After last weekend’s feeling of spring we got hit by another strong front bringing gales and heavy downpours, this put paid to the before work early morning session at Welly Dam. Of course being a public holiday on Monday it also threatened to stay with us over the whole long weekend. So I resided to the idea of not getting out this weekend but I did have a few garden jobs to sort out in-between the rain showers. So I pottered doing stuff indoors avoiding the garden work until midday came when Craig asked what I was up to, and within a couple of hours I was once again sat on a rock face belaying. By now I hope that you may be able to suss out the area I am climbing by the rock texture, but if not I was back at Willyabrup:
Now Craig gets out for a climb once in a blue moon, but he is a fit bugger with his mountain biking and swimming so was happy to climb anything. That said I like to climb lead for lead so we decided to start on one of only a few of the multi-pitch options here and that is also a reasonable grade. Sirius also happened to be the route we finished on when I last was at the main area, and that was when Steve didn’t quite manage to lead it. Not surprisingly with a nightmare forecast there was no one else about, but more fool them as the rock was dry and it was a sea breeze so no salt spray. The sky was relatively clear and we have what Lisa would like to call dappled light, so could feel the sun warming us but not heating us up too much:
It was not the reason to climb this route, but Craig did have a bash at a certain piece of fixed gear. He worked it pretty hard for a while adding to the dings of the tri-cam head, and while it budged a wee bit it was determined to remain fixed. I can image that there will be more attempts on this piece, and with each go it will get more and more battered and less and less inviting to get out. At least for the time being it does provide a solid bit of gear on this airy traverse:
The second pitch of this route is primo and in many ways better than the first. The airy arête and then face provides just enough holds at the grade. The gear can be a bit fiddly in places and the exposure as you step onto the arête proper certainly keeps the heart going and focus strong. I took one of my favourite images from the top of the crag as Wiggins was leading this, as it really shows the character of the pitch and it deservedly made it into the SW guide. So Craig with his long stints between climbs is forgiven for having had a few moments to figure things out but he steadily made his way up this great finish to the route:
In truth I was expecting to have been rained out after a route or two so hadn’t thought what we might climb next. It was a day for trad, no bolts and also dare I say no tri-cams as I thought if it was raining they would be way to fiddly when our fingers are cold and wet. Why is this relevant, well I have always considered that the crux of the next route I lead to be safer when using tri-cams. The only spot for gear on stretchy long blind crux move that Craig is making is in a small rounded pocket that nature made especially for a tri-cam. I was however surprised to find a small cam worked well enough for me to make the move with confidence:
I was even more surprised to find the pockets on the steep top headwall bone dry, despite our late wet winter and recent storms. So The Unbolted and the Beautiful was a delight to climb, and better still the sun was poking out that bit more for some good images. Atop this line Craig contemplated and decided it was time for him to lead one of the crag classics, Hope. So we wandered back down and racked up for yet another good route:
Before he got going a couple wandered along and they too were keen to jump on Hope, so seeing they had not climbed it before and had come down from Perth we offered them the route, with Craig diverting his attentions instead to another special route. Hitching was the first route I climbed (seconded) at Willyabrup. I had been stood-up by my would be climbing partner for my debut at Willyabrup and seeing I had made the trip down before finding out I still walked in. Craig had just started a self-belay lead on this route, so I offered to belay him. For those that watch Big Bang Theory I guess you could say we had a bit of a Bromatic Bro experience climbing this route again:
I’ve sent a few people up this route and most of them get pretty excited and scared at the crux mid-section that Craig has just completed. Steve you may remember this one and piking out right. It is thin, technical and runout… check out where the last piece of gear is. It didn’t stop Craig and he kept moving with confidence that he really shouldn’t have considering how little he gets out. It’s a good job he doesn’t get out more often or he would be dragging me up scary stuff:
Atop once more and the sun brought out that amazing ochre colour that the Willyabrup gneiss can give. It looked like the other party had also had a successful lead on Hope and had topped out about the same time as us. So we decided to check the time and if things were looking good sneak in one more route, as there was still not a hint of rain coming our way:
The time was looking OK and Hope was as good as it always is. Not surprisingly there was no carpet python sun-bathing on top of the flake on this day, but I have no doubt that we will get to see him again another time. As I belayed Craig up I looked out and couldn’t resist taking this image of the traverse of Sirius, and thought it would be a good game of spot the crag booty. A climbers version of Where’s Wally, and the only clue I’ll give is that it is pink:
Seeing we had decided to make this the last climb it of course made sense to climb with packs and avoid needing to go back down just to pack up and walk back out. It’s always interesting climbing with a pack, the slightly constrained head movement and change in centre of gravity. It didn’t stop us and we both gobble up this fine line and Steve will be pleased to know I climbed it with a rack comprising a set of wires and two hexes only. I left the cams and other hexes for Craig to carry up in his pack, but that was however not the reason Craig kept ‘mentioning’ the weight of his pack:
That was because we had decided to take the flask with us down to the crag, and in our usual keep moving manner didn’t stop for a brew. So with only the pack up and walk out left it was most certainly time for tea. Um maybe this afternoon climbing malarkey isn’t that bad after all, as long as you have dappled light:Well now that I have finished this little ditty I guess I better get out into that garden…
Sandbagged 