I guess it goes without saying that if you’ve been throwing up all morning the last thing you want to do is cling off a rock face. So when I was a mere ten minutes away from picking Ash up, and he messaged me to say that was how his morning had been, it was of course absolutely fine for him to bail. Ash was also considerate enough to check if I still needed his rope, on the assumption that I would still be meeting Matthew. But it was all good, once a scout always a scout, and I had come prepared. Something had told me this morning, as I left the house, to throw a rope in just in case:
I wished Ash well, hoping he would come good soon. I’ve not heard from him yet. So I guess he is resting up, and if so it was a good thing he didn’t join us and make things worse. I was indeed still meeting Matthew, but whose he you might ask. I have a bunch of images that my desktop at work scroll through, and at a recent meeting one of my climbing images popped up and this started a conversation about, well climbing. That’s when I found out that Matthew, who was in the same meeting, had been known to play on rock in the home country:
Today Ash was going to continue his journey in building up trad leading experience. We had therefore picked a crag that had a few milder climbs. This also suited Matthew, as he had openly said after I had first talked to him about going for a climb that he would be rusty, and may not even get off the ground. I found out that it had in fact been over a decade since he had climbed outdoors, but he had, since then, very occasional visited an indoor gym. I though my last trip here had been with Mario, when a rock came away in his hand and he took a healthy fall. I was surprised to see that was over two years back, https://sandbagged.blog/2019/10/19/two-out-of-two/:
I was kinda right with my guess about that being the last time I climbed here. Although a mob of us, including Lisa, did siege The Playground (https://sandbagged.blog/2020/01/18/theres-gold-in-them-there-hills/). That was a very social day indeed, but we didn’t make it to Lost Buttress. Matthew and I left the carpark, which was empty, at about 6 and I expected that no one would be about for hours yet. My rationale being that yesterday had been a bit of a manky day, so the Perth crew were probably still in Perth. However, after a quick visit to the wonderful Wilyabrup toilet, and as we were walking back up towards the cape to cape track the next bunch of climbers were already walking in:
They were however heading to the main cliffs, and we left then behind as we followed the cape to cape track until we got to the Northern Blocks. From here there is a fun rock hop along the coast. Granted we could have driven to nearly the top for the crag, which Steve would have loved doing. But I like the walk, and Matthew had said he too was looking forward to the walk in. I expected the rock to be a tad damp, not only from the rain but also the salt spray that was blowing up from the waves. But it was fine, and after a quick run through of belaying and tying in, just in case, I was off:
My intention had never been to go hard today. Not only because I was hoping Ash would have been on the sharp end most of the time, but also because Friday’s early morning session at Welly Dam had been once again pretty tough. During that session I had been well and truly humbled by Flight Simulator, resulting in both myself and Rongy, who was belaying me, to experience air time several times. Today we started, as we intended to carry on, going easy. No Nuts Required was the first line and indeed I didn’t place any nuts, only using cams:
My rationale being that Matthew would be testing himself enough without needing to fiddle out any passive such as wires, tricams or hexes. While he admitted his flexibility let him down on some moves, he still pulled off the climb. I could see that his muscle memory from a decade back, wasn’t vanquished it had just lay dormant waiting until it was needed again. The first line, including his first contact with the good old Australian carrot bolt, hadn’t put him off. Next up was Baby Shower, at a similar grade, that was approx. equivalent to the British grade of HS 4a/4b:
We were taking our time and while the two routes hadn’t put Matthew off, he wasn’t too keen to go much harder on the first trip out. He was however keen to wandered across to The Playground. Here the rope and rack stayed on the deck, as we played about bouldering. It was a lot of fun and I even jumped on Slimeball, which I had given a grade of 19 when we first recorded it. On The Crag those who have since repeated it reckon it is V3, which is about grade 24. I really don’t think so, even today it all felt not too bad and 19 is more than fair:
As I continued snapping images of the morning Matthew said I guess I might get a mention in your blog now. I’m not sure if he was hinting at anything, but my rapid reply was quite simply. It goes without saying, and that it was an unwritten rule of anyone I head out climbing with. That’s not really true, but no one has to date objected to being included. Despite not bagging too many routes the morning went by way too quickly. Maybe it was in part due to all the reminiscing and talking about the great climbing places in the home country. But, eventually Matthew’s arms could take no more, which only left us the fun hike out:
Sandbagged 