TR: Mt Buffalo, I hope this inspires many more memorable adventures for the rest of the year.

Attendees: Mike and James.

To me adventurous climbing is where its at. It doesn’t have to be dangerous or hard. Just a full day out in a spectacular location where you can get up high. To me that’s real rock climbing. Summer brings longer days and potential for longer climbs, but the enjoyment goes down when I get cooked. Also I don’t think I look so good in red.

I’m eager to poke around the Warrumbungles but a trip in summer would probably leave me wrinkly sun-dried. Buffalo provides a cooler alpine option and granite slabbing is something I don’t get to do much. Mike had time to go on the Australia day long weekend but wasn’t able to make the trip when others had planned to go at the beginning of February, so I agreed to join him.

We left Sydney at around 4:30pm on Friday and arrived at the river near Porepunkah at about 1am. Mike slept in the car and I stretched out next to the river. With a dead rat just up the road and a lot of low ground cover I thought I might have a few furry friends that night but they didn’t come to visit.

The view from the park entrance

We drove up the mount to Lake Catani for breakfast then headed out to the Cathedral for a bit of climbing. In the afternoon we had planned to scope out the gorge and Where Angels Fear to Tread (17) before making a run at it the next day, my main reason for coming this far. I was skeptical but Mike assured me we would be back to the car for lunch so I postponed my need to unblock myself and didn’t bring much water or food up to the crag. Big mistake. Read the rest of this entry »

Looking down Megalong Valley from Mr Big

Disclaimer:  I have no idea how to use this thing so if it comes out weird I apologise.

Tom, Kate, Lachlan and I (Sean) set out early Saturday morning, as the second dust storm in a week settled across a Sydney morning.  We could have taken it as an omen for a week filled with unusual happenings and twists, but instead we lamented this was the lame little brother of the first dust storm.  The trusty tarago, stuffed with gear, chuffed up the hills as we watched the Sydney disappear into a mustardy haze below us.

The Tarago already to go

After stopping at Blackheath for pies and supplies we headed to Mount York campground and pitched our tents, including Kate’s Sad Tent.  After only the first night Sad Tent was abandoned by Kate, and put on suicide watch as result.  We then hit possibly the worst crag any of us had been to at New York.  As the temperature dropped and the sun set we all through it would be a great idea to go for some night bouldering.  Unfortunately we had not reconed the area earlier.  The highlight was definitely Pinkie’s raincoat. Read the rest of this entry »

By Fiona Cunningham aka. HexKisser
with a few additions by Georgi Knox aka TradFace.

The SURMC Women’s Trip for semester 2 began bright and early on Saturday morning with Fiona and Georgi cruising over to the Ledge to find Katie, Kate and Aline waiting amongst the hockey players for their ride to Barrenjoey. After a short stop in a North Sydney bakery for coffee and snacks (eat your heart out, Blackheath Bakery!) the girls motored up to Palm Beach in perfect weather and then headed across the beach, through the water and up to the crag.

The high tide approach

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SURMC were victorious for the second year running in the annual interclub climbing competition, becoming the first club to win the newly introduced “Manky Cam” trophy. Highlights for our club included winning both of the team challenges and having several of our climbers placing in the individual categories. The team challenges provided much entertainment and great team spirit as each club urged their representatives on for both a tent setup race and a ropes pursuit course.

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The SURMC annual climbing comp was held on Wednesday 19th of August and it was another great event. Even those who didn’t want to climb competitively were able to enjoy trying a range of new problems and challenges set specifically for the event, with the highlight definitely being the novelty challenges such as blindfold climbing, climbing with the fitball and climbing without using any handholds. A free BBQ was also provided for all participants. We have to thank Phil from the Ledge in particular for setting the problems and generally organising everything as well as the other Ledge staff, Pete and Lelia for firing up the BBQ and making sure everything ran smoothly. Thanks also to Stratton, Katie and Ilana for organising the food for the BBQ.

On one other note, we have the interclub comp coming up on the 2nd of September, which is very soon. We’ll be taking on the clubs from UTS and UNSW and we need everyone to come along and get involved so we can retain the title we won last year in the innaugral competition. The format will be similar but expect even wilder challenges as well as team events and another BBQ.

                 Read the rest of this entry »

Last Saturday (1/8) we kicked off our climbing trips for the semester with a laid back day of bolt clipping at Shipley Upper. The weather was just about perfect except for a bit of wind later in the day and everyone had the chance to get a good session in. In the morning the grey slab area was popular, with most of the lower grade routes situated there, but after lunch the action was centred on the Jack High straight area. Tom set off up “Lardy Lady’s Lats” and Ian was positioned at the anchors on “Jack High”, preparing to capture some photos of the action. I also managed to get a box seat to watch Tom get into a horrendous teetering mantle position as he attempted to get onto the narrow ledge containing the anchors. After much swearing and not too little shaking he managed to grab that sidepul and balance his way up, it was all I could do to resist reminding him of his epic on “Scorpion” at mount Arapiles last year.

It was a good turn out and everyone had an enjoyable day, capped off by fish n’ chips at Blackheath. I look forward to seeing everyone out there on future trips.

Michael

Photos by Ian Conway Lamb

Our Easter pilgrimage to Mt Arapiles begins with a mad rush to get on the road. With around 13 hours of driving ahead of us, everyone is keen to beat the worst of the Easter traffic and start putting the kilometres behind us. However, despite the overabundance of nervous energy associated with way too much drooling over the glossy new guidebook, plans to leave at 5:30 or 6pm were inevitably delayed, and the first half hour on the road got us 200m along Mountain St to the intersection at Broadway (that’s right, just a stones throw from uni). Despite this setback, and the best efforts of Georgi’s navman to send us to Albury (it didn’t know about 90% of the roads we used on the way, Fail!), Dean, Georgi and I (Michael L) managed to roll into the Pines campground at midday on Easter Friday and carved out a small space amongst the sea of tents for the SURMC campsite. We were quickly followed by the double D (Dave D), Jimbo (James H) and Emily in the double D’s car, while Mick and Sean arrived several hours later after taking the slow road (despite leaving earlier, a classic first timers mistake). Others arriving over the following days were Pete, Gavin, Jesse, Fiona, Tim, Strat, Dave M and Mike.

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Serendipity Canyon at Mt Wilson Blue Mountains, Saturday 4th March 2009.

Attendees: James Henderson (author), Dave Dearnley (trip leader), Kate Randall and Eugene Tam.

Originally the intended canyon was Lower Bowens Creek North, however a number of factors influenced leader Dave to change to Serendipity including; our leader not having done Bowens Creek before, the other three members not having done any canyoning before, Bowens Creek apparently involving more walk in/out and a week or so of rain preceding this trip.

Eug, Kate and myself had arranged to meet Dave (who would be driving) at Pennant Hills train station at 6:37am. At 6:37am Eug and myself alighted the train and peered up and down the dimly lit station looking for a shape resembling that of Kate. As the train pulled away it quickly became apparent that Kate would not be meeting at the prearranged point in space and time. A quick phone called awoke a sleeping Kate in Petersham. Read the rest of this entry »

A Trip Report by ET

Role Call:

It began for me at 5:30am in the morning. Having no one to chauffeur me from my place to the crag, I was forced to wake up at this ungodly hour and walk to the station to get to the Ledge… only to miss the train I was aiming for. When I make it to the Ledge I find most the group already there, some looking better than others but for the most part looking like battle weary prisoners of war as opposed to the happy cheery group of bumblies that can’t contain the anticipation of doing their first lead. Mike’s birthday being the night before (and the drinks that came with it) may had something to do with it. I too was at the party, though I did leave a little early since there was climbing to be done at Medlow Bath, place I’ve never been to before, but I digress. Read the rest of this entry »