Tag: climbing

Categories
climbing general

Blast from the climbing past

Seeing as I’ve been sitting around at home with a sick little one – and not feeling so crash hot myself – I’ve been going through a lot of old photos and videos. I’m mostly trying to get a little film/slideshow cut together from our Moab trip earlier this year, but got sidetracked with our climbing trip to Tonsai Bay, Thailand, way back in February 2004. So here’s a mix of photos and footage from that trip! Jack Johnson playing in the background because that was the only CD that the bars along the beach ever seemed to play, and I’m pretty sure we heard it hundreds of times over the month we were there.


A month long climbing trip at Tonsai Bay, Thailand (including Megan's epic ascent of Cafe Andaman 7b/5.12b – I'll never climb that hard again!)

Categories
canada climbing general

perhaps my ice climbing trips are jinxed this season?

Unfortunately this time the jinx did not take itself out on me, but my hapless climbing partner. We drove to Haffner Creek, changed into boots, loaded ourselves up with climbing gear, hiked in to the climbs, picked a likely looking first climb, climbing partner racked up and started leading.

The ice was quite hard, the climb was very vertical, and climbing partner started to get pumped and shaky, attempting to place an ice screw that just wouldn’t bite. Front bail of one of climbing partner’s crampons popped off, and climbing partner rapidly went from being a few metres up on the ice to being on the ground.

Luckily he was falling onto snow and his legs were fine, but unluckily he nicked himself in the face with his tool on the way down. Meanwhile the other tool was still up in the ice. And a lot of blood.

 

Kind man bouldering up to retrieve the tool

 

After the lone tool was rescued we packed up and drove home. A hospital visit and two stitches later and he was as good as new again.

 

Post-hospital with a couple of stitches under the left eye

 

So we dashed off to the Junkyards for a couple of hours of laps on a toprope – and ended up getting some climbing in after all.

Categories
climbing general

mr stumpy

The next day it stopped raining and all the Stumpy Tailed lizards (a.k.a. Shinglebacks) came out to play in the sun.

 

 

And so we climbed a long climb, which was all good until on the second pitch Pete started complaining about how it was difficult to think over the noise of the bees. Then he realised there was a beehive a metre from his head, so he rapidly chose another course. It’s generally unpleasant coming up against creepy crawlies on a cliff face – you invariably have very few escape options available to you.

Categories
climbing general

climbing in the rain at the arapiles

Ignoring the forecast of rain, I figured that it would probably be dry anyway. After all, it never rains at Arapiles. However, I had forgotten to take into account that with the change in government had come a change in weather patterns – since Kevin Rudd broke the drought, it just hasn’t been the same. The bare dirt has gone, to be replaced by actual green stuff growing from the ground – the paths to the climbs are festooned with daisies! And the cliffs themselves seem to be developing a healthy amount of foliage.

 

 

But anyway, it rained. There was a lot of this:

 

Megan (at the base of the cliff) shelters from the rain under a rope bag

 

And this:

 

Pete’s tongue shelters from the rain under a rope bag

 

And occasionally some of this:

 

“Wave your hands in the air like you just climbed Trapeze (11 ~ 5.7) in the rain!”

 

Categories
canada climbing

chronologically speaking

A visual diary of my afternoon/evening:

 

I am at work. I look at Mount Bourgeau.

 

 

I am at Mount Bourgeau. I look at work.

 

 

I go from Mount Bourgeau back down to work.

 

In between, I look around at the mountains and the yellow aspen, and listen to the wind blowing through the trees, and I climb and do not fall despite the strange slanting of the rock which gives the disconcerting sensation that the mountain is casually shrugging you off.