Arapiles Classics

Weekend of 17-18 October

Team Members:

Neil Monteith

Poul 'Danish' Christofferson

Nick McKinnon

Adam Demmert

Marcel (fire on hair!) ?

Ben ?

Calum McLellan

Simon Carter...

As you can see from the above list our little trips are growing bigger and bigger. After a good week of training in the Mill we were all firing for a weekend away. It was the usual organzied friday night meet up and drive. A funny thing happened whilst I was waiting for people to arrive. Someone buzzes my door at home and I ask them who it is on the intercom. They say 'Hi, its Ben here'. Not wanting to be rude, and thinking I had just forgotten this person's name (!??) I let him in. I opened the door to an obvious climber with a big pack. We both looked at each other for awhile and finally I said up 'do I know you?'. He said 'Oh sorry man, didn't Nick ring you and say I was coming over!'. Anyway he was a pommie that Nick had met at the gym and invited along for the weekend with the rest of us. As he was 30min early we quickly 'climber bonded' with a few tales and 'its a small world' storys. He has lived in Aust for about three years and climbed everywhere and with everyone. He spent heaps of time doing alpine routes in France with Tim Balla and has been to Frog a few times. The climbing world is sooo small. Anyway the rest of the crew arrived and we set out for the long haul to Arapiles. We stopped over at Horsham for supplies and didn't manage to find any decent 'reduced items' apart from two choc cakes. Oh well.

Paul and I were too lazy to put up our tents so we just crashed in the Gums campsite whilst the rest of the crew set up camp. We got to sleep at 1am.

Five hours later we awoke to stupid birds landing on our sleeping bodies. They were trying to get to the remains of the reduced item cakes we had eaten the night before. The birds would swoop down, sit on our backs, peck at the wrappers then fly away. Very annoying! We munched on assorted food and scoped out the campsite. It was fully packed. At least 100 climbers maybe more and it was a hive of activity.

Poul met a NZ friend of his Calum McLellan at the pines. they had climbed together for most of last year at Paynes Ford. He had just spent 10 weeks camping at Frog Buttress and doing heaps of routes. He started out on Clockwork Orange Corner (13) and ended up doing Green Plastic Comb (25). I think that was a major increase in grades. He raved about the place, I know I would be very bored of it within a week! He had been at Araps for three days and only done one climb.

We split into three groups. Marcel & Adam went off to do Euridyce, Nick and Ben went to do Thunder Crack and Paul and I went to do Cecelia. Both of us were feeling fairly sick from lack of sleep but I was feeling like a 22+ weekend. Cecilia 25m 22 is in the far right hand side of Central Gully. The route climbs an overhung yellow face on edges and finger locks to a small ledge, then finishes up a great roof and layback flake. I struggled up the start feeling quite nauses (spelling!!) just pulling off the crux move and landing on the ledge very pumped. After a good de-pump I managed to pull through to the top to some of the largest ring bolts I have ever scene. They were twin u-bolts about 20cm high and 1/2' thick. I felt very confident rapping off them! Poul got the second with no falls so it was a good start to the weekend. The rap route was down a route called Intransience 30m 24, which is desribed in the guide as a three star classic. I don't know about the three stars but it does look very nice and has a great funky, sporty start on big hecuo jugs. Its on natural gear though. It looked good so I had a quick top-rope of the bottom crux moves and got it first go. I may be back for a lead some time in the future!

Although both of us were now quite ill we forged on. We moved down to the buttress below Cecilia, Mari Buttress and Poul jumped on the two star Droop Street 30m 21. Rumour has it that it is a bit of a sandbag at the grade. If it was anything like its companion route, Electric Warrior, Poul was certinally in for a challange! He started well pulling off the lower travrese crux with a little runout. Next it climbed twin seams up a rounded arete much like Chinese Algerbra. He cranked up to about 15m to the crux and fell off as he got out of sequence. He wasn't impressed and felt like shit but still managed to get straight back on and finish the route no problems. I seconded and slipped off on the lower traverse so made Poul feel better! It a great route and one I will be returning to repeat. The rock is super smooth and very nice. Poul placed about five cams in a row in the first 15m as the crack flanges alot.

We had a little lie down and waited for the standard five minutes of rain to pass before we planned our next move. We both felt to needed to get in shape for Ozmandias so we decided on a mulit-pitch. We choose Wall of the Afternoon Sun on the left side of the Watchtower face. Its a 138m 19 with four pitches. by this time it was begining to get very hot, it was around 30' so was very sticky for us Vic climbers! We sculled a 1.5 bottle of water in about 30 seconds and set out for our afternoon climb. I got the first pitch, a magic delicate traverse on really frictional rock. No decent jugs, a couple of bolts and some big runouts made sure I was wide awake! I belayed in a slabby corner off a few cams in pockets. As Poul got to my belay some very dark clouds started to emerge over the mountain. Stupid silly me was only in t-shirt and shorts (again!). If we wern't training for Buffalo we would have bailed for sure but our commitment forced us onwards. Paul started up the slab above as the first few raindrops started to spatter down. He kept going, doing friction slab moves in heavy rain until he got to the belay stance. I have no idea how he managed to stay on! At one point the sun was blaring across from the east as rain bucketed down. It was very odd, I was hot getting sunburnt whilst been absultly satutarued by a thunder storm. To top it all if started hailing whilst a stunning rainbow appeared over the pines campsite. In typical fashion this stunning freak weather lasted 5 minutes and disapeared. Pouls belay position didn't appear to match exactly the description in the guide. The guide said 'tiny right facing corner' whilst we were below a 90 degree handcrack corner. I set out just the same and immediatly ran into problems about 3m off the belay ledge. Poul was positioned directly below me and tied in so he couldn't move. I started to pump out whilst my hand started to slip from the crack. I couldn't place pro and I could invision myslef spearing onto Pouls head. I just managed to do a sloping mantle move left and getting out of Pouls way. The next bit of the pitch was very in-distinct. there were three options up a slabby wall. All looked really hard and with little pro. I chose a line on the left which was most worn. At this stage I had un-knowingly climbed into Take Five 135m 20. I did some crazy runout slab moves and ended up on a good ledge. What was suposed to be a 20m pitch turned into a 40m sustained slab fest! Paul decided to finish up Take Five and led a scary slabby start then a beutiful juggy wall for 40m to the Kitten Wall ledge. It was a fantasic climb, very different for Arapiles. We simul rapped off Watch Tower face in the fading light and headed back to camp. Poul started to feel very tired and promptly fell alseep at 6pm. The mosquito's were out in force and we all got very bitten. Next time we are bringing the rid! We dined on a mega vege pasta dish and talked until late.

I awoke the next day feeling much better. Its amazing what 10 hours of sleep can do to your motivation. Nick and I decided do go up to the Bluffs whilst Paul and Ben did Auto De-fae and Adam and Marcel did King Rat. In my usual style I didn't warm up and jumped staright on Scorpian Corner 20m 22 which I cruised and easily ticked the onsight. I felt very in-control on this two star corner. the bottom half had a big overhnmag which was really funky. It was a lot more juggy than it looks from the ground! Next Nick led up the pitch above Scorpian Corner, the route Scorpian which Poul led several weeks ago. Again I seconded bringing with me a hammer to try and remove Adam's stuck Cam which he left there from yesterday. I bashed and smashed but to no avail. We left it for the 'permenants' who had more time on their hands! We headed back to camp for lunch to try and meet up with Poul and Ben for some aiding but alas they were having an epic. Whilst I waited I managed a quick solo of Picallo 40m 11 on the Organ Pipes. Its a great route and I even scored some booty off it.A very easy to pull out rock #1 in prime condition!

Neil onsights Scorpion Corner (22)

I also had a little chat to Simon Carter who was taking some photos of a girl doing Hit the Deck (27) at Dec Crag. His new coffee table book is coming out any day now. Marty managed to get a copy this week so look out for it. It retails for about $40.

Instead of waiting Nick, Adam, Marcel and I decided to do some other routes. Nick was keen to do Squeakeasy so jumped on. He got through the crux (and I got some great photo's) and fell off 1m short of a huge rest ledge. Ohh well, it is mega sustained 22. I then did Quisling 44m 19 next to Squeakeasy and just got the onsight. It has really tricky shallow jam moves over a small bulge. I also scored another free wire off this route! Pouls aid hammer is already starting to pay for itself! I then took the plunge and jumped on Squeakeasy myself. The climb follows a system of pockets and finger locks up a vertical orange wall on emacualte rock. Easily one of the best 22's at Araps. Having been on it before in 1996 it wasn't an onsight but it darn felt like it! I just pulled through Nicks high point and got the big rest ledge. Another 22 bites the dust!   Poul and Ben still hadn't returned so Nick and I went off to do some aiding. I chose a line, The Undertaker 25, on Castle Crag. This is the route with Claws infamous scribble 'baxter is a shit' under it. Its a very thin overhung crack about 20m high. The start moves were quite techo on numerous RP 1's and 0's. Not much off a chance of any of it holding a fall. My aim was to not use any of its fixed pins or bolts and not to use any cams. I succeded with a few dicy aid moves. It was maybe A2- or something. My aid techninque is fairly good know. Nick then had to second as the light faded away. having never used ascenders before he took awhile and had to do the last bit completely at night with no head torch! Try removing RP's from recessed cracks in the pitch black! He did a fine job of it. Our rescure party arrived with head torches and we sorted gear and headed for home leaving Araps at 8.30pm. We arrived back in melbourne at 1am. Don't you hate that! We all went to the Mill last night for a mega bouldering session. there are so many hard core climbers there. There were at least 20 of us all pulling hienous problems, campassing and generally pumping ourselves stupid. I started doing some 'front lever' training for roofs. Very tuff stuff. I also purchaced my own skyhook and some other little bits of aid stuff. Poul and I set a date for our Ozmandias mission. It will happen on the 27th, 28th, 29th and 30th of Novemeber. We plan to do the Direct version with four pitches of A2+ and will be on the wall for three days. That means we need to bring up enough food, and water for two nights. We all went to the Vege Bar in Brunswick Street for dinner and I discovered something very cool. Poul and I have been looking for a cheapo solution to a haul bag. A real one cost in excess of $350 so it way out of our price range. Anyway walking to dinner we passed a set of mini recycling Wheelie Bins! They are the perfect size and shape. they are about 2/3 the size of a normal bin and would hold about 40 litres! Now we just have to do a night mission to steal one and set it up as our haul bag. The walk to the top of the North wall at buffalo is only about 500m so we can literally just wheel it along the path then lower it down on its wheels during the raps! It is such a brilliant solution and will look so cool in the photos!

Nick on Squeakeasy (22)

Thats it for me! We are off to Staplyton this coming weekend for some more big wall action!