You may recall Howsie was considering not climbing on Friday this week. However, once the boys had left for school he found himself home alone, with Nadia out until mid-morning. Indicating to me that he may crack on with a bit of gardening, I planted a seed of my own. Suggesting we could spend an hour or so on my climbing wall. It worked out quite well. I was working from home, making it is easy to take a few hours out. In addition we have been meaning to catch up to discuss a climbing trip planned for later this year:
I am using the flights from my cancelled trip in January. This one does not involve sailing, so the reasons of it falling through should be reduced. It is a good reason to stay injury free, and when I took my tumble five weeks back it felt that I had plenty of time to recover. However, it now feel like the trip is fast approaching. Hence why I have been using a hangboard. I have also started doing some weights, while only a fraction of what Lisa does it is enough for what I need. The last few weeks of exercising helped with our wall session, and it felt good:
We agreed a session of pulling plastic once a week would help both of us. We need to be injury free. But ideally we also need to improve our climbing strength and stamina, if we want to keep climbing during the weeklong trip. It felt like my body was holding up well despite the more intense climbing on a wall. Saturday morning however I could feel my knee. Nothing too bad, but for my quick trip out I did don my knee brace just in case. No one had indicated being keen to get out, the gale force winds and very rough swell probably putting them off:
I don’t mind the elements and was quite looking forward to being in amongst them. Purposely picking the zawn at Smiths Beach, knowing the waves would be dramatic and close. Walking in the waves in the bay of Smiths Beach didn’t look too bad. The sets were very close, resulting in tumbling waves that resembled more of a washing machine. Due to the conditions the Peppy Plungers had decided they would not meet for their first light dip in the ocean back at our local beach. It was dark when I left home so I couldn’t see what it was like but they probably made the right call:
Peppy Beach, like Smith Beach, is in a bay and they are usually that little bit more protected. Although on occasion the swell comes from a different direction, but not today. The zawn on the other hand was at the mercy of the full fury of the ocean. As such I sat and watched for some time before deciding my course of action, and am pleased I did. The video might suggest climbing the wall to the left would be crazy. Indeed my initial thinking was to climb on the right wall, but as shown above the entire base of that wall was being smashed:
My rationale for being on the right wall was it had the easier climbs, but I had to go with the conditions. With the anchors set up at the top of the wall, I dropped the rope into the zawn. All the while being buffeted by winds reaching 70km/hr. Needless to say I was tied in all the time. After rapping down, and before I could coil the rope a big set came in. The water was close to lapping at my feet, it was very exhilarating. Similar to being at the top I remained tied in while at the base. Spray continually funnelled up the zawn almost horizontally and everything was wet. But this is Smiths Beach, with coarse grained granite:
The friction while marginally reduced, was still great. It was totally epic conditions, and I attempted to capture a few more videos but the continual spray made it tricky. Due to the size of the waves coming in, I was restricted to routes on the left hand side of this wall. Climbing out on the last line, being the closest to the end of the zawn that I dared go, a huge wave came in just as I left the deck. I still got drenched. Not just from the spray, as the heavens opened at the same time. Big drops fell from the sky and water was soon running down the rock. While others took a raincheck today I’m glad I didn’t, and had an ear to ear grin:
Sandbagged 