New shoes

This morning Mikie and I headed out to finish off his 10km challenge, and he picked a great spot to do that.  It felt like there was landward breeze as we walked down to the crag but we couldn’t have asked for better conditions.   This place being so close the ocean and also being quite low is often salt sprayed and greasy:

Lost Buttress is the most northerly of the crags in the Willyabrup area and I imagine it is rarely visited.  I was very lucky to have been invited by Kym and Rob to help develop this crag, which admittedly had seen action before but there are no records of what was done.  On days when there may be crowds at the main cliff, no one would think to come here.  That may be the limited number of routes or the distance from the main area, but either way it is their loss:

While it doesn’t have mobs of lines it’s a gem of a place with a high proportion great routes that people have agreed deserve the star or two we gave them when publishing the guide.  Mikie had to bag 108m of leading and we knew that was an easy target at this place, so we didn’t have a ridiculous early start.  We tallied up the route meterage and worked out that six lines on the main buttress plus one on the Playground would be enough.  :

He worked from right to left to warm up on the easier lines (No Nuts Required and Baby Shower (both 13 – UK VS 4b’ish)).  We also brought a rap rope to make things that bit more efficient.  For a relatively short crag this place provides routes that give an disproportionate amount of exposure.  There are two lines that provide great positions above the capping roof, and he started with Airtime (17 – UK HVS 5b’ish):

The image above may give away the fact that I was being a photographic belayer.  When I was a fair distance away that meant anchoring in and when he was leading Overexposed (17 – UK HVS 5b’ish) I used the red cam, the precise piece that he really wanted for this next move:

Unfazed he worked his way out and sorted out something less secure but sufficient before pulling through into the corner on smeary slopey feet in an increasingly airy position.  Kym he agreed that the routes were stonking, and better still unlike some peoples thinking he considered the grades were pretty spot on:

The wind wasn’t turning yet on this glorious day that provided us with dry rock, solid lines and not surprisingly the crag all to ourselves.  Within a mere couple of hours Mikie had racked up the six lines on Lost Buttress, having also bagged the very fine Jenga (14 – UK VS 4c’ish) and Washing Away the Blues (16 – UK HVS 5a’ish).  So next we had to move over to the Playground, which can be seen in the background:

However, before we went over he was keen to try one more route, on second this time.  It was the test piece route of the crag and my own creation call As the Crow Flies (22 – UK E3 5a’ish).  Despite the conditions being great, and I have a stack of lame excuses, I didn’t have the head to make the bold committing moves up the rounded featureless arête on nought but smears:

Instead I piked out by head left, and Mikie had a crack on second.  After a bit of flailing about he worked out the moves, declaring he would never have led it.  I’ve not heard of anyone leading it but would be keen to hear if anyone has been successful.  We then hauled the gear across for the grand finale climb, passing this huge jammed piece of driftwood some 4m’ish long that I always admire when I am here:

For the last route we picked another starred route, Tunnel Vision (18 – UK E1 5b’ish).  Kym and I had been eyeing this one off for ages but the stars never aligned and we never made it to this crag together, so he eventually led it with Lou seconding it.  Being the route that would see him cross the finish line I simply had to get some good shots.  So we set up an elaborate system to allow me to do that:

It was great to watch Mikie work this route.  It has a couple of crux sections with a pumpy start, balancy delicate slab and then a pumpy hold finding roof.  As he climbed it I thought I saw him falter, but he pulled through to finish his challenge on exactly 10,000m (not a meter more or less) of clean leads on routes he had not done before:

This challenge has taken him approx. 5 years to complete and in that time he told me he had gone through two pairs of shoes.  However, looking at the state of his current shoes I reckon he could count that as three pairs.  As a reward for reaching his goal he is going to treat himself to a new pair of shoes, and it’s about time:

Despite being a tad tired it would have been rude not to have a little bounder at the Playground.  Great rock and fine problems above a (mostly) sandy landing makes this a brilliant spot to muck about.  So we had a play on two boulder problems Slime Ball (19 – UK E2 5b’ish) and The Slicer (21 – UK E2 5c’ish), and after much falling and close calls both admitting to being trashed:

I found out afterwards that Tunnel Vision (at 18) was the hardest trad line Mikie had done to date so a double celebration was in order!