Being woken by the alarm at 3:45 made me wonder what I was thinking when I said I would meet Howsie and Rongy up at Welly Dam for a before work climb. My mind nor body was ready for such a rude awakening and if it wasn’t for the full moon, most of the journey would have been in total darkness. That said the view back towards the lights of Bunbury, as I drove up the scarp was pretty specky. And as I got closer to the crag I could see light starting to creep into the sky from the east:
It felt like it was dark enough to use head torches as we pulled our harnesses on, but as Rongy made his way up the first few meters up the crag it either got lighter or our eyes were adjusting to the available light. By the time Rongy was coming back down Raging Torrent the morning had truly broken. Now climbing with three, while trying to squeeze the routes in before heading to work, means we have to be efficient in the way we climb. It was my lead next and I had already set the crate below my chosen route before Rongy had finished his route:
It started off as if all three of us were aging men. I was wondering how I would pull up after pulling plastic on Wednesday night, and with no one else turning up I bouldered by myself and in situation like that I am a little guilty of probably going too hard for too long with not enough rests. Rongy had been out on a big mountain bike ride just yesterday and Howsie had been rehearsing with his band to get ready for a gig this weekend. Despite each of us confessing to reasons we may be tired today, we still pulled the rope after every lead forcing each of us to lead every route:
I had picked BBQ. My thinking being that the first route would limber Howsie’s body up being a traditional style route with lots of three dimensional moves. Then BBQ would warm up the fingers with more technical moves on small holds. All of this was to prepare Howsie for his lead, which of course being 2021 was a grade 21. As he led up my route, he was looking pretty lethargic and I managed to not only run round to get some top down images but also run between the crag and the view over the reservoir as the sun finally popped over the horizon:
When I came back down there was no putting off the inevitable, Just Do It was next. As Rongy cleaned BBQ, Howsie did a quick mental check of the moves that lay ahead. Like an elite athlete he was not only going through the moves in his mind but also physically going through them with his arms. Despite Rongy and my initial, but admittedly short lived, gripes of being tired it would seem that drumming take more out of you than bouldering or mountain biking. We both fared better than Howsie on his chosen route:
Rongy was on fire, what’s new, as he then taunted Howsie by picking a second 21 for his next route… Silverback. A feisty start leading into a delicate and balancy second half, one that threatens to spit you off if you lack conviction or stall for just a moment too long. Rongy walked up it, so fast in fact that he was practically finished before I had cleaned the last route and had a chance to come over an snap an image. I stalled for a little too long on the slab and was spat off, and Howsie did the same claiming it was his chin that pushed him off:
We both got it on the next shot, which is good as Howsie at least managed to complete and tick of one grade 21 today. I really had no idea what to do next, so Rongy pointed me to Shock Therapy which I gobbled up in just a few minutes. If this is the result of bouldering by myself maybe I should do it more often? It was only at this point that I got to hear the Red-Tailed Black Cockatoos. It was only very faint and they didn’t fly over us, but it still counts and I’m yet to climb here without hearing them:
Rongy managed another clean lead, claiming to have almost fallen off near the top, yeah right. Howsie meanwhile foresaw he would take a fall and resorted to seconding the route, as such with a rope above him when he took the fall that he had foreseen he didn’t go too far. By the end of it he was pretty knackered and so chose the short but fun Block and Tackle to polish off whatever strength was left in his arms. By now the sky was a glorious blue and the 3:45 alarm was forgotten and forgiven:
Sandbagged 