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Chockstone Forum - General Discussion

General Climbing Discussion

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1-Nov-2007 At 10:09:09 AM oweng

Message

On 1/11/2007 Lyle Closs wrote:
>Don't want to sound like an arse, and Henry was and is some kind of god,
>but he didn't introduce 23 to Australia. The first 23 was Albatross at
>Lowdina in Tassie, put up by Ian Lewis. Henry did the second ascent on
>his quick but awesome Tassie tour, a day or so after he freed Incipience
>(22) at Coles bay with me ineptly following. Albatross was probably the
>route that gave him the most trouble in Aus - he tried it a number of times
>and almost gave up before giving it one more try and getting up it. Unfortunately
>it was on a small, relatively unknown cliff and only Stefan Karpiniec was
>with him on the day - but that's irrelevant because the route was already
>done free when he got there, and it's still graded 23. He can certainly
>say he was the first to climb it on the first day he saw it - Ian tried
>it many times on many days before getting up it - but it was Australia's
>first 23. As we didn't quite realise 23 was possible back then I don't
>know if Ian had actually graded it 23, but Henry admitted to Stefan after
>climbing it that it was probably 23, and it still holds the grade.
>Lyle

Isnt that interesting!

Here is a picture of the route for those interested:

http://www.thesarvo.com/confluence/display/thesarvo/Lowdina+Gallery