Chockstone Forum

      Sponsored By
      ROCK
   HARDWARE

Chockstone Photography

Australian Landscape Prints

Chockstone Forum - General Discussion

General Climbing Discussion

Author

Coolest features to climb in Australia


deadbudgy

3-Dec-2015
3:20:26 PM

I was reading a thread on Mountain Project, 'coolest features to climb in North America', and that got me wondering what people think are the coolest features to climb in Australia. Not individual routes but the natural feature itself. An example would be the Totem Pole in Tassy. The best climbs are always the ones that travel through really inspiring natural terrain. I want to get inspired!!


IdratherbeclimbingM9

3-Dec-2015
3:23:13 PM

The Totem Pole came to my mind first too.
Second was Ozymandias Direct.
Third was Balls Pyramid.
Fourth was Passport to Insanity.
Fifth was any of the 12 Apostles, ... though the pinnacles like those found in the Warrumbungles tied equally for that position.

... I gave up thinking about it after that ;-)

Jayford4321

3-Dec-2015
3:30:09 PM

Burnley Wall

bentobox

3-Dec-2015
6:33:16 PM

Cleft island / skull rock for best roof crack haha.


ajfclark

3-Dec-2015
7:23:46 PM

Uluru doesn't get a look in M9?


IdratherbeclimbingM9

3-Dec-2015
7:48:08 PM

On 3/12/2015 ajfclark wrote:
>Uluru doesn't get a look in M9?

I am torn on that issue; desire vs respect for culture etc; and it warrants a good deal more thought than I gave my first reply to this thread.
;-)

How about yourself?

martym

3-Dec-2015
7:56:27 PM

Mirror Ball pinnacle in the Grose Valley is a pretty cool natural feature, and some amazing boulders sitting precariously on cliff edges.
Any of the routes surrounding it would meet te "amazing natural terrain" criteria

PeterW

3-Dec-2015
8:00:51 PM

The original article included chimneys in the list of features, so I reckon you'd have to include Agamemnon! (There are bigger, harder, etc. chimney's, but that would have to be one of the coolest!)

I always thought the Fuehrer "walking stick" on the Buffalo Gorge north wall was an amazing feature. I can remember wanting to climb it every time I looked at the North Wall (even after I *had* climbed it and knew the climbing was nothing special).

I haven't climbed it, but maybe the Breadknife in the Warrumbungles?


E. Wells

3-Dec-2015
8:50:35 PM

The breadknife is not so amazing. I reckon three sisters or the arch at centenial trev.

stugang

3-Dec-2015
9:11:12 PM

The big koala.


Southcol

3-Dec-2015
9:26:26 PM

Good post.

Crater bluff, warrumbungles, nsw
The Moai, Tas
The Old Man Pillar, West Cape Howe, WA
Black wall reach, swan river, wa
Crookneck, glasshouse mtns qld


ajfclark

4-Dec-2015
7:40:17 AM

On 3/12/2015 IdratherbeclimbingM9 wrote:
>I am torn on that issue; desire vs respect for culture etc; and it warrants
>a good deal more thought than I gave my first reply to this thread.
>;-)
>
>How about yourself?

Same boat. If there was no cutural significance, I'd be on it like a fat kid on a cupcake.


sliamese

4-Dec-2015
9:58:41 AM

Cape Raoul - Tassie


Goshen

4-Dec-2015
2:53:17 PM

For what it's worth; climbing Uluru's 300m faces like we climb everything else (ropes, bolts etc); would be exceedingly tedious after even the first 15m of the same move over and over again. Crimp to rail to crimp to sidepull to rail to crimp, repeat.

PGS

4-Dec-2015
3:58:11 PM

Frenchman's Cap
Federation peak - Blade ridge
Buffalo Cathedral - Edge Of Pleasure
Upper Grose aretes - The Mooing
Bluff mountain - Aladinsane


Doug

4-Dec-2015
5:03:07 PM

On 3/12/2015 Southcol wrote:

>The Moai, Tas

The Moai, although a nice day out, is a baby compared with the Candlestick, which is about twice as high as the Totem Pole, achievable by the average bumbly - unlike its diminutive neighbour - and requires at least one swimmer to get the rope across.

PeterW

4-Dec-2015
9:08:21 PM

On 4/12/2015 Goshen wrote:
>For what it's worth; climbing Uluru's 300m faces like we climb everything
>else (ropes, bolts etc); would be exceedingly tedious after even the first
>15m of the same move over and over again. Crimp to rail to crimp to sidepull
>to rail to crimp, repeat.

Are you aware that Uluru was "climbed" back in the 70's? The route went up the Kangaroo Tail, and from memory started with quite a long chimney. I think the rest of the route went up a water gully. I'm fairly sure there were no bolts (not a lot of other gear either!) as keeping a low profile (orange t-shirts, orange-painted gear!) was critical after being ordered off the rock at shotgun point on a previous attempt!


wallwombat

4-Dec-2015
11:28:44 PM

That wave looking face, in WA, that was on the cover of Rock a few lifetimes ago.

That strange pinnacle in the Grose that Neil climbed.

Anything on the Kenny Boulder.

5-Dec-2015
12:48:48 PM

From Mountain Magazine February 1974: Part 1

And now for something completely different

by Keith Lockwood

Way back in the dreamtime, Kerungra (the Earth-Mother) brought life on to the earth with her sacred Ngaltawaddi (Digging Stick), and created mortals. So runs the legend of the Loritdja aborigines who inhabit the desert around the Rock of Uluru, the rock that was their repository of sacred knowledge.

To whites, this rock is known as Ayers Rock, the famous tourist attraction rising 1,143ft. from the sandy and spiky, spinifex-grass plain in central Australia. Reputedly the biggest single stone in the world, it was first climbed by a white man in 1873 when explorer W. C. Gosse made an ascent via the only gentle face, a ramp on the north-west shoulder. Nowadays, hundreds of tourists follow in Gosse's footsteps, assisted by an 800ft. railing. There are also legends about young natives trying to climb the rock as a tribal initiation rite, legends as often as not sad in their conclusion.

In 1972, Andrew Thomson and I attempted to climb Kerungra's sacred Ngaltawaddi. Ngaltawaddi (also called the Kangaroo's Tail) is a unique tongue of rock, 350ft. high, leaning against the north face of Ayers Rock. Andrew and I planned our attempt from Melbourne, 2,000 miles away, with very limited information. We had tourist pamphlets, but each showed the rock having a different angle, and it was impossible to judge what the climbing would be like.

But in the hot mid-winter sun, the red rock destroyed any climbing fears. In fact, it didn't look worth the trouble, appearing to be an easy-angled romp. Early next morning, however, as I led off with the desert's cool morning breeze caressing the quiet, now soft-grey stone, Uluru stirred in defence. Loose flakes rattled down, making Andrew's photographic work difficult, although his belaying was easy. In the first 150ft. there was no place for runners, and I belayed, still in a chimney position, to a bolt. Andrew led through into an identical pitch.

Our situation was fantastic, and we revelled in our technically easy adventure up this mysterious and legendary rock.

I passed Andrew, 300ft. up, swinging gently in his Whillans harness. But 50ft. above, Ngaltawaddi forced me out on to the less friendly, indeed quite inhospitable, face. After 80ft. of nervy and unprotected slab work on the ubiquitous loose flakes, I reached the first good foothold on the climb, an 8" x 2" haven. I placed a welcome bolt. Way below, the ranger was conducting his morning excursion of the rock. His band of tourists suddenly grouped, pointing our way.
"You blokes get straight down from there." (Ranger, short-tempered.)
"Can you hear me? Get down here." (Ranger, uniformed.)
"It's safer for us to keep going." (Us, reasonably.)
"I don't give a damn about your safety, get straight down here!" (Ranger, armed.)

Don't ask us why, but we went down.

5-Dec-2015
12:49:39 PM

From Mountain Magazine February 1974: Part 2

Ten months later, our travel-weary VW headed into the desert again, to settle unfinished business. In the last 850 miles to the rock, there are only three tired, dusty little towns. The legend of the Centre is of a great barren plain beneath a blazing, relentless sun. The sun certainly is dominant, but the languid desert is far from sterile. Low, undulating hills of deep red sand break the horizon, the hills themselves being dotted with the tough, pincushionlike spinifex. At times, generally in mid-afternoon, stunted skeletal trees float above a shimmering plain of gibber stones.

This time we were prepared for the Ayers Rock ranger. Our gear was hidden under the seats, and an emergency lot was cached in the bonnet. My palms sweated as I signed into the park; Andrew chain-smoked behind dark glasses. Four thousand miles was a long drive, if we were recognized and thrown out again. We passed as tourists.
Quite early next morning, we drove to the rock, lights out. While I found and climbed the chimney in the cool desert night, Andrew parked the car at the tourist ramp.
Pausing after four hundred familiar feet, we were treated to a superb sunrise as the desert woke, appearing almost translucent in the soft dawn light. Finches fluffed awake and skittered in the scrub way below, and a pair of eagles soared in effortless circles above the rock.

New terrain now confronted us. Out on the flanks of the monster, the rock swept smooth and unbroken above and below, the exposure effectively stilling our exuberance. A 1,000ft. water-scoured groove beckoned to the right, but was guarded by vertical walls, and Andrew ran out 150ft. of sustained and difficult climbing with one runner, before he reached a belay in the mental comfort of the groove. Over the centuries, occasional torrents have sculptured this huge feature into a series of vertical, dry waterfalls interrupted by stagnant pools. We bridged up this for six pitches, dispensing with belays. The theory was that if one of us came off, the other could brace himself across the groove. Fortunately, we didn't have to try it. As the angle rolled back we unroped, ignored the tourist gaze and, laughing hysterically, tore out of the place in a cloud of red dust. It had taken Ayers Rock exactly a hundred years to have a second route established, albeit secretly!

SUMMARY
Australia. Ayers Rock: The Kangaroo's Tail. An account of the first ascent in May 1973 by Keith Lockwood and Andrew Thomson.

There are 44 messages in this topic.