1 • autumn 2012 • au/nz

#1 • AUTUMN 2012 • AU/NZ
Photo: Simon Carter
LEE COSSEY FIRST ASCENT OF SNEAKY
SNAKE IN THE GRAMPIANS, VICTORIA.
THENORTHFACE.COM.AU
PHOTO: KRISTOFFER ERICKSON
AUTUMN 2012
VISIT US ONLINE
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Disclaimer
Rockclimbing and other activities described in this magazine
can carry significant risk of injury or death. Undertake any rockclimbing or other
outdoors activity only with proper instruction, supervision, equipment and training.
The publisher and its servants and agents have taken all reasonable care to ensure
the accuracy of the information contained in this publication and the expertise of its
writers. Any reader attempting any of the activities described in this publication does
so at their own risk. Neither the publisher nor any of its servants or agents will be
held liable for any loss or injury or damage resulting from any attempt to perform
any of the activities described in this publication, nor be responsible for any person/s
becoming lost when following any of the guides or maps contained herewith.
Alldescriptive and visual directions are a general guide only and not to be used as
a sole source of information for navigation. Happy climbing.
Vertical Life is published quarterly
Winter / Spring / Summer / Autumn
Editorial correspondence
Unit 3, 5-7 Mooltan Street, Travancore, Victoria 3032
Telephone 0417 295 495
Founders Simon Madden + Ross Taylor + Patrick Kinsella
+ Chris Ord + Terry Wogan + Heidi & Peter Hibberd
Publishers Adventure Types
Unit 3, 5-7 Mooltan St, Travancore, Victoria 3032
AU Editors Simon Madden + Ross Taylor
[email protected]
NZ Editor Tom Hoyle [email protected]
Associate Editors Pat Kinsella + Chris Ord
Advertising Terry Wogan [email protected]
Design The Bird Collective
Heidi & Peter Hibberd [email protected]
PO Box 80, Sassafras, Vic 3787 www.thebirdcollective.com.au
Video Brett Williams www.sidetrip.com.au
China correspondent + Training Guru Duncan Brown
Senior contributors Steve Kelly, Andrea Hah, Michael Meadows
Contributing writers Simon Young, Rob Baker,
Daniel Lee, Matt Norgrove, Andy Lindblade
Coffee consultant John Szabo
Photography Heidi Hibberd, Simon Carter, Nick Fletcher,
Daniel Lee, Rob Baker, Simon Young, Matt Scholes,
James Morris, Chelsea Bruckhorst, Rich Crowder, Danny
Uhlmann, John Palmer, Josh Windsor, Andy Lindblade,
Rob Taylor, Robert Dun, John Szabo, Ross Taylor,
Eben Farnworth, Mayan Smith-Gobat, Beau Kahler, Tom Hoyle
Cover Photograph John Palmer
Proofer Chelsea Brunckhorst
Web consultant Asia Pacific Disaster Recovery Technology
Consultant Rookie of the Year, Mark Gould
General Dogsbody Glenn Tempest
Foundation Supporters
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Mountain Equipment www.mountainequipment.com.au
Scotty Dog Resoles www.scottydog.com.au
Sea to Summit www.seatosummit.com.au
Spelean www.spelean.com.au
The North Face www.thenorthface.com.au
5
CONTENTS
08. EDITORS’ NOTE Psych
10. FOLIO James Morris
14. COLUMN Andrea Hah
writes on Beginnings
18. FEATURE All Aboard the
Ship of Fools Simon Young’s
Pakistan adventure
32. FOLIO The Carter Files
Words, video and photos
from Simon Carter
38. HISTORY
Climbing for Climbing’s Sake
Michael Meadows
44. FEATURE Titan Free
Ross Taylor climbs
Mt Geryon in Tasmania
58. TOPO Take Your Vertical
Horizontal at the Cave of Man Hands
in the Grampians’ Victoria Range
86. FEATURE Finding
the Balance: Going Solo
on Mt Kenya Rob Baker
60. INTERVIEW
Mayan Smith-Gobat
92. COLUMN Steve Kelly asks
RAD BAD or Just Plain Sad
66. FEATURE From China
With Love, Petzl Roctrip 2011
Daniel Lee + Matt Norgrove
94. TRAINING Duncan Brown
shows you how to Get Your Strong On
74. FEATURE
China Uncovered
Liming with Duncan Brown
79. FOLIO John Palmer’s
New Zealand
100. NEW GEAR Bright Shiny Things
104. REVIEWS Books and films
107. REVIEWS Cafes and Climbing
82. FOLIO Nick Fletcher
108. INTERVIEW Get to the Point:
We interview the author of the new
Point Perp guide, Robert Dun
84. FOLIO Tom Hoyle
112. OBITUARY Athol Whimp
No, it’s not Middle Earth, although
it isn’t far off, being New Zealand;
James Field-Mitchell cutting
loose on Crag Vultures (31),
White Falls, Mt Ruapehu,
North Island of New Zealand.
Josh Windsor
6
7
PSYCHED
Psyched is a word climbers throw around all the time. Not that it is
exclusively climber lingo but we don’t hear a lot of footballers saying,
“Man, I was psyched to coathanger that guy, kick the goal then get
a pat on the arse from my teammates,” or tennis players exhorting,
“I was psyched to smash that forehand into Roger Federer’s smug
Swiss face.” Maybe it’s just the X-gamesification of modern climbing.
Or maybe it’s because climbing can be so confronting that you often
need to be supercharged to even leave the ground, particularly when
it’s hard or scary, and especially so when it’s both.
Psych, though, doesn’t just mean excited. In the climber’s
vernacular the word can operate as a substitute for motivation.
Whereas excited is like an acute state, motivation is a chronic one.
You have to be psyched to train all winter alone on a fingerboard in a
dank hole. You have to be psyched to drive four hours to your ‘local’
crag every weekend to feed your appetite for the vertical. You have
to be really psyched to suffer through the night bivvying on a big
mountain in the Karakoram. The drive to train, to push through pain
and terror and doubt, is one that burns deeply.
To anyone who’s sought to push their climbing beyond a modest
bumbly state, it’s obvious psych is as important as strength or
technique. We all know plenty of climbers who crank far harder
8
EDITOR’S LETTER
than more talented, stronger individuals purely because they are
supremely motivated. Understanding this thing motivation, however,
is hard and what motivates us can be opaque. It could be an aesthetic
line, the potential attentions of a beautiful girl or boy, fame, fortune
or fitness, the solitude of a remote area, the physical demands,
the mental engagement, the flag-planting of being the first or just
plain being the hardest. The pool of motivation is deep and broad.
This opacity allows us to easily lie to others about from where
we draw our motivations – climbers do that all the time.
Sometimes it’s not even a lie we tell others but an expression of
just how difficult it can be to describe the hunger to hang from
rocks. But lying to yourself is an entirely different, more difficult
matter, particularly when you are well out from your last piece of
questionable gear, gripped, pumped and alone. That’s generally
when we find out how powerful our psych truly is.
Even if you can recognise it and describe it, despairingly, psych
is often ephemeral. Desperately hard to hold on to, it’s buffeted
by the need to earn a dollar, blighted by injuries, undermined
by temptations and squeezed by the demands of Life. Often
this squeeze means we sate our hunger vicariously, devouring
magazines and books, scouring the web and drooling over videos.
Which brings us this, our new venture, Vertical Life. It takes a fair
whack of motivation to breathe life into a new mag, but we are psyched
on the stories that bind us climbers together and on the ways we
tell those stories. We are psyched on the possibilities an expanding
digital world opens up for us, both as producers and audiences.
The media is changing and it is 1s and 0s that are bringing about
these changes. We’re not sure what form the nascent and nebulous
digital media is going to take in the bright, beautiful future, nor how
we are going to develop from here, but we do know that we want in.
We want to explore the promises of new technologies. We want to
connect with climbers through sound and vision and words and tell
tall tales and true to entertain, engage and inform.
We are going to lift our eyes to our region and look towards the giant
with the giant possibilities, China, to the rest of Asia and to our bros
and sisters over the ditch in NZ. We think the climbing community
deserves media that knows it, is a part of it, that cheers at it successes, yells at its stupidity and spanks it on the arse when it is bad.
We want to live a life in the vertical.
And above all we want you to get your psych on.
­— Simon Madden + Ross Taylor, Editors
THANKS
Vertical Life would never have been born
without the graceful and generous support
of our contributors, featured climbers,
athletes, advertisers, designers, dirtbags,
videographers, advice-givers, hand-holders,
web gurus, belayers and Adventure Types.
Thank you, our debt is great and our capacity
to repay may fall short, but we love youse all.
CONTRIBUTING
Vertical Life is a home to many
voices, if you would like to be one
of those voices, be it expressed
in words, photography or video,
send us an email at:
AU [email protected]
NZ [email protected]
9
NZ FOLIO Image by James Morris
MATT
EVERHARD
10
ON THE CLASSIC CRIMP
PROBLEM, MONSTER
SOCIETY OF EVIL (V10),
FLOCK HILL, CASTLE HILL,
NEW ZEALAND.
11
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Click on Chris to watch the Sharma legacy
12
13
IN THE FIRST COLUMN
ON HER VERTICAL LIFE, ANDREA HAH
TELLS US HOW IT ALL BEGAN.
WORDS Andrea Hah IMAGES Nick Fletcher
A common question climbers ask each other is, “how did you start
climbing?” I am pretty confident that out on the field football players
don’t ask each other how they got into their first game because it
would often elicit the same response. Climbing is different. It used
to be such an obscure pastime, and is still relatively unheard of
in many circles, often misunderstood as merely a race to the top.
Climbing is so much more than that. Every person has a different
story, and gets something different out of it from the next person.
I often read about climbers claiming climbing is their life. They
live and breathe it and can’t imagine life without climbing. Is that
what it takes to be a good climber? Am I like that? I have my doubts.
Maybe it’s my age? Maybe not. But I feel like every year since leaving
university, there have been ‘big changes in the air’. Constantly at a
crossroad, I constantly have ideas as to what I should do with my time.
14
Everyone goes through the life phase where you lay the foundations
for where you want to be in the next year, through to the next 50
years. But I am constantly conflicted. Due to the ease of sharing
life experiences on the internet, I seem to be constantly coaxed into
joining the fun. Cool videos of bouldering in Font or the Rocklands.
Fun drunken pictures of friends at the Spring Racing Carnival.
Reports of some young punk kid onsighting 9a in Spain. Uni friends
working at the AIS. Friends buying houses. Travelling to Portugal,
Dubai.... you get the point. What do I do? Can I do it all?
I started gymnastics at the age of five. I was hooked. I did handstands in the lounge room. Forward rolls on the bed. Cartwheels in
the playground. I trained 34 hours a week when I was 15. I went
to school for four hours a day where I wasn’t allowed to play sports.
Instead, I went to the library to catch up on maths homework.
IMAGE August 1914 (29),
Centennial Glen, Blue Mountains.
ANDREA HAH 1 5
I ate salads and Vegemite for lunch. No butter. I was supervised for
‘weigh ins’ twice a day. Skin folds once a month. I went to a girls’
school. And blushed at the idea of a boy standing next to me on the
train. I was good at gymnastics. But the beauty of hindsight tells me
I was not the best I could be. I burnt out. I didn’t try as hard as I could.
I hurt my back and retired at the age of 16.
WHEN I GO CLIMBING,
IT’S MY THERAPY. IT BRINGS
MY HAPPINESS LEVEL UP TWO
NOTCHES, SOMETIMES MORE.
I QUESTION WHY I DO
IT ALL THE TIME AND THE
ANSWER IS ALWAYS THE SAME.
I LOVE IT.
The Victorian Institute of Gymnastics has a great relationship with
the VIS. Transfer of retired, burnt out, injured gymnasts to other
sports is highly encouraged. I had a great coach who wanted to help
me move on from all I knew. We thought about aerial skiing, Cirque
du Soleil, hurdling, trampolining, diving, but none took my fancy.
Finally, Mark got it right. He suggested rockclimbing. Why did he
think of such an obscure sport? I don’t know. He organised for me
to go to the local indoor gym and on day one I spotted a cute guy
climbing shirtless. And I’ve been hooked ever since. (I worry about
the youth of today – that same gym now has a ‘no shirts off policy’.)
I joined the junior climbing squad, and trained six hours a week. Easy.
I had a coach Taruna, who treated me like a proper person. He didn’t
yell at me if I fell. And he never made me cry. He is now one of my best
friends, and I smile as I sit on his bouldering pad while writing this.
The transition from gymnastics to indoor climbing felt quite
natural. I was fortunate enough to have the physical and mental
foundations of gymnastics – the body awareness, flexibility and
good power-to-weight ratio. I had the background of performing
under pressure – learning how to trust my body, and confidently
control irrational fear, turning it into the execution of movement.
Getting the job done. The unnatural process only came once I
started climbing outdoors. Camping and walking to the crag.
It’s amazing how many times I have rolled my ankles walking on
uneven trails. And how much I cringed at the idea of wiping my
spoon clean on my climbing pants. But, it seems I have adapted,
and now I don’t even notice myself doing it at home.
For me, part of the beauty of climbing, is that it is self-driven. I don’t
have anyone to report to if I don’t perform. If I don’t want to train or
participate in competitions, I don’t have to. If I want to eat chocolate,
I can. If there’s a party, I can drink alcohol and party all night long.
So, when I do train, it’s because I want to. When I go climbing,
it’s my therapy. It brings my happiness level up two notches,
sometimes more. I question why I do it all the time and the answer
is always the same. I love it. And that I can say this with more
certainty than I can about any of the other decisions I make every
day ingrains in me the knowledge I am doing the right thing. Each
and every time I tie in to my rope •
Andrea’s vertical life is sponsored by Black Diamond,
Cousin Trestec, Big John Climbing Equipment and Tenaya
IMAGE August 1914 (29),
Centennial Glen, Blue Mountains.
1 6 ANDREA HAH
17
SUCCESS, FAILURE AND SHITTING
THROUGH THE EYE OF A NEEDLE
IN PAKISTAN’S KARAKORUM.
SIMON YOUNG ON LIFE LESSONS
AND ATTEMPTING TO SAIL
THROUGH STORMS IN THE SHIP
OF FOOLS ON SHIPTON SPIRE.
AUTHOR Simon Young
IMAGES Simon Young and Matt Scholes
That phone conversation on a balmy summer’s night in the
safety of my backyard seems a lifetime ago. As I watch Matt
descend our wet, core-shot ropes I yearn to be sitting on that
warm, soft grass. Instead, I beat my hands together, desperate
to get some sensation back into them. Snow blows about us, my
mind jerks violently out of the daydream. Clipping into our only
two ropes, I start down the 18 pitches we had fought up over
the previous three days. My heart aches at the realisation that,
despite our best efforts, no summits would be reached.
I stepped onto Islamabad’s tarmac after a tiring day in transit,
greeted by a blast of hot air and an AK-47. Trying to look as
inconspicuous as a white tourist can, I waited patiently in line with
my passport at the ready. A small patch of ink marked my entry
into a country the Australian government recommends leaving.
A few weeks prior, a small volcano erupted in South America.
Like the flap of a butterfly’s wings, the spewed-out ash cloud had
global implications, grounding all planes and making me miss my
connection. I had to buy a new ticket. My schedule was shot.
When I did finally make it to the hotel lobby and allowed myself to
relax, a wave of exhaustion washed over me. I had finally caught
up to Matt, Jamie and Duncan, who were clearly frustrated at
having to wait an extra few days in Islamabad. After quickly eating
the first of many, many curries my head slammed onto the hard
pillow and sleep overtook me.
19
The next day we forced breakfast down, piled into our newly
acquired van and inched our way through the outskirts of the
city. Slowly the road rose higher into the hills and I stared at the
cannabis growing freely on both sides.
Everyone who knows a bit about Pakistan has heard about the
Karakoram Highway. This amazing engineering feat, running beside
the imposing Indus River, has a justified reputation for inducing
life-affirming moments. Every corner shows exactly how far you
would plummet to the river below if the driver lost control, knowledge
that is not helped by our driver hurling into every blind corner.
After two long, frightening days of driving, the steep sides of the
gorge eased off, giving way to the silt plains on the outskirts of
Skardu. Large, snow-capped peaks started to take over the skyline.
We tucked into a memorable curry for dinner with the gusto of the
newly arrived and not yet sick of curries, gladly sharing dinner with
our new guide and friend, Aishaq (pronounced ee-sok). The locals
were happy to see us passing through when they found out we were
climbers, even more so when they realised we weren’t Americans.
The next day we sat through our briefing at the tourism office.
It wasn’t very brief, and the officials barely said a word.
Instead, piles of paperwork required signatures from Jamie,
our expedition leader. After besting the almost-insurmountable
bureaucracy, we squeezed all our gear into the jeep that
would take us to our trailhead, deep in the mountains.
Askole is the end of the road. It’s the gateway to the Baltoro
Glacier, home to some of the world’s hardest 8000m giants.
Arriving, we scoffed a dinner of, yes, curry and crashed headlong
into our beds, minds swimming with what was to come.
While I never saw an espresso machine in northern Pakistan, I’m
convinced the porters must drink a lot of coffee. From the word
go they were desperate to get a share of the work and with more
porters than loads, it was up to our sirdar to organise the chaos as
we made final preparations. Knowing the midday sun would beat
down hard, we started walking early.
In camp that night, porter after porter visited the newly appointed
‘Dr’ Jamie, asking for various drugs or dressings. Having watched
the porters toil all day without complaint was truly humbling.
They carried heavy loads on crude, homemade frames, often in
little more than sandals, enduring silently while tourists struggled
under the burden of a water bottle clipped to their belts.
The second day of the walk saw most of us shitting through the eye
of a needle. My stomach was turning at the sight of food and
nausea stopped me eating anything. When the going gets tough,
the weak turn up their iPod and trudge on.
21
The next day my stomach had settled a bit and I ripped off the top
of the Nutella jar and grabbed the nearest chapatti. My frail body
needed any kind of breakfast; I could already feel kilos dropping
away. Forget Jenny Craig and the Atkins diet. Stomach bugs, a
little altitude, and all-day walking with a splash too much sun
equals the most effective rapid weight loss formula.
We weaved up the glacier, vast walls of granite rocketing into the
thin air beside us. Great Trango’s mighty profile saw us struck
motionless with jaws agape. Nameless Tower came into view next
as we slowly picked our way up the valley, eyes moving from one
imposing peak to the next even more impressive one.
Blasting up the last moraine wall we were greeted by the lush,
grassy meadow that would be our home for the next four weeks.
I looked out across the landscape and caught my first look at a
huge granite wall only a few kilometres away. It rose some 1300m
out of the glacier. With my breath literally taken away by the
altitude, I mouthed two words:
THEY GOT IN A GOOD NIGHT’S
SLEEP BEFORE A BIG-WALL
CLIMB IS EITHER LYING OR INSANE.”
–Old climber’s saying
“SHIPTON SPIRE...”
As we settled into our new home I still felt sick, weak, and unable
to eat much. Using our satphone we got a forecast for good weather.
I put my faith in a concoction of pills from my expedition bag and
was stoked to soon be going camping on a big cliff.
“Anybody who says they got in a good night’s sleep before a
big-wall climb is either lying or insane.” – Old climber’s saying.
Naked ambition drove us out of our sleeping bags early. We drank
our first brew long before sunrise and crossed the intimidating
glacier for the first time. We picked our way gingerly through a
maze of debris and ice, often hitting dead ends that forced retreat.
Soon the sun revealed our first close-up glimpse of the face. It
was much more featured than our tiny topo photo suggested.
Right on cue we heard the whirr of falling rock, a sound that
instantly terrifies. We ducked for cover as the missile exploded like
a mortar onto the scree field, thankfully some distance away.
We delicately made our way through the last of the cut-up glacier.
All the while, loosened stones crashed about the base of the
wall. Soon we found ourselves at the foot of the long scree gully
leading to the base of our route. The scree was so pulverised it
more closely resembled kitty litter.
Having not been an inch above basecamp, we slogged our guts
out and felt fully how unacclimatised we were. Standing breathless
at the base of our route, Ship of Fools (VI 5.11/22 A2 WI6 1300m),
we racked up, packed freshly collected melt-water and tried to
piece together where the line went from the small topo and an
article describing the first ascent.
22
23
I headed up the first pitch, making a grand total of 10m before
pulling on a cam to pass a wet section. The rope went tight as I
reached a belay at a loose, scaly ledge. Matt battled his way up,
jugging the lead rope with a heavy backpack. As we would soon
find out, seconding with the pack was often more physical than
leading. Hauling also proved a nightmare; the bag kept getting
stuck on loose, flaky shards that stuck out everywhere.
As we were hauling the second pitch I heard a terrifying sound.
A cascade of ice crashed off the walls all around us and as the ruckus
subsided we each yelled out to make sure the other was okay. Matt
made his way to the belay, nerves frayed and a cricket-ball-sized dent
in his helmet. There was also a gnarly core-shot in our haul line.
As the day drew to an end, Matt cheekily ran up the next pitch,
fixing a rope to save time for the following day. The ledge
required some intricate landscaping in search of something
approximating flat ground and we settled in for the night without
setting up the tent. The forecast was for a fine night, and it
couldn’t be wrong, could it?
As we felt the first few drops of rain, the decision came back
to bite us. Too late to stay dry, we ducked into the tent as the
rain turned to snow.
24
Dawn woke us to the realisation of snow setting in. To be
successful, our plan to climb the giant peak with so little gear
needed the weather to be perfect. It wasn’t. We made the hard
decision to get out of Dodge.
A few hours later some slightly soggy monkeys (us) made it back
to basecamp. To our amazement Jamie and Duncan were still
on their chosen line on the Cats Ear Spire. We pulled out the
binoculars and watched them putting in a huge effort moving
slowly over wet rock through the wind and rain.
They finally conceded to the elements a few days later and joined us
in going insane in basecamp, passing time reading books, talking
shit and smoking hash, which mostly kept dark thoughts at bay.
The hunger to be up high burnt deep and having sat about idly for too
long, we were bursting with energy. Finally a weather window came.
Matt and I packed for Shipton Spire, Jamie and Duncan headed for
the classic Nameless Tower crack Eternal Flame (Vll 5.13a/28).
Once again we racked up below the granite expanse. After reclimbing the first four pitches we came to a crossroads; a piton
drew us out right, but the ground to the left looked easier.
Matt followed his nose left, barely making the belay with all 60m of
rope out. I gingerly jugged past some massive loose flakes, the odd
trundle thrown in for good measure.
Matt had found a bolted belay but the bolts differed from those we
had previously passed and we figured we were now on another route.
We followed our noses upwards, hoping to find Fantasy Island, a
prominent ledge. The odd piece of fixed gear let us know others had
taken these vertical paths before us.
We continued blindly following a large crack system, without any
kind of topo or guide and soon stumbled onto what could only have
been the hoped for Fantasy Island. Cursing the lack of a portaledge,
we again hacked into dirt and rock to fashion a bed for the night.
Meal times are definitely my favourite part of big-wall climbing.
Even a freeze-dried meal is something to savour in the midst
of exhaustion. Lying back with our feet up, we stared as clouds
danced through an amazing sunset, lighting up the magnificent
26
peaks and rock towers that rose up to ring the glacier. Small
birds flitted on the wind, chirping goodnight. We settled
contentedly into our two-man sleeping bag, having caught a
glimpse of the beauty in adventure we had set out to capture.
Waking to our second day, Matt fished out the precious coffee,
a gift from my friends at rad Hobart cafe Yellow Bernard. Half a
litre each saw us charging and, besting the mandatory big-wall
clusterfuck, we were soon ready to climb. A beautiful, golden
granite splitter loomed above but it wasn’t long before I was
pulling on gear, just wanting to get up this thing as fast as
possible. A full 60m pitch had me at the belay.
Matt snuck a peek up the next pitch as I passed him the rack. An
iced-up chimney with a fixed rope frozen into place. Big-wall trash.
Pulling on whatever was available, he made his way up. Soon I
was jugging the pitch behind him, slip-sliding on the ice. Another
few pitches and we could nearly see the day’s goal – the Notch.
Jamming a splitter crack, Matt made his way onto a blank-looking
face. Finding multiple dead ends he was forced to make some wild
pendulums leftwards to link up with another crack. Digging his
way up the overgrown crack, he fought to find a belay. To free up
enough rope I had to untie, clamp an ascender to the very end and
extend it with some slings while top-stepping the highest piece of
the belay. With the night looming we turned tail and headed back
down to our gear on the ledge below. We had hoped to reach the
Notch that day, but ended still four pitches shy.
The next morning glorious weather welcomed us and suitably
caffeinated we quickly regained our high point, where Matt set off
into uncharted waters. (We would find out on the way down we had
actually missed the turn-off for our intended route, and probably
climbed some new pitches – explaining all the loose rock!)
We now had only a couple of low-angled pitches to the Notch and
Matt sprinted up, this time leading with the second’s pack.
The terrain meant we couldn’t haul, so I climbed with the haul
bag on my bag. Sucking hard for air I fought up the grade-12
slab in mountain boots, working harder than I ever had before
and only just staying on. Getting to the Notch was my reward.
We stared up at the ridge riding the skyline above; it was a route
of a completely different character, it was an alpine thing.
We stopped to catch our breath, put on a brew and chopped
a camping ledge into solid ice. Feeling free and light at not
having to bring all the big-wall baggage, I struck out in the late
afternoon and found easy crack systems. Floating up them,
I suddenly hit my stride. Looking about at the abundant beauty
I found a peaceful happiness. This feeling is exactly why we
go on these journeys, to escape the mundane. My sense of
mastery of the moment was overwhelmingly cool. I hammered
home a belay and made my way back to our temporary home,
happy as can be.
27
Happiness makes optimists of us all. I looked around at the cirrus
clouds, and still more forming, thinking, “It’ll be fine, it’s just
a few clouds about the valley”. We packed our bags for the next
day’s summit push. In 24 hours, we’d hopefully return to this
ledge having been to the top.
However, the best laid schemes o’ mice and monkeys…
We were woken by wind and rain. Well, not really woken as the
cold, cramped ledge wasn’t conducive to anything other than fitful
slumber. Listening to the weather we knew we should have seen
it coming. Optimism is no substitute for reason. We had shivered
through the night, praying to any god that would listen for it to
clear by morning.
Our splatter gun of prayers went unanswered and in the damp
morning we looked through our meagre rations – one day’s food
left – and considered options. After a few hours tiptoeing around
the obvious, we decided to head down. Experience had shown
the system would stay around for days, at least, leaving the ridge
in a dangerous condition.
Matt retrieved our fixed line and we started retreating down the
18 pitches that had led us to the Notch. Cold, wet and tired, we
paid extra care to our ropes, one having a nick at halfway, and
the other a big core-shot. Slowly we made our way back down.
Walking across the glacier through the rain we cast our minds over
the last few days. With a small amount of gear we had made good
ground on a Karakorum big wall. We were both content, knowing we
wouldn’t have done anything differently.
Still, the next few weeks saw us moping about basecamp. A short
window allowed one mad dash up a massive snow gully towards
Trango II. We climbed all night under a full moon, without
headtorches or ropes. We moved quickly upwards, all of us in
a quiet, reflective mood. Again, we did what it seems I do best:
nearly made the summit before turning back a stone’s throw
from the top. Still, it was an amazing 24 hours, climbing 2000m
to look across the biggest mountain range in the world.
And soon we were walking out. A few days playing tourist and we
were on a plane home. Most would call the trip a failure, in that
we didn’t stand atop any piles of dirt. My time in the mountains
though has allowed a great perspective on the things that truly
matter. Memories may fade but new found perspectives remain;
like the outlook of a rich westerner with too many “things”,
confronted by raw poverty that rams home the only things that
really matter in this life: relationships and experiences •
“This is your life, and it’s ending one minute at a time.”
– Tyler Durden, Fight Club
29
REACTIVE
LIGHTING
CONSTANT
LIGHTING
DECLINING
LIGHTING
ECLAIRAGE
AUTOADAPTABLE
ECLAIRAGE
CONSTANT
ECLAIRAGE
DÉCROISSANT
Facebook.
com/Petzl
TECHNICAL GEAR AND LIGHTING FOR ALL YOUR OUTDOOR ADVENTURES
www.petzl.com.au
www.spelean.com.au for stockists
30
ELIOS
REACTIVE
LIGHTING
CONSTANT
LIGHTING
DECLINING
LIGHTING
ECLAIRAGE
AUTOADAPTABLE
ECLAIRAGE
CONSTANT
ECLAIRAGE
DÉCROISSANT
REVERSO 4
HIRUNDOS
GRI GRI
31
The second to last pitch of the Spigolo Wiessner on the Sass d’Ortiga. Dolomites, Italia. ©Jocelyn Chavy
FOLIO Images by Simon Carter
SIMON CARTER needs no introduction,
he is simply Australia’s best climbing
photographer. Here is a selection of some
of his finest recent images along with a
description of the process of taking them,
as well a short video where he talks about
the art of climbing photography.
Crystal Davis on the vertiginous line of El Matador (5.10d/21),
Devils Tower, Wyoming, USA.. Nikon D3s with 14-24mm f2.8 lens
@ 14mm, aperture priority, 1/400 sec @ f9, ISO 400.
The first time I photographed this route was back in 2003 for
The North Face. I was happy with that shot – and considering we
snuck it in, in a ten minute blast of light squeezed in between a
hailstorm and sunset, I was actually pretty stoked. But the Devils
32
Tower’s geometry is so striking it left me wondering – could there be
a better way to show it? The answer was obvious – get the camera
further out from the cliff. But how? I had the image that I wanted in
my mind for years, and I mulled over the problem from time to time.
In 2006 I returned to Devils Tower but there was no chance to shoot
due to big snowstorms. Still, just staring at the Tower again got me
psyched to try to figure out the problem. So I bought some bits and
pieces from a camera shop in Boulder and got a painter’s pole, and
later on that trip (at Red River Gorge) played with ways to rig it all –
and to get the camera to hang down below the pole (so it wasn’t just
shooting straight down). I got some results then too – though I had
to guess what the camera was seeing as I was shooting on film back
then. It was four years before I was able to return to Devils Tower
but by then I had refined the system and was shooting digital – and
had a video feed running from the camera to a little monitor so that I
could see the composition. For this shot I was able to get the camera
about eight metres out from the cliff. I was really stoked this time!
Garry Phillips on pitch two of his mega
new route Live the Life (pitches are
21,28,27,27,26 and 25) at Lake Huntley,
Tyndall Range in western Tasmania, Australia.
Nikon D3s with 14-24mm f2.8 lens @ 14mm,
manual mode, 1/500 sec @ f8, ISO 200.
Matt Norgrove on Mr Line (32), Diamond
Falls, Blue Mountains, Australia.
Nikon D3s with 70-200mm f2.8 lens @ 130mm,
manual mode, 1/400 sec @ f3.2, ISO 500.
34
I wanted a clean action shot from this shoot,
so we waited for a cloudy afternoon to
eliminate horrible harsh shadows. Then I
abseiled in a fair way to the left so I could use
a longish lens with a wide aperture to throw
the background out of focus and isolate Matt.
After tensioning myself off a bolt to stop
myself swinging around in space, it was just a
matter of nailing the focus and blasting away at
full 9fps when Matt was going for it.
FOLIO Images by Simon Carter 3 5
RIGHT Monique Forestier leading pitch nine of the Punta
Delle Cinque Dita Traverse (Five Finger Towers), UIAA
grade IV, 205m to the “Thumb” (the entire traverse is 600m),
in the Sassolungo group, Dolomites, Italy. Nikon D3 with
85mm f 1.4 lens, manual mode, 1/6400 sec @ f4.5, ISO 200.
The aim was to shoot some of the moderate classic alpine
rock routes in the Dolomites for a new book and a Rock and Ice
assignment. We met two super-competent American climbers, Rico
Miledi and Dave Russell, who kindly offered to show us around and
help out. The ‘moderate classics’ can get crowded so we were first
in line when the Sassolungo Gondola started up in the morning.
We raced to the start of the route and climbed in two parties of two.
A guide who had probably done it 100 times, and his client, were
chomping at our heels. We ran some pitches together – luckily Rico
and Dave had done it before – so that helped speed things along. It
wasn’t until I was following the ninth pitch that I saw the first good
photo opp. Rico was my rope gun, he locked me off and I just sat
back on the rope. My camera kit was trimmed to the minimum; lens
selection was simple. Monique was leading this one, it was pretty runout and the rock wasn’t great, she was 14 weeks pregnant (this was
her last lead for a while) and so I wasn’t going ask her to pose around.
So I just lined things up, worked the shadow into my composition
as best I could, and made sure I tracked the focus as she climbed
through. Getting off is involved but we were back in the Sella Pass
Refugio before the inevitable afternoon storm. Man, that refugio’s
three-course dinner was out of this world!”
WATCH
SIMON CARTER
INTERVIEW
VIDEO Brett Williams
ABOVE Brittany Griffith on Mr Clean
(5.11a/22), one of the immaculate
lines on Devils Tower, Wyoming, USA
36
FOLIO Images by Simon Carter 3 7
A HISTORY OF CLIMBING IN AUSTRALIA
WHEN DID CLIMBING IN AUSTRALIA
REALLY BEGIN? MICHAEL MEADOWS
FILTERS THROUGH THE HISTORIC
RECORD TO EXAMINES THE OPTIONS.
WORDS Michael Meadows
IMAGES Bert Salmon Collection / Cliff and Lexie Wilson collection
One fine March morning in 1910, a 23-year-old driver for the Royal
Australian Artillery, Henry Mikalsen, scrambled onto the virgin
summit of the 380m volcanic spire, Coonowrin or Crookneck, in the
Glass House Mountains north of Brisbane and made Australian
climbing history. It took him three hours to climb through the maze
of shrubbery, loose boulders and cliffs that make up the vertical and
sometimes overhanging north face of the mountain. Mikalsen lived
with his family on a farm in the shadow of the towering and imposing
trachyte peak. He climbed it alone and with no rope to assist him.
While in climbing terms it was a significant accomplishment, it
took four months for his achievement to be reported in the local
newspaper, the Brisbane Courier. Regardless, this single event
was a catalyst that, a little more than a decade later, influenced the
formation of the first organised rockclimbing activity in Australia.
3 8 THE HISTORY COLUMN
Three decades before Mikalsen’s achievement, Scottish-born
explorer William Landsborough acknowledged that rockclimbing
as a sport in Australia was lagging well behind its British
antecedent. He observed shortly before his death in 1886 that
if Crookneck was in England, “it would have been climbed a
dozen times”. It was an accurate assessment as in the 1880s
rockclimbing had been simultaneously born both in England’s
Lake District and the German Alps. Nevertheless, the ‘spiritual
father’ of the Queensland-based rockclimbing movement –
the enigmatic Albert “Bert” Armitage Salmon – persistently
acknowledged Mikalsen’s feat as the birth of modern Australian
climbing, with good reason: Crookneck was the last significant
unclimbed summit in the region because it was quite simply the
most difficult and dangerous.
Queenslander George Fraser
traverses into the Boar’s Jaws,
Narrowneck 1934.
Bert Salmon Collection.
39
“THE PHYSICAL DENIGRATION OF
PLACES BY CLIMBERS HAS BECOME AN
ENVIRONMENTAL ISSUE IN MOST STATES,
WITH INCREASING SCRUTINY OF BOLT
PLACEMENT, FOR EXAMPLE, IN NATIONAL
PARKS. KNOWLEDGE OF THIS KIND
OF ACTIVITY DOES LITTLE TO APPEASE
LOCAL INDIGENOUS GROUPS WITH
CUSTODIANSHIP OF PLACES THAT CLIMBERS
FREQUENT. THESE TENSIONS ARE REAL
AND WE MUST ACKNOWLEDGE THEM.”
There is another name that needs to be included here alongside
Mikalsen’s, that of Australia’s first mountaineer: Emmaline Freda du
Faur. Nine months after Mikalsen’s ascent of Crookneck, she became
the first Australian – and the first woman – to climb Aoraki–Mt Cook
in the New Zealand Alps. Freda du Faur, as she was known, excelled
as a rockclimber, honing her skills on the rambling sandstone
outcrops near her home in what is now Sydney’s Ku-ring-gai National
Park. She was 28 when she stood on the highest summit in New
Zealand with the two New Zealand brothers who had become her
regular climbing partners, Peter and Alex Graham.
For Europeans, the idea of climbing is a significant but relatively
recent element in a history of a fascination with mountains, as
Robert MacFarlane so eloquently describes it in his excellent book,
Mountains of the Mind. Similarly all features of the Australian
landscape, including high places, were inscribed into Indigenous
cosmology for millennia before European invasion but, sadly, much
of this knowledge has been lost. It does though seem highly likely
Indigenous people had climbed many, perhaps all, of the soughtafter summits across the country, generations before Europeans
began to contemplate the activity we now know as climbing.
There had been other European climbing activity in Australia
well before the historic ascents by Mikalsen and du Faur in 1910,
but it was sporadic and largely confined to isolated instances of
individual activity, usually associated with a motive other than
climbing for the sake of it. Exploration and scientific endeavour
essentially dominated the desire to reach the colonial summits:
William Hovell and Hamilton Hume reached the Mount Buffalo
plateau in 1824 with the Mansfield brothers venturing into
the Victorian Alps 25 years later. Rockclimbing was far from
the intentions of these early explorers. In 1828 the brutal
commandant of the Moreton Bay penal settlement, Patrick
Logan, made his mark by recording the first European ascent of
Mount Barney, one of the most spectacular mountains on the
Australian mainland. He climbed the 1351m East Peak up the
ridge that now bears his name, casting off his boots and socks to
make the final steep and exposed 200m scramble to the summit
alone, leaving his companions – botanists Allan Cunningham
and Charles Fraser – languishing on the ridge below. It was
the highest known mountain in Australia at the time and yet
Logan’s achievement was reduced to a footnote – in which he
was unnamed – in Cunningham’s report on the expedition to
the Royal Society in London four years later. It remained the
colony’s highest peak until 1834 when most probably scientist
Dr J Lhotsky strolled to the summit of Mount Kosciuszko in the
Australian Alps. The imposing 1177m rhyolite mass of Mount
Lindesay on the Queensland–New South Wales border became
another lodestone for would-be climbers with the first European
ascent in the mid- to late-1940s. This was preceded by local
stories of Aboriginal people climbing the towering cliffs using
the vines that hung from the rainforest-clad verandas above.
The vines were reputedly destroyed by a huge bushfire in the late
1940s, but more on that in a future column.
There are varied accounts of traditional Indigenous peoples,
both here in Australia and around the world, climbing mountains –
most commonly because high places were accorded powerful
religious or spiritual significance. And because mountains were
part of Indigenous cosmology, reasons for climbing them had
to be justified in these terms. In effect, it was and remains for
many, a parallel universe where the meaning of what we see
now as everyday events – climbing, for example – is interpreted
very differently. It is why the Anangu, for example, request people
not to climb Uluru in central Australia and why other Indigenous
clan groups make similar pleas for respect of local traditions at
significant places in other parts of Australia.
As the invaders, we imposed our own perceptions of place on the
landscape and in most cases, this overrode pre-existing traditional
frameworks. Whatever we think about this, the simple fact is we
cannot go back to the way it was; but it does not mean we should
ignore the impact of our presence on the landscape in both physical
and spiritual terms. The physical denigration of places by climbers
has become an environmental issue in most states, with increasing
scrutiny of bolt placement, for example, in national parks. Knowledge
of this kind of activity does little to appease local Indigenous groups
with custodianship of places that climbers frequent. These tensions
are real and we must acknowledge them. Perhaps it boils down
to a simple question of respect and an acknowledgement that
White Europeans did not take the first steps on this continent.
But it remains a task for others more qualified than I to write
a history of Indigenous perceptions of place. My focus is elsewhere.
4 0 THE HISTORY COLUMN
TOP Henry Mikalsen following his first
ascent of Crookneck in 1910 / Published in Thomas
Welsby, Discoverers of Moreton Bay, Brisbane, 1913
LEFT Bert Salmon soloing the steep and loose
BOTTOM Brisbane Courier, 1910
Bert Salmon Collection.
North Face of Crookneck in the Glass House Mountains.
41
The first Australian climbing movements – informal groups of
friends who set out to make what were the hardest ascents of
the day for the sake of climbing alone – emerged a few years
apart, first in southeast Queensland in 1923 and subsequently a
few years later in the Blue Mountains, west of Sydney. Evidence
suggests the Queensland-based cohort, centred around Bert
Salmon, attracted not only young men but, significantly, women.
In fact, on some occasions, female climbers outnumbered their
male counterparts. Interestingly, it is only now that the proportion
of females engaged in rockclimbing is approaching that mark
again. The emergence of influential female role models like
American Coral Bowman and the home-grown Louise Shepherd
have encouraged more Australian women to see climbing as not
merely the preserve of ageing men wearing ‘baggy pants and
hobbers’, as the enigmatic, eloquent and influential John Ewbank
once described the ‘old guard’ of the Sydney Rockclimbing Club.
The popularity of rockclimbing in Australia spread slowly after
World War II and more often than not, climbers emerged from
the ranks of bushwalking clubs. It was not until the mid- to
late-1960s that influences from the UK and California’s Yosemite
would change rockclimbing here forever.
While the aim of my contributions through this regular column
will be to focus on a history of the European – and particularly
Australian – ‘invention’ of rockclimbing as a sport, pastime,
recreation, vocation, however it is conceived, I think it is
important to consider our achievements in context. There is a
rich tradition behind the façade of modern day climbing and
I plan to delve into this in future writings. I should say from
the outset that some of you will undoubtedly take issue with
inadvertent (or ill-informed) errors I will make and I welcome
any feedback that will help to put the record straight – after all
history is not an exact science by any measure. The extensive
information relating to Australian climbing history I and others
have gathered over the past decade-and-a-half has come
primarily from archival collections (private photographs, diaries,
manuscripts and newspaper cuttings), existing published works
and interviews. Some of this material has been given a brief
airing on my blog, The Living Rock, ( http://climbinghistoryoz.
blogspot.com.au) which is a precursor to a book I hope to soon
publish on this topic. This column will offer an opportunity to
delve into some of the earliest known accounts of climbing
in Australia. The protagonists may not have had a shiny new
rack of cams and chocks but they paved the way for the tens of
thousands of us around Australia who call ourselves climbers.
BLACK
BLACK DIAMOND
DIAMOND
ATHLETE
ATHLETE BEN
BEN COSSEY
COSSEY
ANDREA HAH
MR LINE 32
BLUE MOUNTAINS NSW
I am delighted to be involved in this exciting new publication
and look forward to sharing some of the wonderful stories of
influential people and events with you in upcoming issues.
I congratulate all involved in the venture as it can only serve to
make us more aware of our own rich, rockclimbing heritage •
[email protected]
proudly supported by
Climbing for the camera…A typical group
of Queensland climbers in action for
Cinesound News on Tibrogargan in the
Glass House Mountains near Brisbane in 1934.
4 2 THE HISTORY COLUMN
Cliff and Lexie Wilson collection.
43
TITAN
FREE
TWO BROTHERS
RETRACE THEIR
FATHER’S FOOTSTEPS
44 YEARS AFTER
HIS FIRST ASCENT
OF TITAN ON
GERYON’S EAST FACE
AUTHOR Ross Taylor
IMAGES Historic images Rob Taylor
All other images by the Author
It is 1968, the dying days of a Tasmanian summer.
My father, Rob Taylor, and his climbing partner, Roland
Pauligk, maker of the legendary brass wires RPs, stand
beneath the vast dolerite spine of Mt Geryon in the
dominion of Gods, Tasmania’s Cradle Mountain – Lake St
Clair National Park. Rising more than 300m above them is
the powerful crack and corner system they intend to climb.
By today’s standards their climbing gear is antiquated:
wooden chocks tied off with cord, mild-steel pitons,
4 4 IMAGE The shadow silhouette of Mount Geryon.
hexes cut from steel bar, a hand-drill, hammer and bolts
and a selection of Roland’s heavy handmade stainless
steel pitons. They are clad in the rough gear of the era:
woollen jumpers, flannelette shirts, hard-soled EBs
and heavy climbing helmets – they wear no harnesses,
instead they tie the end of the rope around their waists.
But the spirit of adventure is strong in them,
and they leave the ground at 9am, heading boldly
into the unknown.
45
TOP LEFT Lachy on the summit of Foresight.
MIDDLE LEFT Roland on the historic
sixth pitch,44 years earlier.
BOTTOM The second abseil
off the gully below the Foresight.
Moss falls in my eyes. I rip out a small leafy plant getting in the
way of a good jam, and stuff my taped-up hands deep into the
recesses of the crack. It bites in the good way you want when
you are desperate, but at the same time you know will hurt later.
Above me the crack stretches towards a wide off-width roof
liberally covered with black moss; chockstones wedged in the
back like rotten, uneven teeth in a savage vertical smirk. Giant
cams pull at my waist, the daypack on my back filled with water
adding its own awkward weight.
How did I end up here? Good question.
Sometimes history has its own weight, tugging at your sleeve
incessantly until you can no longer ignore it. Forty-four years ago
my dad and Roland climbed a new route on Geryon called Titan,
a proud, intimidating line on the vast, 300m-high East Face which
goes to the top of the Foresight, a pillar of rock that sits between
the North and South summits of Geryon. But they left a little
unfinished business. In the style of the day, where just getting to
the top was the main thing, they used aid on six of the 13 pitches,
grading it 17A3 – a grade that suggested it would require some
hard climbing to free it.
I had always carried a vague plan to try and free Titan, one day.
But life is often unforgiving of vague plans. Plus the description
in Chris Baxter’s mini-guide to Geryon didn’t make it sound exactly
alluring: “This (probably) unrepeated scrubby monster was a
big effort for the day, but could well go free to an off-width king.”
I am mainly a soft sportclimber that steers well clear of cracks,
particularly the scrubby kind, and I am definitely no off-width king,
unless the title is given to the monarch of avoiding them.
But really it started with a phone call from my brother Lachy.
“Hey mate, you coming down to Tassie at all this summer?”
46
(Lachy lives in Hobart.)
I’m keen to, what do you have in mind?”
“What about freeing Titan?”
Like many decisions where you don’t know exactly what is
involved, it was easy to make.
“Sure.”
And so it began. But the story was a little more complex than that.
As it turned out, we had a little competition to free Titan – that
nasty description hadn’t put everyone off.
Tasmania is full of strange, twisted characters who are into
all kinds of perverse pleasures, including off-widths, and one
man with more than an unnatural taste for them is ‘Crazy John’
Fischer, or CJ, as everyone calls him. CJ had been into Geryon
to try Titan not once, but twice. During the first trip with Deano
Rollins the two of them spent five days at the Geryon Campsite
(which is in the damp, sunless valley below the West Face) waiting
for the rain to stop (it didn’t), living on a diet of Mi Goreng noodles
and playing endless hands of spades. On the second trip CJ had
good weather, but his partner, in CJ’s words, “Shat himself,” so
they ended up doing nothing.
And so Titan remained un-freed.
But, CJ had plans to return – and he really is an off-width king,
having repeated many of the hardest in Tassie (indeed, run laps
on them). At the same time Lachy and I made our plans and
hoped we could at least convince CJ to hold off and join us as
the rope gun on our attempt. My brother was the conduit in this
conversation between the three of us, and duly reported that
CJ had made plans to go back into Geryon on the Australia Day
weekend, this time with his girlfriend Anna. But, as if cursed,
when Australia Day weekend came Anna pulled out, exhausted
from work. And so CJ planned to come in with us in late February.
47
It was a fine and sunny day when the Lake St Clair ferry dropped my
brother and I at Narcissus, from where we had a six-or seven-hour walk
up to the bivvy cave at the foot of the East Face of Mt Geryon. Despite our
heavy packs, full with food and climbing gear, we were feeling fit and
strong, having just come off an eight-day walk to Precipitous Bluff on the
South Coast of Tassie, where we had climbed a new route.
Sadly, we were not blessed with a rope gun. CJ had pulled the pin at the
last moment because he was a lettuce-packing piker (he’d been offered
a week’s work packing lettuces). We were going to have to tackle those
off-widths on our own.
We walked the nine kilometres to Pine Valley Hut quickly. On the way my
brother’s phone beeped a message – from CJ. He had packed in the lettuce
packing and was coming to join us the afternoon of the following day.
As he said at the end of the message, “Fuck yeah!” It did leave us with a
dilemma though, we only had two climbing days and if it was good the
next day we didn’t want to waste it waiting for CJ. We decided if the weather
was good, we would go for it, if not, CJ could join us the following day.
It took us another hour from Pine Valley Hut to the Geryon Campsite,
where we filled up with ten litres of water because we were uncertain
about the water situation at the bivvy. Although Roland had told us
about a small spring nearby, it had been a dry summer. Our packs
felt considerably heavier as we climbed the steep scree slope below
the West Face of Geryon, then traversed across to the saddle between
Geryon and the Acropolis, before traversing back below the East Face.
Under the East Face we stopped to find the line of Titan.
Although the face looked foreshortened from the ground – like it was
150m instead of 350m – the crack looked wide and intimidating.
I HAD ALWAYS
CARRIED A VAGUE
PLAN TO TRY
AND FREE TITAN,
ONE DAY. BUT
LIFE IS OFTEN
UNFORGIVING
OF VAGUE PLANS.
We headed on to the bivvy, eager to check it out. Almost 44 years ago
exactly, our father had come here with Roland and a bunch of others,
including my mother, who had endured part of her honeymoon in this
cave. Not only had my dad lost his wedding ring doing a new route on
the West Face of Geryon, but mum and dad had gotten benighted on the
South Peak of Geryon with another couple, the four of them sharing a
very windy, sleepless night with only a space blanket to keep them warm.
How my dad managed to get my mum to spend her honeymoon this way
(and how they are still married), I will never know.
The bivvy cave was smaller than we imagined, about a metre and half deep.
But some history still remained; Roland called the bivvy ‘Heim’, German for
home, and had made a small wooden plaque with the name carved out on
it – it still hung from the roof of the cave from two rusty old pitons. There
were also some old abandoned tins in the back and a broken helmet.
We made ourselves comfortable in the two flattest spots available, then
went to find water. It was just where Roland said it would be, a crystal-clear
spring of freezing water. With its incredible view out to the cirque below the
DuCane Range, Heim seemed like the most magical spot to spend time.
That night we set the alarm for a pre-dawn start – Titan was 350m
long, we would need all the time we could get to make it up and then
negotiate the long descent off.
48
ABOVE A pensive breakfast at the base of the route.
49
RIGHT Lachy seconding
the tricky and
exposed 12th pitch.
“Beep, beep, beep...” The alarm dragged me from deep sleep. It
was dark and cold and there was thick cloud scudding through
the Acropolis–Geryon saddle at high speed. I didn’t stir from the
warmth of my sleeping bag, and when Lachy asked if we should
get up, I said, “Give it another half an hour...”
It wasn’t looking any better half an hour later either when we
dragged ourselves out of our bags and into the cold morning air.
Still, we made porridge, ate, then geared up and headed over to
the base of Titan. Looking up, half the wall was hidden in cloud.
I started up the first pitch, a chimney jammed with giant
chockstones. It was good to be on rock, the rough dolerite grippy
beneath my fingers. I belayed at the base of a scree slope, off a
tipped-out cam, a wire between two loose blocks and the tied-off
root of a bush. Lachy led on through, if you can call scrambling
up a loose scree slope climbing, belaying at the base of where the
proper climbing started. As I seconded light rain began to fall. At
the belay we couldn’t see more than 15m above us for mist. We
decided to wait. Half an hour later the rain was getting heavier and
we retreated back to Heim. Everything would ride on the weather
being good the next day.
50
Back at Heim it got cold and we rugged up, reading and dozing in our
sleeping bags. We kept expecting to hear or see CJ, but as the day
stretched into the afternoon there was no sign of him. Then, just as
we thought he must have piked, we heard his voice calling through
the cloud. Eventually, two or three hours later, he and a mate, Simon
Bischoff, appeared looking very wet and bedraggled – apparently CJ had
told Simon they wouldn’t need rain jackets... They had also come up the
Acropolis track instead of via the Geryon Campsite, but when they got to
the top of the Acropolis and tried to scramble down to the saddle they
were greeted by a wall of cloud and a precipitous drop. There they had
had to wait until the cloud cleared, allowing them to find a way down.
Despite the epic, CJ was his usual ebullient self. While Simon seemed a
little worn down, particularly after he changed into his dry clothes, then
got lost and soaked again looking for the little water spring.
We had expected CJ to turn up on his own, so now we had some delicate
negotiations because there was no way you wanted two parties on a
route with so much loose rock. However, CJ had already realised this,
and had decided to try the Shield (24), a Steve Monk’s route, and
the hardest line on the wall. Now we all just needed decent weather.
That night the clouds cleared to reveal the most incredible array of stars.
51
WE WOKE UP AT DAWN TO THE MOST
AMAZING SUNRISE –
AND CLEAR SKIES,
THE DAY WAS
LOOKING GOOD.
We woke up at dawn to the most amazing sunrise – and clear skies,
the day was looking good. Lachy and I were climbing by 8am, the
first two pitches racing by. At our highpoint we argued about which
crack line to take for the third pitch – there were many cracks and the
description was vague.
My lead probably didn’t follow the original line, but we ended up on
what was the right belay ledge, where Lachy lead the next pitch;
across and left and up to the base of the main crack of Titan, which
loomed unmistakably above.
The next pitch was mine and the first of the aid pitches, graded 17A2.
According to my dad’s diary, on the first day of climbing Titan – it took
them three days all up – they had climbed up to this first hard pitch,
which Roland then took several hours to lead, before dad followed,
cleaning what he could. Then they had abseiled back to the ground
and spent another night at Heim.
The start of the pitch was quite tricky, made harder by small bushes
and thick, black moss crusting the inside of the crack and falling in my
eyes. I was glad I wore tape gloves. But aside from that, the climbing
was good, maybe grade 18 or 19 jamming, with the occasional face
hold, and protected by biggish cams. It was with excitement that I found
the first sign of dad and Roland’s passing: an ancient wooden wedge,
still with cord tied through the eye. I didn’t clip it.
It was exciting to get to the belay with the first aid pitch done clean –
where I belayed off a single old carrot that Roland would have placed.
Funnily enough, we only had one bolt bracket that I had mistakenly
not given back to a mate when we were climbing at Freycinet a few
days earlier – it was an RP bracket.
I brought Lachy up for his lead. He took one look at the dirty,
overhanging off-width above, jammed with chockstones and lined with
black moss, and decided it wasn’t for him. I was happy to take it.
Dad’s diary says this about their next day on Titan: “Return to previous
high point. Roland prussiks fixed rope and I climb. Surmount the
overhang and then difficult rock. Just as it is getting dark we get to
reasonable stance – however, Roland insists on going on to a ‘better’
one – in the pitch dark. Follow with pack, pulling up on bushes. New
bivvy is sitting only.”
The next pitch was 13A3. At its very start Roland and dad aided up the
wall to the left of the crack using a bolt, but I climbed straight up the
crack, protecting it with a big Camalot that they wouldn’t have had.
The overhang looked hard, but despite the steepness and the moss, I
climbed through fairly easily, clinging onto the chockstones jammed
in its mouth. Another aid pitch down, maybe grade 18 or so.
I was carrying our water in a hydration bladder on my back and every
time my brother wanted to drink he had to suck on the hose attached to
my chest. So it wasn’t long before I was offering him a drink of ‘brother’smilk’ at every belay. For some reason it really put him off his water.
52
RIGHT Lachy holding one of Roland’s homemade stainless steel pegs.
The seventh pitch followed a number of discontinuous corner
cracks at 13A2. It was actually quite tricky to know which corner to
take, and halfway up the pitch I was stopped by an unremarkable
little corner. It had low gear, while the corner walls were coated
with black moss, making it tricky to commit to the hard moves
above. After climbing up and down several times and arguing with
Lachy, I started trying a variant just to the right, only to fall off it.
After much tooing and froing I brought Lachy up, then tried the
corner again, only to fall off it too and land on the ledge.
Impasse.
Annoyed, I climbed down and to the right, then up into another
corner, which had a desperate move guarding its entrance. I kneebarred up a very wide crack then was blessed with easier ground.
I raced up the rest of the pitch linking it into pitch eight, running it
out in eagerness to make up for lost time.
Dad and Roland spent their uncomfortable night somewhere up
around this pitch, dad wrote, “Doze in fits and starts. Roland snores.
Sunrise over the Traveller Range. Climbing now easier. Penultimate
pitch is hard and light running out. I take a fall – peg pulls.”
Pitch nine and 10 were both graded 13A2, but went okay. Pitch 11
was graded 15, but was probably harder and quite bold, making
me glad we carried in the number five Camalot. Pitch 12 was
the penultimate pitch dad foretold in his diary. When I spoke
to Roland he remembered dad taking a big fall, telling me about
how dad had been complaining about Roland hammering in the
pegs too hard...just before he pulled one out and took a big fall.
The pitch followed a tricky corner system, that is maybe 18, then
exited right around a roof that exposes you to 300m of clear air
to the ground. At the end of the roof, on the arete, was what looked
like a block so loose as to be merely sitting there. After some
procrastination I realised there was no way I could climb around
it – you had to fully commit to pulling on the block with your full
weight (there were no footholds) and swing around the arete.
Having come so far there was no going back, and with my heart
in my mouth I committed; the block held, and I cranked around
onto a good stance.
All I had to do then was climb the thin crack above past a bolt and,
with just one easy pitch to the summit, we would be home.. The
thin crack wasn’t easy. I clipped the bolt with our one hanger, then
did the old up-down thing, trying the moves and scuttling back
to the rest. Time was slipping away. After much fiddling around I
worked out I could step right onto a slab, which I climbed with no
gear for six or seven metres, until I hit easy ground.
TOP Roland’s name plaque for Heim,
put up in February 1967, according
to the inscription on the back.
LEFT Lachy seconding the 5th pitch,
which was the first one with aid to be freed.
54
RIGHT Lachy below the line of Titan.
I whooped as I brought Lachy up. He led on through to the
summit of the Foresight, his screams echoing through the
cirque, then he brought me on up. It was 6.30pm, we had been
climbing for 10-and-a-half-hours. The sun was low in the sky
out to the west, the shadow of Geryon showing the ragged
silhouette of the South Summit, the Foresight and the North
Summit – Geryon was a mythical three-headed monster afterall.
We could see out over the Traveller Range to the east, the
Acropolis to the north and to the east, out over the Labyrinth and
beyond to Frenchmans Cap.
When Roland and dad breached the summit it was late in the
day and they were forced to spend the night on its table-sized
summit. Roland remembers my dad being reluctant to share his
sleeping bag, but in my dad’s diary he wrote, “Spend night on
summit in steady rain with unzipped sleeping bag – soaked.”
The next day they started descending at first light.
Lachy and I took photos and shot a short video for our dad,
before starting the series of abseils to get off. Shortly after we
ran out of brother’s milk, our mouths cottony with dehydration.
As we descended the West Face it was bathed in an orange glow.
It took us an hour to get back to the track and as we arrived at
the Geryon–Acropolis saddle darkness descended and we made
bush-bash back to Heim by headtorch. We arrived 9.30, badly
dehydrated, totally wasted, but ridiculously happy.
Unlike CJ. He and Simon didn’t have a good day. The first eight
pitches of the Shield are basically access pitches and, as they
discovered, totally rubbish, covered in loose rock and bushes.
Three or four pitches up CJ managed to drop his girlfriend’s
camera 80m (which he miraculously recovered unbroken),
after which they decided to retreat, spending the rest of the day
sulking around Heim. Simon had had such a bad time he wasn’t
even keen to climb the next day. That night as I drifted off to
sleep I am sure I heard CJ sobbing gently.
The next day Lachy and I were up at dawn again to leave; I had
a plane to catch back to Melbourne that evening. We made our
way out by the light of headtorch, the East Face looming above
us in the dark; it was no longer such a mystery, we had unlocked
one small path up its mighty face. As the sun slowly rose,
bathing it in rich early morning light, we felt incredibly lucky that
we had written our own chapter in the story of Titan, 44 years
after Roland and dad had begun it.
As it turned out, CJ’s trip wasn’t totally in vain, he did come
away with some climbing spoils. But that is a whole other story,
which you can read about here >
cjclimbs.blogspot.com.au/2012/03/blog-post.html
TOP Roland
leading during
the first ascent of Titan.
BOTTOM An old
wooden wedge left over
from the first ascent.
57
1. Julesy’s Problem (V9ish)
WATCH
SIMON WEILL
DOING
MANHANDLED (V11)
LEFT Simon Weill
climbing Hand Out (V6).
Sarah Osborne
2. Hand Solo (V11)
Start in the far left of the cave and
work your way right before finishing
up a combination of Manhandled
and Cold Hands.
3. Underhanded Tactics (V8)*
Head straight up the obvious
flakes to a hard and high finish.
4. Manhandled (V11)**
Hard climbing with a
powerful and shouldery crux.
5. Cold Hands, Cold Heart (V9)**
Fantastic moves using some really
interesting holds. Tough Start.
6. Dos Manos (V11)*
Easy climbing leads to a couple
of hard moves on slopey holds.
7. The Sound of One
Man Hand Clapping (V11)**
Easy climbing to a dynamic and
reachy section through a blank
looking roof. Cut loose and prosper.
8. The Pummelling (V4)*
Follows the obvious rib to a tricky finish.
Download a printer-friendly version of the full topo from the VL site
O
N
T
A
L
HORIZ
TA K E Y O U R V E R T I C A L L I F E
AT T H E C A V E O F M A N H A N D S
WE BRING YOU THE PHOTO
TOPO FOR THE CAVE OF
MAN HANDS, A RAD NEW
BOULDERING CAVE IN
THE VICTORIA RANGE,
SOUTHERN GRAMPIANS.
Discovered last winter, the Cave of Man Hands offers some superb
IMAGES Simon Madden + Sarah Osborne
VIDEO Brett Williams
Follow this until you hit the base of a rocky escarpment. Clamber over
new bouldering in a beautiful setting, with only a short walk
in. Most problems were put up by Simon Weill, with a couple of
additions by Dr Julian Saunders and VL’s own honcho Ross Taylor.
To get to the Cave park at Manja Shelter on the Harrop Track, which is
just south of the turn off to Buandik Campground. Follow the walking
track east, after about five minutes it will start to bend south, shortly
afterwards there should be a very faint track that continues east.
the escarpment and continue a further five minutes, until just below
the main cliff. Now, look down and to the left, you should behold
the well-hidden Cave of Man Hands (but it can be a little tricky).
5 8 THE TOPO
RIGHT HAND SIDE TOPO
MAYAN
SMITHGOBAT
FOCUSED, DETERMINED, TALENTED:
WE SPEAK TO
NEW ZEALAND’S FINEST
FEMALE CLIMBER.
IMAGES Simon Carter, Rich Crowder and Danny Uhlmann
Mayan Smith-Gobat
at home in Castle
Hill, New Zealand.
Rich Crowder.
60
INTERVIEW MAYAN SMITH-GOBAT 6 1
LEFT Smith-Gobat looking
fit on the crux Salathe
headwall pitch (5.13b/29).
Danny Uhlmann.
RIGHT Attempting
Colossus (33) at Little
Babylon, Darran Mountains,
New Zealand. Simon Carter.
You seem to be one of those climbers who has steadily
improved, what do you see as the major turning points in
your climbing career?
In 2009 you climbed L’Arcademecien 8c/33, the hardest
route by an Australasian woman, do you have plans to push
your sport climbing further?
Yes, definitely! I am actually en route to Europe at the moment
intending to spend this (northern) spring in Spain sportclimbing.
Looking back at it now, even while I was skiing, I always knew
There have been several, the first was the accident. Then travelling
to Europe to compete in the World Cups, which introduced me to
the European scene and opened my eyes to the endless possibilities
Europe has to offer. The year before that trip I’d been studying, in a
futile attempt to have a proper career, but climbing in Europe made
me realise climbing was what I really wanted. Not competition
climbing, but climbing inspiring lines on real rock and pushing
myself to my limit. Most recently, my trip to Yosemite in 2009. When
I discovered that I have some natural ability to move over those huge
granite walls, and that I really love this type of challenge – the long
sustained effort and suffering required to climb these huge routes.
I would return to climbing at some point in my life – I always felt
What do you see as your greatest strength as a climber?
How did you start climbing?
What was it about climbing that made you give up the skiing,
I was born in the shadow of Mt Cook, so I’ve been exposed to
climbing all my life. However, we moved when I was five-years-old,
and I didn’t start climbing until I was 15. I got a summer job at Mt
Cook and took a mountaineering course, which started me alpine
climbing. The following summer I returned but the weather was
really bad, so I went rockclimbing instead – and loved it!
particularly when you were the best in NZ?
When I left school I moved back down to the South Island and
climbed and skied for a bit, but soon the skiing took over. I spent
the next couple years following winters around the world and skiing
competitively until I had a bad accident, resulting in two broken feet
and a broken jaw. I was unable to walk for about four months, so I
returned to climbing because I could train my upper body and have
been focusing solely on climbing ever since.
The catalyst was the accident. I’m unable to sit still for long periods
of time, so I began training my upper body and climbing again (on
one foot) to keep from going insane! In the process I rediscovered
my love for climbing; I believe it fits my personality better. I love
the problem solving aspect. I also find the climbing scene much
less pretentious than the skiing scene, and I much rather living in
a warm climate than being cold all the time! My decision was also
helped by me very quickly becoming the best in NZ, and
I knew I had a lot of room for improvement.
While climbing and skiing are two very different sports,
have you found any of the skills from skiing have translated
across to climbing?
a strong attraction to the sport!
The mental game has distinct similarities. Controlling your head
space in stressful situations, and maintaining a calm mind,
especially in the face of danger, is key for both climbing and
skiing. Although while climbing I rarely get myself into really lifethreatening situations, there’s a lot of perceived risk and not letting
this affect you is crucial to performing well. This is something that
has definitely translated across from extreme skiing to climbing.
Everything! The full mental and physical challenge, and total focus
What is it that you enjoy about climbing?
required to climb at your limit. The parts of myself it exposes and
the way it forces me to face my weaknesses – there is no hiding
behind pretenses. The direct contact with nature – the raw power
of the places it takes you. The lifestyle it promotes, and the
amazing group of people around the world that have become my
family through climbing.
My perseverance, dedication and stubbornness.
Simply not giving up once my mind is set on something.
You were invited on the Petzl RocTrip in the Getu Valley in China
where you got to climb with Lynn Hill, what was that like?
It was a very special experience. We climbed the ultra classic,
four-pitch route running straight through the roof, established
by Arnaud Petit and Stephanie Bodet – it’s a fantastic, wild route!
It was great to climb with, and be on the same level as, the one
person I’ve always looked up to in climbing. I also really enjoyed
getting to know Lynn a little on a personal level.
You’ve now climbed a couple of free routes on El Capitan,
first Salathe (5.13b/29, 35 pitches) then Freerider (5.12d/27,
35 pitches) in a day, what inspired you to start trad climbing
after climbing some very hard sport routes?
I’ve always wanted to be a well-rounded climber, and pure crack
climbing was something I wasn’t familiar with at all. I’ve always
wanted to go and spend some time in Yosemite learning these
skills. I have also always been fascinated by big wall climbing – that
many pitches in a row and living on the wall were things I wanted
to experience... but I had no idea I would become so obsessed by it.
When you were working on Salathe you spent a lot of time
up on the crux headwall by yourself trying it – how exposed
is it up there, and what was it like?
It’s fantastic! The headwall of the Salathe is one of the most
amazing places in the world, and definitely one of my favourite
places to be. It is super exposed: a blank five-degree overhung
wall, with one flaring crack running up the center, suspended
above a 900m freefall to the valley floor!
It was intimidating at first, especially because it was the first time
I’d used a Mini-traxion as a self-belay device and was trying to
figure my systems out. But I quickly became very comfortable,
and simply loved being there on my own.
Okay, Punks in the Gym (32). On your blog it says you’ve put
more time into this route than any other, what is it about the
route that keeps bringing you back, and why do you think
you are finding it so hard?
Punks in the Gym is an inspiring route in many different ways: it’s
an aesthetically beautiful line; it requires an incredible mixture of
powerful yet technical climbing; and, of course, the history, the fact
it was climbed by Wolfgang Gullich (the master of sportclimbing),
it was the first 32 in the world, and has not yet had a female ascent!
In addition, because of the reachy nature of the route I always
thought I would never be able to climb it. So when I discovered
a way that worked for me, I became very determined. Once I
have invested a certain amount of time and effort into a route,
I simply cannot walk away.
You and Jarmila Tyrril have both put in a fair bit of time
on Punks – whoever climbs it first will claim the first female
ascent – is there an unspoken (or spoken) rivalry to do it first?
Well, I can only speak for myself. We’ve spent some time working
the route together, and there was no obvious rivalry. We were
both supportive and encouraging of one another. But I do know
we’re both pretty competitive people, so I’m sure there is some
underlying competition there. The bottom line is I want to climb
Punks for myself, irrespective of who has climbed it previously.
The few times I have seen you climb, you seem very focused
and not afraid to push yourself, have you always had a
good head for climbing?
Yes, I’m very focused and love pushing myself hard, almost to a fault
at times, when really focused I shut everything and everyone out.
I’ve always been good at controlling my emotions and switching off
fear and other distractions. I’ve also always had a fascination with
being up high, and don’t ever remember being scared of heights,
but the level of comfort and control has definitely increased through
continuously putting myself in exposed situations.
You’re involved with Pro Climbers International (PCI), can you
tell us a little about this organisation, as many people won’t
have heard about it, and why you became a member?
PCI is a not-for-profit organisation, which focuses on connecting
athletes with the community and giving them job opportunities
outside of sponsorships, through events such as clinics, slide
shows and school programs. It promotes these top climbers
as role models, instructors, athletes and all-around good people,
64
and in this way inspires others to become top level athletes.
I joined PCI because I like the idea of being part of an association
of these top-level climbers. It’s not easy trying to be a professional
climber, especially dealing with larger companies and trying
to promote myself in a professional manner. I jumped at the
opportunity to get some help with these aspects, and form
contacts in the international scene.
The New Zealand climbing scene is even smaller than
Australia’s, has that made it more difficult for you to become
a professional climber?
I don’t think becoming a professional climber is an easy task
anywhere in the world. But yes, it is definitely much harder in
such a small scene... Actually it’s virtually impossible! The only
way I’m managing to make it work is by travelling a lot, becoming
recognised internationally and working on getting sponsorship
from international companies rather than local NZ companies.
Sometimes coming from NZ works to my advantage, because it
gives me a point of interest. However, it’s been hard work to make
people acknowledge me as an international athlete.
Have you found that with more sponsorship comes more
pressure to perform?
I try not to let it put more pressure on me because I want to
keep my passion for climbing pure. Climbing is something I love
doing for myself, and that’s the way I want to keep it. Having more
sponsorship just makes me put more effort into publicising my
achievements, updating my blog frequently and making sure I get
photos and video footage.
You have done quite a few hard routes in New Zealand, is there
still a lot of stuff you are psyched to do there?
Yes, but not that many and there are a lot of routes in the world I
would rather do than those few in NZ. In saying that there are some
amazing routes and projects in the Darrans I’d like to go back to at
some point. But that is the only place in NZ I’m really keen on now.
Do you have other big wall routes that you want to do
in Yosemite?
I’m definitely planning to be back in Yosemite this Autumn, but
I’m not sure what I want to work on yet. The Nose is something
I’d like to play on, to try to work out the Changing Corners
pitch. But I’ve definitely found that nothing I have been on so
far compares to the Salathe Headwall – it’s the most amazing
pitch ever, so I have been thinking about trying to do the Salathe
in a day as well.... Who knows, there are a lot of options!
Mayan is sponsored by Five Ten, Blue Water Ropes, Petzl,
Earth Sea Sky and Em’s Power Cookies.
To find out more visit
CLIMBING IN EUROPE MADE
ME REALISE CLIMBING
WAS WHAT I REALLY WANTED.
NOT COMPETITION CLIMBING,
BUT CLIMBING INSPIRING
LINES ON REAL
ROCK AND PUSHING
MYSELF TO THE LIMIT.
www.mayanclimbs.com
RIGHT The stupendous crux headwall pitch of Salathe (5.13b/29) Danny Uhlmann.
65
From China with Love
Each year Petzl holds its
acclaimed RocTrip, last year
the destination was China.
Two Aussies made the
trip to the remote corner of
the republic, and
survived to tell the tale...
DANIEL LEE
I’m lined up at KFC anxiously trying to decipher the menu – there’s
a throng of people behind me and I should be on the bus. My head
is swimming, a brief skim of “phrases you might need” the night
before did not include “two-piece feed”. As it turns out most of
the phrases “you might need”, you don’t, and even if you did, you
certainly couldn’t pronounce them well enough to be understood.
China travel tip number one, throw the phrase book away.
Other bits of advice swirl around my travel weary brain, “just eat local,
it will be safer”, “I got sick from the street vendor”, “don’t eat the
chicken you’ll get sick”, “eat the chicken at least it will be chicken”.
Why is KFC the only fast food in Guiyang Airport? And will that
loudmouth American be quiet for just a moment? Imagine travelling
with him...actually, he looks like Dave Graham…it IS Dave Graham.
WORDS Matt Norgrove and Daniel Lee
IMAGES Daniel Lee
Rewind. Spelean P/L, the Australian/New Zealand Petzl distributor,
and my very patient employer, had offered to send a team on the
journey of a lifetime, the Petzl RocTrip. I just had to convince them
to send me. I may have done couple of laps of the planet and spent
some time in Asia, but sadly I don’t climb hard and I’m the least
senior Sales Rep. Fortunately, fate blessed my colleagues with
family commitments, And I Steven Bradbury’ed it. WIN!
Preparation began and the team was announced; Matt Norgrove
(NSW), Wiz Fineron (NZ), Mayan Smith-Gobat (NZ) and I would be
heading to the Getu Valley to climb some of the newest limestone
routes in the world. Among such talent my role was clear: support
logistically and belay hard.
TO GET MAYAN SMITH-GOBAT’S
TAKE ON THE GETU ROCTRIP HEAD TO
the VL website
66
67
“Pictures do no justice to
the beauty and atmosphere,
let alone size of this place.
You could literally fly
a Jumbo through the arch.”
The centrepiece of RocTrip 2011 was the enormous Chuanschang
Arch, the ruins of an ancient underground river. It’s an incredible
natural rock feature that almost defies comprehension. Pictures
do no justice to the beauty and atmosphere, let alone size of this
place. You could literally fly a Jumbo through the arch. Although
I doubt China Southern will be adding this to their itinerary, they
have recently added a direct flight from Sydney to Guangzhou,
this would be our first leg...
Flight time 11 hours. Got to know Matt and Wiz a little better.
Lay over at Guangzhou Airport: three hours. Matt and Wiz
got to know squat toilets. Delay at Guangzhou Airport,
four hours. Flew to Guiyang, arrived 2am, met our transfer
and rescued Italian wunderkind, Gabriel Moroni, sharing
my room at the flash new Novotel. Woke up, had last ‘real’
breakfast, got in a taxi back to Guiyang Airport, faced death
several times thanks to suicidal driver’s love of the wrong
side of the road, arrived and rendezvoused with Petzl Team.
Then things got complicated.
Petzl’s Chinese liaison had a just-landed American contingent,
sponsored athletes from other countries, some guys from
FiveTen, us, and one very modest sized bus. For myself,
Matt and Wiz this was the first time we would meet some of
the world’s best climbers; Ethan Pringle, Joe Kinder, Lynn Hill,
Sasha DiGulian, Dave Graham to name only a few. I was
kind of awestruck and they all knew each other so well, what’s
the etiquette? I’m back in Year 10, the new face at school and
these are the cool kids. A friendly looking American girl smiled
and took my picture, “Hi I’m Collette”. We made some
introductions and it turns out these cool kids are actually super
friendly, and minus big egos. There was time for one last meal,
“Hey, there’s a KFC…”
Somehow they find room for us all on the Petzl chartered bus.
I was up the back, next to the loud American (Dave Graham!).
It seemed a mammoth transit from the US had not dulled his
enthusiasm and, I have to say, he made for a very entertaining
journey. Dave is by far one of the most interesting people I’ve
ever met. His attention to the simple things that pass by most
people un-noticed, and interpretation of the story behind these
things, is not only entertaining but also kind of humbling.
At Getu village the people were warm and accommodating but knew no
English. Petzl had booked most of the hotel rooms for their guests and
they had gathered the best-of-the-best; Dani Andrada, Chris Sharma,
Daila Ojeda, Steve McClure, Nina Caprez, Enzo Oddo, the Americans,
quite a good showing of Aussies and
so many more. That first night, I really didn’t know where to look.
Matt and Wiz were a good match and both found the climbing
challenging – as the rock in the Arch seemed to give up its secrets
less easily than the rest of the crags – but eventually rewarding.
Mayan Smith-Gobat joined us a day later and I spent most of my time
bouncing between them, a friend from Perth, some of the Americans
and a sponsored couple from Holland.
I managed to thrash my way up a couple of very modest routes. While it
seemed nobody minded belaying a noob, I felt like I’d brought a Hyundai
Getz to the F1 weekend in Monte Carlo. Still, with around 250 climbs
between the various crags and offering every grade from 12 to 35, there
was certainly something for everyone.
The final day was a celebration, an exhibition of climbing from the
best in the world in one of the grandest theatres, the Chuanschang
Arch. A 15-minute walk from Getu through stepped rice paddies and
giant bamboo saw us arrive at the small river crossing. A wooden
boat punted us across the narrow green void. On a clear autumn
morning the sun breaks like golden torchlight through the Arch
that dominates the skyline to your right…or so I’m told. The cloud
never did lift when we were there. The next part of the walk is the
reason no one goes back to the village for lunch, 1400 uneven steps
zigzag up the hillside through the forest.
At the Arch we spotted Chris Sharma belaying Dani Andrada through
his eight-pitch Corazon de Ensueno (8c/33). From the floor of the cave
it rises up into the roof of tufas and hollows before breaking out onto
the headwall, an ambitious line that took 11 days to clean and bolt.
Meanwhile Lynn Hill and Mayan Smith-Gobat were on the opposite
side climbing Lost in Translation (8a+/30), the first route that reached
the top of the Arch. Unsurprisingly, a dizzying array of ropes and
photographers webbed the cave’s ceiling.
The day culminated in a large party in the centre of town. Cheap beer
and solid tunes by inspirational Petzl athlete, climber, part-time DJ,
filmmaker and fire twirler, Phillip Ribiere, had the crowd in a frenzy while
some otherwise quiet characters exposed their less inhibited side on
stage. A good night was had by all but perhaps this is one part of the
event you will just have to see for yourself…at the next Petzl RocTrip.
LEFT Wiz Fineron and Matt Norgrove.
RIGHT A climber with the Great
Arch looming above.
BOTTOM Wiz climbing Going
With Buddha (7c+/28), Buddha Cave.
69
TOP LEFT Mayan escaping
the crowds by getting up high
BOTTOM LFT Matt on
Going With Buddha (7c+/28),
Buddha Cave.
“Getu is a small, isolated little
village surrounded
by limestone cliffs that
are just mind-blowing.
It’s hard to explain
in writing just how
much rock is in this area.”
BOTTOM RIGHT
Matt and the Great Arch.
MATT NORGROVE
Chaotic roads that wind through never-ending limestone peaks; local
families working away on their farms; rice with pork for dinner and
noodles and egg for breakfast; and how could I forget the 250 sport
routes that surround the Getu Valley in Guizhou Province, China?
In late-April last year, I received a phone call from my sponsors
Spelean asking if I would be interested in attending the 2011
Petzl RocTrip. Considering I had never travelled overseas before
and was being invited to a premier climbing destination, it’s pretty
safe to say I was excited.
I had briefly seen pictures of the Great Arch that towered above Getu,
but as to the style of the climbing there, that was anyone’s guess.
In the week before leaving for China, Wiz Fineron, a good friend
from New Zealand, came and stayed with me in the Blue Mountains.
Apart from his snoring Wiz is the perfect companion. Beautiful
spring weather in the Blue Mountains, climbing and coffee, what
a combination. We got a little carried away climbing and before I
left for Getu my hands looked like they had been through a meat
grinder, luckily I would not be climbing anything for a few days.
70
On 23 October, skinless as Christmas turkeys, we flew to
Guanzhou, the capital of Guizhou (the poorest province in China).
From there we took a short domestic flight to a small city
called Guiyang (which is only about twice the size of Sydney).
Unfortunately, our flight was delayed meaning we did not arrive
in Guiyang until 2am in the morning. Luckily, Spelean had
booked us in at the Novatel that night, which was sweet, if only
for the king-sized buffet breakfast.
The next day Petzl organised a bus to take Team America and us
to the Getu Valley. Getu is about a five-hour bus ride from Guiyang
and the road winds and rolls through some incredible countryside.
Limestone peaks appeared from every angle, I was amazed at the
amount of rock we had seen before even arriving at our destination.
Getu is a small, isolated little village surrounded by limestone cliffs
that are just mind-blowing. It’s hard to explain in writing just how
much rock is in this area. After checking in at our hotel rooms, we
were invited to dinner where we all got to know one another and I
was introduced to rice and Getu pork. The beer here is quite cheap
90 cents a bottle. You can buy a main course meal for a little under
$4. That gives you an idea of how cheap it is in China.
The following week involved a lot of climbing in the great arch
above Getu and at a separate crag called Banyangs Cave. Both
cliffs are around 40 minutes walk from the village. Petzl had done
an awesome job preparing the area and half a dozen other crags
that surround Getu. Sloped limestone pockets and tufas covered
the vertical walls of the cave, while the roof consisted of endless
stalactites and phenomenal multipitch routes.
On average most of the pitches were 25m – 30m with the rare
exception. Getu has an interesting style to say the least, the slippery
limestone had many, including myself, puzzled for the first few days.
FAR LEFT Joe Kinder
distracts the onlookers as
Dave Graham ninja-exits
from Team Petzl’s bus.
LEFT A welcoming Getu
local sees the funny side
of the Roctripers.”
This didn’t stop Steve Mclure onsighting 8c/33 on his second day
climbing in the valley. Petzl athletes were attempting the 9a/35
project on the main wall in the arch throughout the trip, despite
wet crux holds and less than ideal conditions, Gabriel Moroni
from Italy sent the route on his last day. Banyangs Cave was
quite different, having one side, the left, steep and overhanging,
while the right-hand side was 10 to 15-degrees overhanging
on small edges, tufas and pockets. Wiz and I spent the majority
of our time at this crag.
RocTrip was amazing, and I felt privileged to climb alongside some
of the world’s best. For me, it was more than just climbing, it was
also about soaking up the atmosphere, meeting new people and
enjoying an amazing event. During the evenings, Petzl played
short films and movies from Dani Andrada, Chris Sharma, Daila
Ojeda and many more. The vibe just felt really cool, climbers from
all around the world, in one spot for the same thing.
Getu was also a total culture shock. Putting the climbing aside,
people there live what we would consider an extremely poor
lifestyle. Although they live differently, the encounters I had with
the locals were most pleasant, although we could not really
understand each other. They went far out of there way
To find out more visit
to accommodate us in many ways. It also made me realise how
lucky we are to live in our small community, with clean, non-polluted
crags. Although the climbing in Getu was great, I was shocked at
the amount of rubbish on the sides of the roads and also at the
crags. I was disappointed to think foreigners who had participated
in this event had just dropped their rubbish on the ground.
Above all, the motivation I’ve gained from this trip is what I need to
push myself that little bit harder. Giving it 110 per cent day in and
day out is all that separates a good climber from a great climber.
It’s sometimes too easy to get carried away with results and
ticking projects, but taking time out to soak up the atmosphere,
enjoy the entertainment and have the opportunity to climb in such
an incredible location is what the Petzl RocTrip is all about.
The goal of Petzl’s RocTrips is to discover new places and develop
climbing. Anyone who can climb independently can sign up,
participate and add to the event. Since its creation 10 years ago
the Petzl RocTrip concept has created real and lasting benefits for
climbers. For the areas it visits, the injection to the local economy
and support to help with access and conservation issues will last
long after the event has passed. Many thanks should also go to the
army of route setters and volunteers.
www.petzl.com/en/outdoor/petzl-roctrip/china2011
73
CHINA UNCOVERED
TOUTED AS INDIAN
CREEK MEETS SANDSTONE
SQUAMISH, THE NEWLY
DEVELOPED LIMING
COULD JUST WELL BECOME
CHINA’S TRAD CLIMBING
PARADISE. WE SPEAK TO
ONE OF THE AREA’S MAIN
DEVELOPERS, MIKE DOBIE.
INTERVIEW Duncan Brown
IMAGES Eben Farnworth
Rockclimbing as we know it first started in China when Todd
Skinner bolted lines in Yangshuo in 1991. This inspired a wave
of development, chiefly in Yangshuo, in Guanxi province, and
more recently in the Getu Valley in Guizhuo province. The tone of
development was thus set and the sport climbing ethic spread
rapidly, so it wasn’t until 2010 that a few pioneers left the bolts
behind in search of the trad climbing opportunities China has to offer.
They found what they were looking for in a small corner of Yunnan
in southern China, in a sandstone Mecca called Liming. This small
group of developers soon started a traditional climbing movement,
quickly becoming the new old-school climbers as they put up
amazing all-gear lines. We’ve been able to get a hold of Mike Dobie,
the driving force behind Liming’s traditional climbing movement.
So the big rumours in the Chinese climbing scene these
days mainly revolve around Yunnan and the development
you and others are doing up there. Why is Yunnan so special?
which boasts mountains that reach 6700m and a wild
assortment of plants and animals. Liming is a small town
nestled in the park at 2100m, surrounded by red sandstone
cliffs that reach more than 150m high.
So Liming, it’s meant to be endless red sandstone offering a limitless supply of perfect crack lines, is it really as
good as the rumours would have it?
Well, when we originally started here in 2010, I thought the
area reminded me of Indian Creek. But after a few more
trips it can be more accurately described as a sandstone
Squamish because of its epic corners and straight-in
cracks. Unlike Indian Creek, the crack systems tend to
have a bit more character to them. Rather than 30m
of the exact same size crack, you have to do more varied
and interesting moves all in one climb as the width changes.
And the multipitch routes are great too.
Well being so geographically and culturally diverse, Yunnan is
already a great place for travellers to visit. Elephants roam
the jungles in the Province’s south, while the Himalayan uplift
to the north is culturally part of Tibet. My team and I have been
busy developing in northern Yunnan’s Laojunshan National Park,
ABOVE Geordie Yep
climbing the superb Faraway
Corner (5.11d/22), Liming.
7 4 CHINA UNCOVERED
75
LEFT The cliffs of Liming
are said to be a cross between
Squamish and Indian Creek.
RIGHT Mike Dobie on the stellar
second pitch of Back to Primitive (5.11d/24).
2011. They put up six or so routes, one of them the hardest
traditional line in China. This climb, Air China, went free at 5.13d
(31). Currently, there’s a total of 106 routes, with most of the
development occurring in one major valley, but there are at least
eight more valleys of rock that we haven’t even begun to explore.
We estimate there to be at least 500 potential routes, but there
could easily be thousands. As for access, the local park officials
in Liming are supportive of climbers. Every person needs to buy
a entrance ticket for 80 RMB ($A12). We have heard that in the
future climbers will need to sign a waiver of liability before climbing
here, but as of now this is just a rumour.
CURRENTLY, THERE’S A TOTAL OF
106 ROUTES, WITH MOST OF THE
DEVELOPMENT OCCURRING IN
ONE MAJOR VALLEY, BUT THERE ARE
AT LEAST EIGHT MORE VALLEYS OF
ROCK THAT WE HAVEN’T EVEN
BEGUN TO EXPLORE. WE ESTIMATE
THERE TO BE AT LEAST 500
POTENTIAL ROUTES, BUT THERE
COULD EASILY BE THOUSANDS.
Any routes that you consider area classics?
Any interesting stories about the development process?
One of the coolest discoveries we’ve made is that climbing has been
going on here for perhaps centuries. The local minority, the Lisu
people, found very creative ways to get up the walls in search of bees’
and birds’ nests. We have run across ancient ladders made out of
tree branches that reach almost 30m up the walls. We’ve also
found evidence of humans as high as 70m. It’s always quite a
surprise when you think you’re on a first ascent and you run into
old ladders and holes in the walls. So much for being the first...
We’ve sat with the older Lisu people and they’ve explained their
‘tradition’ of climbing. We don’t feel very bold bringing modernday equipment to the game compared to these guys. But they
are very supportive of us as we are fellow climbers, and they
recognise that the tradition we bring has a different goal and is
pushing climbing to greater heights.
What has been done up there so far? How many routes have
been put up compared to the potential of the place? What is
the local access situation like?
7 6 CHINA UNCOVERED
My team and I started developing the area in the winter of 2010-11
and so far we’ve put up over 95 pitches, ranging in difficulty from
5.5 to 5.12+ (grade 6 to 25+), with a mix of single and multipitch.
The area was also visited by Matt Segal and his team in November
The single pitch classics include the Great Owl (5.9/17), Dancing
with Dragons (5.10d/21), Scarface II (5.11a/22), The Quest (5.11c/23),
The Faraway Corner (5.11c/23), The Boving Reflection (5.12-/24),
The Reckoning (5.12/25), and the area’s hardest established route
Air China. Of the multipitch routes the best are Soul’s Awakening
(5.10/19), Back to the Primitive (5.11d/24), and the project Wind of the
North, which we haven’t freed yet, but will probably go at 5.12c/27.
How would a travelling climber go about adding Liming
to their China trip?
Check out our guidebook at junshanclimber.com
It’s free and has everything you’ll need. The website is a hub for the
Liming and Dao Cheng climbing community, as well as a source for all
the information my team publishes. It’s maintained by Eben Farnworth,
a fellow team member, developer, photographer and climbing guide.
What’s the best season?
Either March to June or October to November. The summer
months from July through September see heavy monsoonal rain.
Climbing would be spotty at best. December, January, and February
are the coldest months, but usually the driest. Nights are cold,
but during the day you can climb comfortably in the sun and in
the shade with a jacket.
Xiao Young on The Quest (5.11c/23), Liming.
How do you get there?
Is the intention of Liming to be completely bolt free?
The first step is travelling to Lijiang, Yunnan. It shouldn’t be too
hard because Lijiang is the number one tourist destination in
China. You can fly direct to the city from all major Chinese cities
or get there by train. It’s also a very easy trip from Yangshuo. Once
you arrive in Lijiang there are a number of ways to get to Liming
outlined in the guidebook. While in Liming, my team stays at the
Faraway Hotel, but there are a few other options you can try.
We have been bolting anchors, mostly for abseiling only, leaving
traditional anchors for most top roping and top belaying. The
ethics of the area state you can place bolts on a climb for abseiling
and safety reasons. Most of the climbs are all trad, but a few have
the odd bolt. Our resources have only provided expansion bolts
and we encourage developers coming to use glue-ins. Gear beta? What do you need up there? How long of a rope?
What sort of rack?
Primarily cams. My personal rack has Camalots and TCUs from
micro to six inches, with multiples of each. There are also splitter
pitches that will take as many as four of the same size. If you are
a moderate trad climber you could get by with a rack of Camalots
from .3 to 5, but if you are looking to push your grades past 5.10
(21+) bring more small gear. Also a set of nuts and slings will do
you well. A 60m rope will be fine for most of the routes.
Thanks so much for all the help buddy, you guys are doing
outstanding work to open amazing new areas, nurture and
grow the Chinese climbing scene and I for one salute you for it.
See you in Liming soon!
Thank you Duncan, you rock, and we hope that everyone enjoys
the routes! We would like to thank our sponsors Kailas and Black
Diamond for their support for this year’s development trips.
Visit the website for team updates and new areas we are developing.
junshanclimber.com
VERTICAL LIFE’S NEW ZEALAND EDITOR,
TOM HOYLE AKA GOMEZ GARCIA
GONZALEZ, PROVING THE DIET OF
REFRIED BEANS IS WORKING
ON RITUAL DE LO HABITUAL (23),
WALL OF SOUND, MT RUAPEHU, NEW ZEALAD.
IMAGES John Palmer
7 8 CHINA UNCOVERED
79
Ewen Sinclair getting
big air off Seamonsters (V7),
apparently Wellington’s
best boulder problem,
Turakirae Head, New Zealand.
8 0 NZ FOLIO Images by John Palmer
Jonathon Clearwater wearing the
grimace-smile as he unleashes the
beast on his Burning Man project, now
climbed at grade 30, White Falls,
Mt Ruapehu, New Zealand.
81
JAMES
‘ALL-STYLES’
FIELD-MITCHELL ATTEMPTS
BETA RECONNAISSANCE
ON THE MAJESTIC
CHARLATAN PROJECT,
WHITE FALLS, MT RUAPEHU, NZ.
8 2 FOLIO Image by Tom Hoyle
83
LEFT Holgar Moeller on the sandbag
Keep Your Helmet On (V3),
The Trenches, The Balkans, Sydney.
TOP Holgar Moeller checking If the Shoe Fits
(V8), The Frontline, The Balkans, Sydney.
BOTTOM Ben Cossey with textbook
fixed-stare and flexing-guns.
8 4 FOLIO Image by Nick Fletcher
AUTHOR & IMAGES Rob Baker
GOING SOLO ON MT KENYA
8 6 IMAGE Old Moses Hut, Mt Kenya
I couldn’t sleep. Every possible scenario was
running through my mind in a mixture of
anticipation and excitement. In a few hours I
would be climbing the 800m North Face of Mt
Kenya alone, drawing on years of accumulated
experience to not just succeed but to survive.
These emotions were familiar companions
before a big climb. Many previous summit
days had followed sleepless nights; the only
difference was this time I would be without
a partner to share the climbing, the routefinding and the experience. It was my time, my
experience. In a few hours I would be doing
what I had been planning for months.
In July last year I travelled to East Africa with the goals of
climbing Mt Kenya (5199m) and Mt Kilimanjaro (5900m) and in
the process experiencing some of Africa. In terms of climbing,
Mt Kenya held the most appeal. It’s a beautiful rocky mountain
capped by the twin peaks of Nelion (5188m) and Batian (5199m).
It has a rich climbing history with technical routes on both rock
and ice. Friends from Adelaide had visited in 2008 and climbed
the Standard North Face route on Batian in three days and raved
about it and the mountain’s flora and fauna.
On the first day, we squeezed into a local bus for four hours in
moderately crazy traffic to make the journey from Nairobi to
Nanyuki, near the base of Mt Kenya and the start of the Sirimon
Route. The following day, we picked up our porters and begin the
two-day walk twards the North Face and Shipton’s Hut (4200m).
Mt Kenya was visible for most of the walk in, soaring into the
sky and looking rather intimidating. Setting out from the hut the
next day, Kate and I acclimatised by trekking up Point Lenana
(4985m), the peak most visitors to Mt Kenya climb.
It had been a year since I’d been in the mountains, climbing,
exploring and pushing body and mind beyond their normal limits.
This is what I come to the mountains for – that intensity so often
missing from everyday life.
87
The alarm sounded at 4.30am. I scoffed some breakfast and five
cups of tea, shouldered my pack and began the one-hour approach
to the base of the route through the pre-dawn gloom. Light filled
the sky as I began climbing at 6.20am, carrying only a litre of water,
some chocolate bars, energy gels and a light down jacket. I had
a 60m, 8mm rope, some wires and a few cams to protect myself
while climbing or to allow safe retreat if the fear took me.
I have long been fascinated by the experience of soloing on rock
and ice, and have regularly soloed long routes at Araps and shorter
routes on the solid gritstone crags of England’s Peak District.
I feel quite comfortable up to grade 15. Soloing easy routes allows
a reasonable margin of safety and evokes a cerebral experience
akin to meditation. There’s nothing to worry about but the rock
and the moves, the focus of making sure every one is 100 per cent
solid, no ropes or gear to distract you.
The first eight pitches had moves up to grade 15 on mostly solid
rock following a gully system that led into a big amphitheatre
on the North Face. After an hour and a half, I clambered into
the amphitheatre, psyched to be moving fast and way ahead
of schedule. I was at nearly 5000m and feeling strong. My detailed
route description led me up the hard variation of the crux,
Firmin’s Tower. I uncoiled the rope and dragged it behind me
rather than carry dead weight on my back.
Despite the guide, route-finding was a little confusing, so
I followed my instincts and the odd bit of fixed gear. Every move
was deliberate and positive, the years of climbing and soloing
paying off. I slowed as the difficulty increased. My senses were
heightened and concentration left no room for fear. As I climbed
the amazing cracks for 150m up Firmin’s Tower, I leapfrogged
cams attached to daisy chains to protect the grade-18 climbing.
The weather was holding and it was only 11am when I reached
the top of the Tower, where I came across some peanut shells
left by the previous party on the route. I knew this was their high
point after a 24-hour day. I felt in total control and kept moving,
intermittently forcing myself to drink water and suck gels.
After Firmin’s Tower a few more pitches led to the summit ridge and
some exposed climbing toward the summit of Batian, still another
400m away. Route-finding proved challenging because the safest and
fastest route weaved across the ridge between pinnacles and along
ice-covered ledges. From the ridge, I could see in every direction.
The South Face was covered in ice and snow; treacherous and
foreboding without crampons and ice tools.
After traversing along some easy ledges I came to the most exposed
part of the route; the traverse of Shipton’s Notch, which involved some
extremely exposed moves across a short wall blessed with hundreds
of metres of air below it. This was followed by a ten-metre-long
narrow cheval ridge, so narrow I had to shuffle along with a leg either
side. With amazing 360-degree vistas, the exposure was incredible.
With only Kate and a few people watching my progress from the hut
1000m below, I had the entire mountain to myself.
IMAGE The vantage from Firmin’s Tower, with Shipton’s Hut just visible on the distant ground. 8 9
I arrived at the summit around 12.30pm, relieved, but not relaxed;
I still had the descent to negotiate. The nearby summit of Nelion
seemed very close. Photos are a poor simulacra of the panorama,
unable to capture the profound experience, but I snapped a few
anyway to record the moment. During intense experiences, the
mind blocks out seemingly irrelevant or trivial occurrences and
it is only afterwards when looking back on the photos, however
inadequate they are, that I can recall and appreciate those
otherwise lost moments.
I began the descent in in a state of complete concentration,
a combination of scrambling and abseiling off pitons and
old pieces of cord. Switched into auto pilot mode, the motions
of descent became mechanical. Setup. Check. Double check.
It wasn’t over till I was back on the ground.
Abseiling down Firmin’s Tower back to the amphitheatre required
some rope-stretching abseils as more than once I only just
reached the next set of anchors. On the last abseil into the
amphitheatre, I accidentally kicked a huge block of rock, it
wobbled, then teetered, then fell onto the excess rope lying on the
ground. This caused me some concern. Most of the rope I needed
to safely descend now lay pinned under a two-tonne boulder.
By some stroke of luck, there was a fine layer of dirt over the ground
and I could pull all the rope out from under the sheet of rock.
9 0 IMAGE Basecamp at the foot of My Keny
I continued descending, scrambling and abseiling further into
the amphitheatre and then gully, arriving at the base of the
climb at 4.30pm, a bit tired but happy, relieved and satisfied.
I spent a few minutes alone there, absorbing the experience
before Kate and some tourists walked up to meet me.
It was strange seeing people again after my solo adventure
and it brought reality back quickly. It had been a long day
of continuous concentration and exertion, those essential
components of a rich, unadulterated experience. It always
takes a few days, weeks or sometimes months for the
experience and adventure to sink in. After more than 18 years
of climbing, I have realised I need those intense adventures
to renew my psyche and maintain balance in a busy lifestyle,
and combining it with travel in new countries and meeting
new people makes the journey that little bit more rewarding.
As the years progress, finding such intense experiences
becomes more difficult and seems to require more risk.
Finding balance is always a challenge.
After a safari to see the animals in the Masai Mara and
Lake Nakura national parks, we walked up Mt Kilimanjaro
(5900m). We did it with a few other tourists, most of who
were unaware the more beautiful and inspiring mountain of
Mt Kenya, and its promise of amazing adventure, were only
a few hours north. When I look back now, the solo of Mt Kenya
stands out as an incredibly vivid experience. Sure, the
memories will dull with time, but the balance was restored,
if only temporarily •
A (worthless) essay
subjecting you to the subject
of subjective grading.
It seems it has taken 22 years to confirm what most people, including
the first ascentionist, already knew: that Hubble, the world’s first 8c+
(34), is indeed the same grade as Action Direct (9a/35).
Now that some visiting Euros and Americans have sampled the
line (the White Peak is a bit of a backwater when it comes to
vacation spots), some sort of confirmation has now been officially
raised, especially since wunderkind Adam Ondra spent three
sessions on the route without success.
This has led to the inevitable (and controversial) question: was
Hubble the world’s first 9a?
Ben Moon put up Hubble at Raven Tor (UK) in 1990. The line famously
consisted of an English 7b move followed by four English 7a moves.
In today’s money it has been better described as seven moves (V13)
into a grade 28 finish. All up, 10m. Although it may well sound like a
path, in 22 years it has had only four repeats. These have been mostly
by people that have lived in a cupboard training on a wooden model of
the route while subsisting on a diet of steamed broccoli.
Back in the ‘90s Moon argued the point that many European and
even American routes were starting to be overgraded relative to their
older counterparts. Moon tried to explain relative grading by citing the
differences between two routes in the same grade, using Theoreme
(8b) and La Rose et la Vampire (8b) as prime examples (both at Buoux
in France). He explained that “just because a route felt harder than
the other, didn’t mean it was a whole grade harder” – which, if you
thought about it for long enough, gave you a headache.
or just plain
WORDS Steve Kelly
?
92
Nowadays there seems to be a lot of merit to his argument. Lots
of the old-school crags - such as Buoux, Orgon, Volx, the Verdon
Gorge and, of course, Raven Tor) contain what many consider to be
‘stiff’ grades. These stiff grades – or at least the speculation that
they are now stiff compared to more modern climbs of the same
rating – are due to one event: ‘The AD Effect.’
The AD Effect (Action Direct Effect) came about supposedly as a
result of Wolfgang Gullich’s autobiographer Tilmann Hepp using
some creative license in his book Life in the Vertical, when he stated
that Wolfy’s 1991 Frankenjura test piece was in fact French 9a. This
went against the man’s original grading of UIAA XI, which if you could
find a translator, looked a lot like 8c+, the same grade as Hubble.
As a result, the grading of a route became determined by
whether it was BAD (Before Action Direct) or RAD (Relative to
Action Direct). The BAD routes remained in places like Raven Tor,
Pen Trwyn, Buoux, Volx, Orgon Canal and the Verdon Gorge. RAD
routes meanwhile started popping up all over Spain, America and
even Thailand. Soon it became evident that BAD 8cs in places
such as the UK were remaining unrepeated, while RAD 9as in
Spain were being put up every week by teenagers sponsored by
McDonalds. Something was amiss.
Down here in Australia the tide was turning as well, mainly due
to a small group of people from NSW that had visited the UK
and seen for themselves what it was like to be BAD. This led to
the Nowra movement, a period during which numerous routes
were established that reflected being very BAD indeed. (It is no
coincidence that this took place around 1992, one year after the
first ascent of Action Direct).
Conversely, a number of Victorians headed for the USA instead
and returned with visions of creating routes that were utterly RAD.
This explains why a Nowra grade 29 feels more like a Grampians’
30 (though the former looks like a pile by comparison). And so the
AD Effect had spread…
Today the problem is so rife that entire crags have become infected
by the AD Effect, hence the constant grade bickering that occurs
amongst climbers in campsites or on dodgy Internet forums.
Where once there was consensus and relativity, there is now just
confusion. This is not limited to the hardest grades either, as
generally a 1977 grade 22 can be found to be somewhat harder than
a 2002 grade 22. If you’re in any doubt, go and try Light Fingered
(Arapiles) and then (after a long car drive) have a spin on Ruddy
Norry (Blue Mountains). All should become clear after that.
Compounding this problem are the people who want to forever
be BAD yet run over to Spain and tick as many RAD routes as
possible. These climbers then return to places such as Taipan
Wall and put up things like The Groove Train and grade it 8c. It is
only when one of those RAD American climbers visits our shores
and jumps on the same line that the truth comes out. If it was in
the kingdom of RAD, it’d probably be 9a.
So what is to be done about the problem? Well, in many respects,
it is sorting itself out – although only gradually. RAD routes are
still getting repeated en mass while BAD routes aren’t receiving
half as much attention. Just the other day a BAD route from
1987 had its first repeat, prompting the second ascentionist to
immediately call for an upgrade. But that was in Austria you
understand, so most people are agreeing with him. Meanwhile
over in Wales a line that went unrepeated for 17 years recently had
its second ascent as well – yet despite being graded HXS 7a/b it’s
not getting upgraded (probably because no one really knows what
that means anyway).
The telling tale however is not so much in the upgrading; it’s in
the language of climbers worldwide, as in: “Wow! That is one RAD
route!”, or, “Damn! That route was BAD!”
Or, more commonly, “That route was BAD-ASS!” The latter
apparently can be defined as, “Before Action Direct – After ‘70s
Sandbagging.” •
Expat Aussie, training-guru and
all-round nice guy Duncan Brown
is making his mark in China’s
booming climbing scene. This is his
first article in a series in which
he tells us what it takes to condition
yourself for a life in the vertical.
INTERVIEW Duncan Brown
IMAGES Craig Ingram
THE WHYS
GOAL SETTING
At some point all of us want to improve our performance and, as
there is no quick-fix climbing Viagra, inevitably we look to training.
But what makes us want to improve in the first place? And what
exactly does ‘training’ entail?
First, goal setting. Training towards set goals gives you the
drive and focus to push through difficult sessions and stick to a
structured plan. As I mentioned earlier, we are all different and
have different motivations but in effect we all want the same end
result – to climb better. The differing goals make ‘climbing better’
mean something different to everyone. The main thing is to try and
clarify your goal, then target your training to zero in on it.
The motivations are easy to pinpoint. That elusive project we’ve
been working all year, that upcoming trip to our dream climbing
destination, or even just wanting to one-up your mates at the gym
– all are legitimate reasons to want to improve. But how does the
average person make this happen?
We’ve all seen videos of superhuman machines doing endless
one-arm chins, thousands of laps on brutally steep walls and
laughing at gravity with effortless front-levers. The unfortunate
corollary is that most of us think unless that is what we are doing,
we aren’t ‘training’.
Folks, this isn’t the case. Firstly, most would be broken inside a
week if we tried to emulate such Olympian efforts and, secondly,
most people aren’t grade-34 climbers trying to break the magical
grade 35 so we don’t have to go to such extreme lengths to
improve. Still, there are things we can all learn from the pros.
Pro and semi-pro athletes don’t run about randomly doing things
in the hope they will get better. They set out a deliberate training
plan that targets an ultimate goal. This mindset is something
everyone can bring to their training, and will lead to more rapid
improvement and realisation of goals. And success only increases
motivation. What you get is not a vicious cycle but a victorious one.
In this article we’ll look at the steps from initially making the decision
to train to actually stepping into the gym for that first session.
Do you want to go up a boulder grade? Onsight endurance routes
a grade or two harder than last season? Do more volume so you
can tick more classics in a short holiday next autumn? Goals are
unique to each individual.
One important thing to remember is to not shoot too high in the short
term. For example, a climber redpointing 18 this season probably
shouldn’t set their main goal for next season as onsighting 33. That’s
not going to happen. Simply put, keep your goals realistic and you will
be more likely to realise them, and that will give you more motivation
to push on to ever higher levels. Goals need to be achievable.
As well as articulating a long-term goal, include several smaller
goals as steps along the way. For example, take Mr Climbero,
who this year redpointed several 24s and onsighted some 21s. His
goal for next year is to tick his first 25 and onsight 23. Now being
a good goal setter, on the path to glory he has his sights set on
onsighting 22, onsighting multiple 21s in a day and redpointing
multiple 24s in a day. All of these are achievable goals that will
maintain motivation on his way to the big prize of 25.
Set a long-term goal, supported by short-term targets to chase
along the way, and you will both structure a better training plan
and keep your psych up.
95
“IT TAKES TIME,
DEDICATION, CONSISTENCY
AND PATIENCE TO REAP
THE REWARDS OF ANY
TRAINING PLAN BUT EACH
OF US CAN BENEFIT FROM
BETTER TIME-MANAGEMENT,
A GOAL-ORIENTED
APPROACH AND A LITTLE
BIT OF DISCIPLINE IN
OUR WORKOUT SESSIONS.”
EVALUATION: SKILLS, TIME, ASSETS
Second up – self-evaluate. Honest self-evaluation is key as
it provides the foundation on which to target training.
Ask yourself what your current skill level is, what assets are
at your disposal (gyms, hangboards, training partners, etc)
and, crucially, how much time and energy you can and are
willing to devote to training.
Most of this is easy. Time; forward plan with a calendar by
marking out available training times. Assets; do you have a
hangboard or yoga mat, Thera-bands and weights, at home?
Is there a gym or home woody nearby? Partners; do you have
friends (even friends of convenience) keen on structured
sessions or are you on a solo mission? Current skill level,
though, that’s tricky.
Boasting about redpointing grade Y and onsighting grade X
might be a good way to impress your latest romantic target,
but it’s not a tangible way of measuring your current
physical ability. That’s not to say grades don’t factor into
self-assessment, rather they are not clear enough to
measure incremental improvement as the steps from grade
X to grade Y can be big and may take some time to make.
A general fitness test is a much more reliable yardstick
of improvement over time. A decent fitness test for a climber
needs to cover a range of different aspects of physical
performance in order to be of any value.
WRITING A TRAINING PLAN
Here’s an example of measurable factors – both climbingspecific and general fitness – to use in assessing yourself before
making your training plan and then, later, to measure gains.
1. Max chin-ups.
2. Max duration of hang on medium-sized hangboard hold X.
3. Find the smallest hangboard hold you can hold for
a minimum of six seconds.
4. Endurance – use a consistent, gently overhung route
at the crag or gym, a grade below your onsight level,
and lap it to failure measuring the number completed.
5. Max push-ups.
6. Max burpees in two minutes.
7. Max V-sits in two minutes.
8. Flexibility – measure your toe-touch distance,
high-step height, front- and side-splits distance.
This is just an example of a fitness test and you can tailor it to suit
your needs, but just remember to include all the aspects we will
be training such as power, endurance, flexibility, core strength and
general fitness.
With the fitness test in the bag, you can look at your results and
make a proper assessment of your current state and, using
that alongside time and assets, you can start looking at how to
construct an effective training plan. Remember though, you can lie
to everyone but yourself – the key here is honesty.
Having set goals and stared hard into the self-assessment mirror,
it’s training plan time. The first thing to do is grab a calendar and
mark the times you have available to train and
where those sessions will be.
Let’s return to Mr Climbero and walk him through making a
training plan. Mr Climbero wants to improve a couple of sport
grades. Like most of us he is cursed with working nine-to-five,
Monday to Friday. He has some free mornings and evenings and
can get to the crag two or three weekends a month. He marks in
his calendar a one-hour hangboard and Thera-band session at
home on Monday and Wednesday mornings and a climbing gym
session on Tuesday and Thursday evenings. He also locks in the
cragging weekends and on those that he can’t get out,
he commits to a Saturday gym session.
His training schedule could look something like this:
Monday Morning – Cardio, Core and Flexibility session
Tuesday Night – Gym Session
Wednesday Morning – Fingerboard and Cross-Training Session
Thursday Evening – Gym Session
Weekends – Either climbing at the crag or a gym session
The need to manage your time effectively can not be overstated.
This doesn’t mean only identifying time for training sessions
but - and here’s the rub - also articulating what you
do during that session.
At the moment Mr Climbero’s gym sessions are unstructured.
He rocks up with his friends and haphazardly does some routes
and boulders. Sound familiar? That’s because the normal person’s
‘training’ session goes like this: bumble about a little bit to warm
up, play around with your mates on boulders or routes until you’re
burnt out, then maybe do a token stretch. This is not an effective
use of time, nor is it training.
All good training sessions follow a similar trajectory, including a
light cardio warm-up, a warm-up stretch, gradual build-up towards
our target workout focus, a warm-down and a cool-down stretch.
This should be laid out in your mind before you begin, then make
sure you stick to it. Use your time to derive maximse benefit.
Naturally what your goals are and what your existing strengths
and weaknesses are will decide what you are training in any
given session. Over the coming issues we will go into the hows
of training power, endurance, or the oxymoronic-to-non-climbers
power endurance. The main thing is to target specifically towards
your objectives. Keep your eyes on the prize.
One caveat - many fall into the trap of going too hard too early.
It’s easy to get excited about a new training plan and go at it like
a bull at a gate only to give up within a fortnight because it’s
all too much. Start by rethinking your existing training sessions
to make them more effective, then as you settle into your routine
add extra sessions. Build volume and intensity incrementally.
HEAD TO THE
VERTICAL LIFE
WEBSITE
for an all-killer-nofiller workout complete
with a how-to video.
RE-EVALUATION
BONUS: THE ONE-HOUR KILLER SESSION
So, how do we know if it’s working?
Of course, ticking your project is a good sign, and you can use your
intermittent goals as markers of improvement along the way, but you
can also regularly re-test yourself against your original fitness tests.
The following is a one-hour training session you can do at home
with nothing but a hangboard, or at least a chin-up bar and an
edge to use for the endurance program. Not essential but helpful
would also be a yoga mat, a skipping rope and a Thera-band.
Keep a simple training diary and re-test yourself every few weeks
to discern if you are steadily improving or stagnating. If you’re not
improving or, worse, going backwards you need to look at your
training plan and re-evaluate its effectiveness. Over-training and
not resting enough? Training the wrong aspect of your climbing
(eg. building endurance when you really want to boulder harder)?
Training plans are dynamic. They require constant analysis,
revisiting and tweaking to adjust for what is and is not working.
This little workout packs a big punch and can be done any time I like to use this sort of thing in the mornings or as a quick blast
when I have a busy day and can’t unleash a full training session.
It takes time, dedication, consistency and patience to reap the
rewards of any training plan but each of us can benefit from better
time-management, a goal-oriented approach and a little bit of
discipline in our workout sessions. To break it down:
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
98
Set your goals.
Evaluate your skills, assets and time.
Lay out a training calendar with available sessions.
Plan each session to use your time productively.
Reassess regularly and make adjustments where necessary.
Reap the benefits of a more focused training plan!
There are six parts to the workout that in turn warm you up,
stretch you, work your entire body both in climbing-specific and
general conditioning ways and then warm you down. That’s all the
ingredients for a killer all-round workout for the climber on the go
right there. All the workouts, with descriptions and videos, are at:
www.athletebychoice.blosgspot.com
• Five minutes of cardio (skipping, jogging, jumping jacks,
exercise bike – anything, so long as it’s nice and steady).
• Five minutes of yoga / stretching (a few rounds of Sun
Salutations if you know how or a simple series of light
stretches to limber big muscle groups like calves, quads,
hamstrings, back, shoulders and chest).
• 10 minutes – 60 chin-up program. Set a timer and do three
chin-ups every 30 seconds for 10 minutes for a total of 60
pull-ups. If three is too many, start with one every 30
seconds, build to two as you get stronger, then three,
then four when that’s too easy, then five, then...
• 15 minutes – hangboard endurance program. Use a
medium-sized hold and hang it with both hands with your
feet up on a chair out in front of you. Hold this for one minute,
then rest for 30 seconds and repeat 10 times. Use a hold that
allows you to stay on for the full minute. Make sure you’re
feeling well pumped after the first few sets but can still make 10.
• 20 minutes - Total Circuit. A Total Circuit is a whole-body
strength and conditioning workout. There is a special one in
this article’s accompanying video for you to try out or you can
choose any of the killer circuits from the site. Basically, progress
through the 10 exercises, completing as many reps as you
can in a minute, then go through again for a 20-minute workout.
• Five minutes yoga / stretching. As for the warm-up either
yoga or light stretching as a cool-down.
There you have it. Everyone can find a spare hour somewhere
in their week and turn a small time window into a killer session
that will produce results. Now go get it! •
NEW
GEAR
PETZL
ELIA
In the bad old days the outdoor industry used to refer to creating
women’s gear as ‘pinking and shrinking’. No more. Now nearly
all companies purposely create gear for women. And so it goes
with the Petzl Elia, a new, women-specific helmet.
Built along similar lines to the Elios (a unisex model), the Elia
is sized for the smaller heads of women (52-58cm headband).
But its biggest innovation is for those with long hair, what Petzl
is calling the OMEGA headband system: essentially the headband
has been designed so that you can stick a pony-tail out the back.
This makes the Elia suitable not only for women, but for longhaired hippies and Fabio-types.
Instead of having the adjustment dial at the back like the Elios
(where your pony-tail would go), on the Elia the dials have been
shifted to the sides of the helmet, where you can easily adjust it
to get a perfect fit. Like the Elios, the helmet sits low, so you don’t
look like a mushroom head. The Elia comes in one size (285g) and
two colours: white and violet (which looks suspiciously pink to us).
WATCH
a video about the helmet.
Petzl Elia RRP$119.95
petzl.com.au
1 0 0 GEAR REVIEWS
101
BLACK
DIAMOND
FLIGHT
HARNESS
BD has just dropped its latest high-performance harness, the
Flight is designed for either the modern bolt-clipping sport climber
or those whose missions are very long and very lightweight.
Despite its light weight, the Dual Core XP construction
technique used to put the Flight together makes for
comfortable hanging if on your project you are reduced
from tickage to dogage. Mondo gear loops afford big
racking space, bombshell abrasion patches add durability,
the pre-threaded speed adjust waistbelt makes putting
the Flight on idiot-proof and extra attention has been paid
to the leg loops, which sport their own patented adjustment,
the trakFIT system. In this case punctuation is important,
it’s Flight over flight any day.
Black Diamond Flight Harness RRP $109.95
Distributed by Sea to Summit 1800 787 677
1 0 2 GEAR REVIEWS
blackdiamondequipment.com
PRANA
BRONSON
PANT
Sources tell us that the Bronson Pant from prAna is
‘The Sharma’s’ goto pant. ‘Nuff said really. We could end
this review here.
But we won’t.
The search for the perfect climbing pant is eternal, but in the
Bronson you might find something approximating it. These
pants are made from an abrasion-resistant micro-sanded
(you can just imagine the dwarves wielding their little
micro-sanders, singing Oompa-Loompa chain gang songs)
canvas fabric (98 per cent cotton and a crucial two per
cent Spandex). They have a gusseted crotch and a small
amount of stretch for those delicate high-steps, five pockets
and come in three colours: cargo green, charcoal and khaki.
These ones are sadly not pre-worn by The Sharma, but
apparently they can be picked up on eBay if you are a true
Sharma stalker.
METOLIUS
MAGNUM
CRASHPAD
Pads have a simple remit, to stop your easily broken body from
crashing into unforgiving ground. Given this, it makes sense then
to max-out the amount of ground a mat covers. The grandly named
Metolious Magnum takes this as its maxim so that unbundled
it has about the same sprawling footprint as Greater Melbourne.
With numbers like 122cm x 169cm x 10cm it makes a particularly fine
choice for the solo explorer who gets up high sans-spotter and wants
a generous target to lob off onto. She’s big in the carrying department
though so be careful with it on your back in strong wind that it
doesn’t morph into a sail and sweep you up and out of Kansas.
On the plus side, one bonus of its bigness is you don’t need to take a
mattress to the crag to get in your mid-arvo nap in supreme comfort.
The Magnum is durable and has all the expected bells and
whistles in the form of inner and outer pockets, shoe wiping mat
and thickly padded shoulder straps. Go big with the Magnum
Maxi-cure for loneliness.
prAna Bronson Pant RRP $99.95
Metolius Magnum Crashpad RRP $479
Distributed by Climbing Anchors (02) 6658 6063
expeditionequipment.com.au
metoliusclimbing.com
103
FULL
CLIMB OF MYSELF
POINT PERP
Point Perpendicular is the kind of place where the routes linger
long in the memory; cracks, faces and aretes climbed above the
churning sea far below. On my first trip there as a 16-year-old I
remember spending most of my time feeling terrified, but on later
trips I learned to love it, and when the Point Perp bug bites, it bites
hard. Of course, the problem with climbing at Point P was that
the routes were bloody hard to find, particularly because you are
always above the cliff rather than below it, and the old guide was
sadly lacking in that modern necessity, the photo topo.
But all that ends with Robert Dun’s lovingly put together Climb
Point Perp. As you can find in our interview with Dun on page
108, to get the necessary images for the topos he took the skies,
shooting images from a light plane. The result is a much more
user-friendly guide that allows routes to be easily located – these
alone make the guide worth buying.
Aside from the addition of photo topos, clearly a huge amount of
knowledge has been translated into the book. If a route receives
stars or a caution symbol then there is a short note saying why;
useful information at a place like Point P where the routes are
often ‘adventurous’. I also like the short sections at the start of the
guide describing the various styles of the main route developers.
Like artists having a particular style, the key new routers at Point
P all have their own signature style, from the ‘Choss Masters’
Ian Brown and Peter Blunt to the more modern approach of the
author and his partner Ivan Valenta. Other than that, the design
of the guide is simple, but clean, and it is illustrated with lots of
nice photos that will help you get inspired.
Point Perpendicular has been lacking such a great guide for
a long time, and there is no doubt that it will inspire a lot of people
to visit or revisit one of Australia’s great sea cliffs.
­— Ross Taylor
1 0 4 BOOK REVIEW
Climbing is a strange way to spend your free time. It has no clear set of
rules, or scoreboard. Participation is not dictated by financial means,
police-checked records or private school attendance. It entices an
incredible spread of the mentally sound and mentally unstable into a
common pastime. If climbing were colour, it would be a box of smarties.
Not surprisingly then there lies the same variety of stories, some of them
legendary campfire stories of the utmost brilliance. Enter Johnny Dawes,
British climbing legend. His most famous year in terms of climbing
exploits was 1986, when he established Britain’s hardest traditional leads,
culminating in his ascent of The Indian Face in Wales. Yet this book is not
just about climbing. It’s a self-analysis of sorts and the title speaks volumes.
The book shines with passages such as the original text of the Indian Face
saga, written by Dawes a week after the ascent, and insights into the mindset
that enables a 30m runout above a RURP tied off with two millimetre cord.
Move by move descriptions, reflections on why a particular shift in body
weight didn’t work or why cornering a car into a hairpin with the extra weight
of two German hitchhikers made it unsustainable are all part of the package.
Then there’s the history, tales that have become climbing folklore.
The rivalry between ‘The Beast’ (John Redhead) and himself; the mid-80s
scene in Stoney Middleton; hiking into Strone Ulladale (Outer Hebrides)
armed with a schoolboy’s suitcase, 100kg of gear and a bottle of White
Horse Whiskey; travelling to India with Joe Simpson to try the West Face
of Bhagarathi III; day-trip soloing on the Troll Wall in Norway.
The writing itself is not penned by your average novelist. Like the subject,
it is supremely colourful, creative and at times just plain bizarre, but this
is what makes this book so special. It’s like sitting down to a cup of tea
with the man himself.
Many of the photos are truly inspiring. One image which epitomises Dawes’
level of commitment is the classic shot by Neil Foster of him onsight soloing
‘Velvet Silence’ at Black Rocks in 1986 in poor conditions. No tell-tale chalk,
no holds, no rope, and a light sheen of lichen covering the holdless slab.
This is a book written by no ordinary climber, containing a life’s supply
of un-ordinary events. Like some of Johnny’s climbs, it will not appeal to
everyone, yet to some it will be a masterpiece. Johnny wrote in his final
account of his Indian Face ascent: “Gawt’s Indian Face is climbed. I can
rest and feel proud.” He should feel the same about this book.
­— Steve Kelly
By Robert Dun
by Johnny Dawes
Robert Dun, 2011 / RRP $39.95
Johnny Dawes Books, 2011 / RRP $25
www.pointperp.com
Johnnydawes.com
BOOK REVIEW 1 0 5
CLIMBING
DICTIONARY
by Matt Samet
The Mountaineers Books, 2011 / RRP US$14.95
www.mountaineersbooks.org
Whether peaking out on shiny new gear, one-upping each other over
flickering campfires, planning dream trips or deciphering route
descriptions, we climbers use a huge number of specialist words to
describe our pursuit.
Some stuff even lay non-climbers should know – granite vs sandstone, for
example – but often they don’t. There are false friends; bomber is not a
WWII plane, flash is not an act of sexual depravity, Elvis leg is not the lewd
gyration of a fat singer and ground fall, well actually, a ground fall really is
as shit as it sounds – falling and hitting the ground. Some stuff everyone
pretends to understand so they don’t look stupid, like the oxymoronic
power endurance, yet even then you need to know what you are pretending
to know about in order to pretend convincingly. Every subculture has
its complex and rich lexicon of exclusionary jargon that has outsiders
scratching their scones in bewilderment. Climbing is no different.
Language is important because it’s what we use to describe the
world around us. Not to nerd-out too hard, but language then is an
exploration of the particular way in which the world is framed by the
people who use it. It is a window into their reality.
Matt Samet’s Climbing Dictionary provides words, their etymology, a
usage note and sometimes an illustration. And the entries are the right
length to make this perfect sit-and-think fodder. The dictionary then, with
its attempt to catalogue the vernacular of the vertical life, shines a light
on our world. If you muse on its contents it provides a journey through
that world’s history, its technology, its sociology and its psychology.
This review might be a tad grandiose, but that’s the linguist in me. Our
words really are the connections between us. They are the stories that
inspire us, the knowledge that empowers us and the lore that unites us.
Sure Samet’s tome might be a little Sepo-centric but there is enough
meat in it that we Antipodeans can chew on to make it worthwhile.
1 0 6 BOOK REVIEW
— Simon Madden
The Caffeinator
THE
SAMPLE
LIFE
COFFEE CONSULTANT Johan von Shag
Climbers dream of living in the Blue Mountains or the Grampians with easy access to the crags we love.
The reality, however, is most of us are urban creatures who
spend equal time in climbing gyms and cafes as on cliffs.
From charging up on coffee in Blackheath, Horsham or
Berry before hitting the crag to a pre-gym session caffeine
hit, coffee is the unspoken hero in our lives. As the late,
great Wolfgang Gullich once said, “You don’t climb then
go for coffee, coffee is part of climbing.”
In coming editions we are going to breakdown all things
coffee - crag, city and all in between - meanwhile, here is
our first review of the best spots to get your fix:
SAMPLE COFFEE BAR
Reuben Mardan, ex-Mecca Espresso, is an obsessed climber
with more coffee than blood running through his veins.
He’s the mastermind behind Sample Coffee Bar, and,
together with head barista Karl Tabet, he serves up some
of the best coffee in Sydney right now.
The beauty of Sample Coffee Bar is, in addition to offering
its own wonderful blend the ‘Pacemaker’, it allows customers
to sample different blends and single estate/micro lot coffees
from different roasters from around Australia.
Since opening they have featured beans from 7 Seeds, Mecca
Espresso, Market Lane, Proud Mary, Supreme Coffee, Rueben
Hills, Coffee Alchemy and Small Batch Roasters.
On any given day, you’ll have the option of trying the ‘Pacemaker’
or a guest blend, filter or cold drip brew. There’s also a selection
of beans to buy for brewing at home or cliff.
It’s a small espresso bar with a handful of tables and chairs, but the
Surry Hills’ people-watching is great. High quality sweet and savory
baked goods are on offer, but the coffee is the true stand out.
And being masters of crag brewing, Reuben and Karl can advise
on beans and brewing gear, be it for a pre-project-send boost or a
campsite wake-up.
SAMPLE COFFEE
ADDRESS 1A/118 Devonshire St, Surry Hills
OPENING HOURS Mon to Fri – 7am to 4pm
IMPORTANT LOGISTICS
15MINS to SICG (St Peters) and ClimbFit (St Leonards).
30MINS to good bouldering in Sydney.
1.5HRS to the Blue Mountains
samplecoffee.com.au
CAFE REVIEW 1 0 7
Get to the Point
We speak to Robert Dun,
the editor of the new guidebook
to Australia’s pre-eminent
sea cliff, Point Perpendicular
IMAGES Robert Dun
1 0 8 Brendan Helmrich on Hungry Eyes (23), Seaside Area.
Guidebooks usually require a substantial commitment
of time and effort: what inspired you to take on the Point
Perpendicular guide?
I have often found that guidebook authors have some
kind of special connection with the areas they document is Point Perp a place of significance to you?
I lived in Wollongong for many years so Point Perp was my
local crag and I just loved the place. After I moved to
Newcastle I missed climbing there regularly and would talk
about it and the possibility of writing a guidebook a lot. In
the end my wife told me that I either had to write the book or
stop talking about it. Plus, traditionally the Point Perp guide
has been updated by whoever put up the majority of the
new routes since the last guide and in this case it was Ivan
Valenta and me. I am also a bit of a guidebook buff so when
the opportunity came to make one it was difficult to resist.
Do you have a favourite route or area?
Point Perp seems to polarise people, it’s either love it or hate it. I love
it. I never get tired of going there. I love the smell of the ocean and
the sound of the waves while I’m climbing. It isn’t just the climbing
either, visiting Currarong is like going back in time, and camping
at Honeymoon Bay in winter can be magic; quiet, secluded, empty.
It depends a bit on my mood but I can always tell how well I am
climbing by jumping on Bad Luck Streak (20) in the Lighthouse
Area. I’ve done it lots of times but I never really know how I’m going
to go on it. Sometimes it’s easy, sometimes it’s not, but it’s always
good. It’s also a crack and I have a bit of a soft spot for cracks.
FAR LEFT Rick Phillips climbing
Neptune (17), Lighthouse Area.
LEFT Ivan Valetta on
Jaws (19), Seaside Area.
RIGHT Geoff Woods on
Hello Dolly (18), Bayside Area.
You must have spent a lot of time out at Point Perp, do you have
any favourite memories?
I always enjoy myself but I’m afraid there aren’t any stand out
stories; although I do recall walking into the bombing range once
and coming across a huge crater right in the middle of the road.
I remember wondering which was the more pointless activity,
rockclimbing or shooting at targets?
The biggest improvement I notice from the previous guide is
the addition of aerial photo topos. It must have been tricky
getting these shots. How did you do it?
Knowing where you are on the cliff top in relation to the climbs
has always been a big problem at Point Perp. For this reason I
wanted to use topo photos that showed both the cliff top and face
in a single image. The only way to get these images was to take
photos from the air. I chartered a small plane and shot out of an
open window. I thought it would be fairly easy but I soon realised
that small planes travel at 160 Kph and wobble a lot. I ended up
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taking over 600 shots in less than 30 minutes and by the end of the
session I had some serious forearm pump from trying to hold the
lens still against the battering wind.
I noticed there is no history section, is there a particular reason
you left it out?
Point Perp was developed by a reasonably small number of
individuals and there’s a section at the start that has a blurb about
each group and their respective climbing styles. There are also
a few previously unseen photos of first ascents from the ‘80s. All
the rest of is included in the first ascent details. I didn’t include a
‘stories’ section because I don’t really know many good ones and
it’s easy to offend people, so I thought it best avoided.
Are there many more routes in this guide than the previous one?
There are over 70 new routes but overall there are 30 less routes
than in the previous guide. This is because in 2003 the Department
of Defence closed access to the bombing range so there are 100
routes that can’t be climbed anymore.
Every guidebook author generally knows the potential of an
area: does Point Perp still have a lot of scope for new routes?
There is still a huge amount of potential at all grades. All that is
required is a little more work, walking or muscles. Take your pick.
There is a lot of choss though, so choose wisely!
Do cars still get broken into regularly at the Lighthouse?
I haven’t heard of any for years. As part of the range upgrade the
Department of Defence installed a 24-hour manned security gate
at the entrance to the range and they record the number plates of
all vehicles that enter. These days it’s probably a lot easier to nick
stuff from the car park at Nowra!
You mention that you are a bit of a guidebook buff, what are
some of your favourite guides, and did you draw inspiration for
your guide from them?
Writing the guide was a great excuse to buy a bunch of guides
for the purpose of ‘study’. My favourite Australian guide has to be
the Arapiles Selected Climbs guide. Every route description is just
so accurate. It’s as if the authors have climbed each route in the
book ten times. It inspired me to get out and do some more route
checking to make the Point Perp guide as accurate as possible.
My favourite foreign guide is probably the one for Indian Creek.
I just love the action photos, especially the nasty offwidths!
It is unusual for such a small number of people to have
developed such a major area, do you think Point Perp attracts
a singular type of developer?
I don’t think Point Perp attracts a certain type of personality.
I suspect it has more to do with Point Perp development
requiring a bit more time and effort. It’s not that easy to wander
along the base of the cliff looking for new lines. Development
has tended to be done by locals who have had a bit more time to
spend at the crag.
You can see a review of the Point Perpendicular guide on page 104.
You can can buy a copy of the guide at
www.pointperp.com
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Athol Whimp back down on the
glacier after making an alpine-style
ascent of The North Face of Jannu
(7710m), Nepalese Himalaya.
Andy Lindblade
Athol Whimp
—19 6 1- 2 01 2—
He the one that grew from the land,
Over and over again on the ramparts,
Fissured, pushed against the sky and
Held to the wind by his quiet valiance.
Who else wakes in wonder about Athol?
The one cast from sands and snows and truth,
His heart, wrapped in bone and wrangled from
His love of all that has gone under his traveled limbs,
Holding, carving, and now collapsing back into
The scrabbled rocks, sliding with the rivers
Of grief he knows we hold.
Andy Lindblade
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