Damage Done with Tom the Brit

Weekend of the 5th of December 1998

Climbers

Neil Monteith

Gareth Llewellin

Tom Briggs (UK)

Two weeks ago I had arranged with Gareth to meet me at Troopers Creek on the Saturday and go climbing on the weekend. Nick and the rest of the normal crew went off to Arapiles to start mountaineering training for New Zealand. They did some crevasse rescues (between the Organ Pipes?) and some Glacier Travel Practice (along the slick base of Brolga?). It would have been very funny to watch!

Luckily Gareth was indeed camping at Troopers Creek when I awoke on the Saturday morning. He is not the easiest person to keep in contact with - I think he checks his email once a month or something! Gareth's current climbing partner is a pommy guy called Tom from Sheffield. My first impression was him sitting eating pancakes and chuffing on a cigarette. Writing him off as a bumbly Brit I was soon stunned to find that he had just ticked Pythagarous Theorem (26 2 tries) and Archemdies Principle (26 3 ties) at Eureka Wall the previous day. Other impressive ascents he has done in Australia include Monkey Puzzle (28 3 tries?) and numerous 27's on Taipan Wall. What is it with Brits? they are always doing such unhealthy things to their bodies, live in a country where you can only climb for a couple of months and then just roll over to Aust. and tick all our mega classics. Both Gareth and Tom were looking quite worse for wear. Gareth has taken up the full time feral image, his hair is fully dreaded and his pants had so many holes in them they were falling off.

Gareth the feral

Tom's wasn't much different, his pant were almost in four quarters. They both were in a state of shock and the true amazingness of the previous day's climbs. Tom rated them as the best two routes he has done in Australia, better than anything on Taipan or Araps. High praise indeed. I may have mentioned this before but the wallabies at Troopers Creek campsite are the tamest I have ever seen. Last time I was there I was letting them come right up to me, this time I attempted to pat them and they fully just sat there. One wallaby let all three of us fully pat and scratch it as it just sat there. It must have been drugged! If I was a tribal hunter gatherer I could have just hit it on the head as I was patting it. These wallabies are not scared what so ever.

I managed to snap them out of their trance and drag them into Centurion Walls. I managed to get completely lost and never found the marked track we laid out last time. Instead I bashed through solid thorn bushes for a good 30 minutes. The heat has finally hit Victoria, I was sweating like a pig by the time we reached the cliff. Tom was immediately drawn to the far right end of the cliff and the 'impossible' looking 60' overhung orange wall. He eyed several good holds and decided to rap down it for some absiel inspection. Whilst he set his ropes up I jumped straight on my nemesis project Damage Done. This time I brought a larger selection of gear and also some slings. I cruised the scary start, placed the vital cams in the break and cranked up to the finger lock, pulled through placing the vital wire and hellhooked up and grabbed the two finger pocket. Struggling at this point I clipped the bolt and took a rest. I was climbing well, I was past the crux and had taken only one rest. Three more rests later I made it to the top. I began to think that this project might even go today! Gareth convinced me to have a rest and jump back on it. I took his advice, placed some natural pro just above the lip of the roof and rapped off. It was quite scary lowering off a few cams when the first bit of the rap is jumping off the lip of a monstrous roof. You don't touch any rock the entire way down and end up on about 5m away from the base. It's very overhung!

Tom found several good holds on the route he rapped down and reckoned there was only one hard move. To me it looked like the whole thing was a super project. Mr Tom has vision, that's for sure. After an extended lunch session (Tom had a few more cigarettes!) I jumped back on Damage Done and cruised up to my high point, cranked the moves to below the roof, found an awesome rest just under the roof then cranked the final roof to get the first ascent! I almost sketched out on the last couple of moves. I did the big lunge to get the jug flake on the lip and missed and only got a little crimper. I stuck it, then lunged again getting the proper hold. In my haste in lunging my feet fully cut loose and I was swung one hand on the lip of the 3m roof. Very exciting indeed! This is my hardest new route I have done. I think 24 is the right grade. Tom seconded cruising through the lower crux, finding the thin mantle under the roof hard then proceeded to do the roof backwards. From my belay stance I first saw a set of feet come over the lip. He managed to get a good foot jam on the lip and hang in space. Show off! He confirmed the grade.

Tom seconds Damage Done (24) on FFA

I set up a toprope on the severally overhung heuco filled wall right of Left Hand Black. Similar to some of the routes on Spurt Wall @ Taipan this wall looked very hard. The crux seemed to be a big horizontal dyno from a heuco to a jug on the lip of the first bit of the roof. Toproping it wasn't easy, as soon as you fell off it was a guaranteed 10m pendulum out from the cliff. Not the greatest setup for working the moves! I got about 4m off the ground but was stumped by a big throw to a sidecling. Tom jumped on and got the move, he then cranked to the first of the larger pockets. The climb really tricks you, from the ground it appears vertical but when your on it it gets steeper and steeper the higher you go. The 'big' pockets were in fact crap and Tom was screwed so we bailed off the route. I think it might go at 28+ or something! I think if a guy who has done Monkey Puzzle couldn't do it it might be a bit tough for me.

Tom works the route right of Left Hand Black

Whilst Tom had a sleep Gareth and I checked out the cliffs above Centurion walls. All we found was an amazing labyrinth of choss. One cave would have awesome sport routes - if only the rock didn't turn to sand when you touch it. There are three natural pro routes hidden amongst this choss. Scary thought that someone actually climbed this utter skank. I didn't find a single potential climb in many hundreds of metres of rock. It's funny how there can be good cliffs and bad rock cliffs literally within a hundred metres of each other.

I then jumped back on Centrifugal Force's direct start and got severally whipped. It was mega hard, just as I remembered. I only tried the move twice then bailed up Left Hand Black getting it clean. It is such a cool sport route.

Tom decided to check out the bouldering potential of the wall below Left Hand Black. In the space of an hour he had cleared the base and established two classic problems, one V1 and one about V3?. He started working eliminates and got several that were really hard. Some awesome pockets pulling and sloper moves, very similar to Taipan Wall. Lots of weird body position and severe lat stresses. By the end of our bouldering session the area looked like a bouldering super crag (only about 5m wide!), it was all chalked up and the base was entirely cleared of rocks and vegetation. There are quite a few projects for the future around the same wall.

Tom boulders

On Sunday I dragged Gareth and Tom up to the Promised Land crag near my Lunar Crag. I needed to get a photo of Gareth doing the classic arete route Chequered Flag (22) for Bill Andrews new guidebook to the area. I have already sold four of my photos to him and he wants more so I am shooting as much as possible! The climb is a very gritstone climb up an almost featureless arete. It involved lots of struggling layaway friction stuff. Gareth took a few falls so I reckon it must be a sandbag as he seconded Tom on the 26's only a few days previously. I got some great shots but won't have them developed until I get back from Brisbane in early January. I did a reanactment of Adams fall as I attempted to downclimb from the ledge I was taking photos from. I had solo climbed up this horrid offwidth to get there and it was impossible to downclimb. I tried my best but got stuck, suddenly my foothold/jam snapped and I plummeted five metres to the ground falling through a tree. I was very very sore and scratched but okay. Nothing broken! That little fall meant I left the guys early to go home. On the way back I checked out a crag near Halls Gap called Wall of China. It only has about 10 climbs but they all look really great pocketed face routes with good bolts. Most are around grade 20 so are perfect for me. On the walk in I went on the ugliest piece of National Park track I have ever been on. The tracks goes up a gorge called The Grand Canyon (a very small version!) which was really nice. Its a pity the NP had built a huge metal walking structure over the top of the boulder filled creek including metal handrails, ladders and steps. The walk up the creek would be easy for any able bodied person but instead now any cripple can walk in. It didn't help that the entire structure was shiny silver. Some of the handrails were inserted into the rock direct. They can't complain about climbers bolts when they have installed 20cm diameter handrails into the cliff. The entire structure looked only about 5 years old. Very dodgy and embarrassing.

That's it for me!