mt kuring-gai

well, not a big update... spent the last few days doing some wedding planing and surfing in some ok surf but today I made it up to Mt Kuring-gai with Serge. It's a new crag with lots of nice ring bolts and lots to offer a low grade climber like myself! Had a good drive up, only 50 mins of so away and 5 mins later we had made our way through the sparse bush to the top of Fossil Crag, which Serge proceeded to fall down... well sort of. We kicked off with short Vandstone the Vampire (16) a well protected sports route with some fun moves. 

We had decided to hit up Mt Kuring-gai for based on it being a well drying crag, important after a very wet few days. And... I was nice and dry, but the rain had brought out THE LEECHES! I hate these little fuckers! We discovered them after we had waded through the waist deep ferns at the base of the crag (hoping for no snakes) as we found our next climb - Legoland * (16). With dozens of leeches seemingly coming from everywhere we made the decision to bail. I climbed up and from the top, hauled the pack then belayed Serge up to the nice dry upper crag. What relief, though I think Serge hates leeches more than me (if thats even possible!) It's a shame we had to leave that spot, as we both really enjoyed the climbing. (though we both thought the grading between the two 16s wasn't that consistant, we both found VtheV a bit harder)

We walked back up to the car and decided that we should check out the other crags whilst there, hoping for no leeches... So we made our way along the fire trail and scrambled down to the Motocross Wall. To our relief it the bottom was a lot dryer - with no leeches! We kick off on Extinction Never Felt So Good (17), the move off the second ledge proved much trickier that it looked! Afterwards we just stuffed around on the bouldery starts of some nearby harder climbs and called it a day. (a good day!)

Serge with the main Fossil Crag wall on the left - note the thick leech supporting fern life!

The overgrown base of Fossil Crag

Our first climb of the day, Vanstone the Vampire (16)

It goes up the middle of the wall.

Jenolan Caves

Today we visited the Jenolan Caves, I've been wanting to go there since moving to Sydney (over a decade ago!)... and I wasn't disappointed! Overall it capped off a nice low-key, relaxing weekend very nicely!
The caves are located on the edge of the Kanangra-Boyd Wilderness Area in a very severe landscape, making for a great drive in. The rock is limestone eroded by acidic rainwater which seeps through the rock slowly dissolving bits of the limestone. After a great guided tour we drove out to gape across the Kanangra Walls.

pics in manly

Took the slr out for a walk with Maria the other night..... pics say more than words :)

more barrenjoey!

Good times last week... made it up to the ever scenic barrenjoey crag twice :) first with Serge, then later in the week with Renee. Both days were great for me, I got up what I was after for that day, firstly with Serge, Pledge a Legend ** (14) and Serge climbed Marsupial Smearer ** (18) on a top-rope - nice work by Serge, all I got was sore finger tips on that one! Later in the week I returned with Renee and despite the cold, had a great time too. Most of our efforts were spent on the tricky start of Cosmic Ecology ** (14) which, due to erosion is a fun bouldery start - after which the climb is straight forward with easy pro.

How can you have a bad day at a crag like this??

Hauling my fat ass up Cosmic Ecology
Yay Hexes!

Tropico ** (15) which Renee & I climbed a few weeks ago, goes up the arete, crux at the 2 bolts on the upper right side - nice & airy!

piddo & narrowneck with dave

I've been stoked to be getting out with me mate dangerous dave a bit too - two weeks ago to Mt Piddington where we headed to the marvelous Flake Crack area, which stars, well, Flake Crack (17) a stellar lay-back flake, which we top-roped. I'd love to lead this in the near future! I led a coupla easy routes and we mucked around top-roping a few others. I'd love to get back and climb Tombstone Wall (15), it's been beckoning me since I first layed eyes on it a  few years ago. Sorry, but no pics that day.
On Friday, Dave & I returned to the Blueys, to hit up Narrowneck near Katoomba. We rapped without the guide and climbed a variation of one of the 100' Slab Direct (14) starts with the remainder of the original route. Afterwards on the walk back to the car we decided to climb an easy little crack we had spotted on our arrival, only 12m or so of easy climbing but it was enjoyable. I can't find any details on the route but it was roughly grade 10 with easy pro. I'm sure it's been climbed many times over, given it's position right by Technicolour Dreams and the access trail. Enjoying that, we rapped back down to check out the wall to the left. I took a fancy to the hanging arete to the left over TD, so I launched up to traverse to it... the pro was rather shoddy in sandy breaks so I reversed from a third the way along the traverse. The climbing was not technically hard, but position was rather exposed with nasty fall potential - and I had no idea if there was any pro at all once I reached the arete! On the ground I convinced myself that it'd go so I jumped on again, this time getting far better gear in on the traverse. And to my satisfaction I found a great gear spot for my lovely 3.5 Friend, clipped it, breathed a sigh of relief and turned around to give myself a rather sharpened sense of the emptiness behind me! Talk about exposure! It took a fair bit of composure to leave my little (protected!) foot ledge and to my dismay the pro opportunities were slim, but with easy climbing I headed up and topped out - thrilled to bits! Now I've gotta try & find out more info on this route, as I'm guessing it's been climbed before... but we'll see :) Dave then followed and we sat on the top ledge for a bit to gather our wits/wish for a beer!

Dave rapping down 100' Slab.

The hanging arete route

The view from the top!



















Good times!

a little climbing fill-in

Well, the good news is that with work rather slow, I've managed to get in lots of climbing lately! I'm really enjoying getting out there and can feel myself improve. Best of all is that I'm getting a decent amount of trad climbing in - and getting more trad gear! So, some pics from Feb/March;

Thats me on Noodle (15) at Mt York. At lovely sports route in a great location with lots of air beneath.

....me topping out at the anchors...

...and Maria on a top-rope...

We also got up the Barrenjoey a few times, here Maria is belay-queen whilst....

...Renee heads up Carrie Bradshaw (14).

Maria on the same.

Axls are a GO

Well, a few months back when I had a whiff of a chance for a ski (never eventuated :( ) I got all excited and mounted up my old, shitty, shitty K2 Public Enemy's with my shiny new Axl bindings. I mounted them onto some threaded inserts that I installed in the ski so I can pull them off and use them on multiple skis... in the meantime, they sit waiting for the snow to come ~ and it's on its way! Light snow falls last Thursday have me thinking of snow again........... so I got dangerous dave around & wee mounted up some of his old skis with some touring bindings (naxo's), so we are ready to go, pending snow.