply to thin, brittle ice over seamless granite, dusted with powder snow and a smattering of frozen turf. Alternatively, rise to a significant height then either descent rapidly on skis / snowboard or slog your way home via torch-light.

Season at night with the scent of smelly socks drying over the fireplace. Enjoy with gin, single malt or dark ale.


Random Photos
Afternoon alpenglow on Barrier Peak (viewed from the Homer hut balcony):


A class 2 slab avalanche releasing from Mount Talbot, down into MacPherson Cirque:

Steph enjoying the steep and funky second pitch on Gabites-Rogan (photo by Ron Dempster):

Enjoying another perfect day, this time it was lunch on Gertrude Saddle (Milford Sound is in the background):

Nemesis [nem-uh-sis]

–noun, plural

1. something that a person cannot conquer, achieve, etc.: The performance test proved to be my nemesis
2. an opponent or rival whom a person cannot best or overcome
3. Classical Mythology. the goddess of divine retribution
4. an agent or act of retribution or punishment

Definitely the most insane climbing I have ever experienced. The first 75 metres was steep, thin, funky ice - grade 6 all the way to the belay ledge. The next 50 metres was even crazier - traversing right and up on runnels, curtains and mushrooms.

Route: Nemesis - WI6, 150m
Location: The Stanley Headwall, Yoho National Park
Photos: Doug
Fun Factor: 5 out of 5

Just Another Day in the Ghost

The Ghost Valley is definitely a blokes place to go ice climbing. In addition to all the sharp, pointy climbing gear, you need a 4x4 with all the rescue equipment to get in there. The locals say that being in the Ghost Valley is an adventure in itself. Frozen creek crossings, snow drifts, big hills, shovels, jacks, tyre chains, cumalongs, slings... the list goes on and on...

It is probably the closest ice climbing to Calgary geographically, but access can be quite lengthy, especially when you get stuck in a snow drift. It took us 2 hours to dig and winch our way out of this one:

So with our plan to climb Hydrophobia well and truly snookered time-wise, we headed into the Valley of the Birds. This narrow canyon weaves it's way gently down to the Ghost river, but has a number of short, steep flows feeding into it. When properly formed, the valley makes an awesome day out in an awesome setting.

Hedd-wyn leading a very sun-baked, featured and detached pillar called Eagle (WI5, 30m):

This picture gives you some idea as to the condition of the ice. It's almost rotted out just above me, with the broken pillar a few metres below me. It was a pump fest seconding this. Hedd-wyn styled up with no dramas - not bad for a 62 year old.

Letting it all hang out

Route: Louise Falls - 110m, III, WI4-5
Location: Banff National Park, 30 minutes walk from Chateau Lake Louise
Fun Factor: 4 out of 5

The route climbs up to the curtain at the top of the photo, then steepens up. We chose to climb behind the left hand side of the curtain, and pop through the small hole, before climbing to the trees at the top. It was super exposed - quite the rush!


At the curtain, and the start of the exposed exit:

Bow Falls

Route: Bow Falls - 60m, IV, WI3-4
Location: Icefields Parkway
Fun Factor: 5 out of 5. The full adventure - skiing, climbing, avalanche terrain, cornices, wild weather. Bring your mountain head.

We skied up to the route, over Bow Lake, in perfect conditions. A slight breeze from the South West, and clear sunny skies. Bow Falls is the wide, fat flow on the left hand side of the cirque


The access slopes looked a little suspect - hard wind slabs. We skirted around the worst of them, and belayed across the rest.


Half way up the route, the wind picked up from the West, sending torrents of snow off the Wapta Icefield down on top of us. I climbed the last 5 metres by feel, as I couldn't see anything with the spindrift driving into my face. Part of the cornice to our right collapsed as Dan climbed up, sending tonnes of ice and snow down. The mountains put on a good show for us that day.


We rapped the route in gale force winds, shivering uncontrollably and covered in frozen snow. It was great fun!!!

The Professor Falls

Route: The Professor Falls - 280m, III, WI4
Location: Mount Rundle, Banff National Park
Fun Factor: 5 out of 5
Photos: Dan

The route tumbles down for 5 pitches:



It's a 7.5km walk from the parking lot, so a mountain bike with slick tyres and no brakes makes things much quicker:


The ice is fat, blue and never ending - 5 pitches of awesome:)

The Canadian Rockies Weight Loss Program

I weighed myself just before coming over here in February - a whopping 74kg (well, heavy for me anyway). After 8 days climbing ice and 4 days back-country skiing and eating as much food as possibly, I'm down to 70kg.

Could freezing your ass off and running around the mountains be the "next thing" in weight loss programs? Ha Ha Ha!!!


Brent on pitch 1 of Nemesis. We walked, swam and crawled up snow for 3 hours on Wednesday, sometimes chest deep, to get to the base of this mega-route:


The avalanche hazard was listed as "Moderate" last Thursday, but we suspected otherwise after the 30cm of new snow sheared off this creek bed when we skied up to it:

Climbing at The Bluff, Victor Harbour

Location: Petrel Rock
Route: Choice Cut, 10 metres, grade 14
Style: Off-width start, fist crack / face holds finish
Fun Factor: 4 out of 5 (for the off-width inclined :)
Photos: Mike

Mind Games on Flight of the Gull

Last Sunday morning a group of Adelaide Hills climbing regulars made the drive South down to the sea cliffs a Waitpinga. The main contingent headed straight for Cephalopod wall, however Greg and I decided to traverse over via a climb called "Flight of the Gull", on the adjacent Mollusc wall.

The traverse is about 110 metres long, on mostly natural gear, and goes at grade 17. Essentially, you climb West to East and stay an atmospheric 10 to 15 metres above the ocean below. The rock quality is pretty good for a sea cliff - smooth, slate like slabs with a few blobs and cracks for holds. Friction is good, however sandy sections, loose flakes and the odd crumbly hold keep things interesting.

We got slightly off route during the second pitch, and I ended up a little too high, at a rusty old bolt and home-made aluminium hanger. I backed it up with a sling around a broken flake - it wasn't what you would call a bombproof belay. When I pulled in the rope for Greg to come across, my last piece of gear, a large wire, popped out of the crack. So I was now hanging off a dodgy bolt and sling, with a 100kg bloke on the other end of the rope and no other protection for 20 metres. Not good.

When Greg got to the last decent runner on the pitch I shouted for him to stop. He ferried some more gear across to me, so that I could then climb on to a better belay. By this time, the waves crashing below me and the dodgy belay had really got my imagination and fear racing. I climbed on for another 5 meters or so to a decent crack system, plugged in a few wires and called out for Greg to come across. He continued past me to a shiny, new, hangerless bolt at another crack system.

At this point we had two options - another traverse appropriately called "Down to the Sea in Slips", or down-climb the crack, timing our exit between the waves crashing on the wet boulders below. It was more a choice of either risking a fall on a run-out slab or risking getting soaked down-climbing to the boulders.

We took the less potentially painful option, and managed to get off the climb with dry clothes, for a well earned lunch.


Greg at the first belay:

Downclimbing the exit crack:

Fun in the Grampians

I spent last weekend rock climbing in the Grampians. It was actually a bucks party for Brad. Funnily enough, we had all crashed out by 10:30pm on the Saturday night – wild dudes eh?

Here is a photo of Jon climbing Eat more Parsley in Summerday Valley. Below that is a video link showing me using my long reach to cruise the crux of Overkill.


Video Link:

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=6255991531353205133

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.

The Woodie

One bonus of working on a project in Whyalla was the accomodation. Instead of sharing a construction camp with a thousand other blokes, we were placed into local housing.

So after settling in to the routine here, I began a project of my own - a backyard woodie. It was based on the moon board. The angle of my woodie however is adjustable: it is fixed at the bottom with hinges, and connected with chains at the top. It was installed outside on a frame made from scaffold tubes.


We have had to move recently, and the woodie is now inside a "small" shed - check out the heinous change in angle!!!