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General Climbing Discussion

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Araps Bolting Gone Silly 18-Mar-2008 At 8:20:17 AM mankrambler

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On 17/03/2008 chalkischeap wrote:

>The Trojan bolt however is a simple case - it is not "needed" by anyone
>as there is good gear next to it. It is therefore just a convenience.

But in reality, this is splitting hair: no one really needs ANY bolt at Arapiles--they are all there for convenience.

There are plenty of naturally-protectable rockclimbs, especially in Oz, to fill anyone's lifetime. But this is not to say that bolts are necessarily a bad thing: they can be great fun to have: take sport climbing for example.

So I want to point out that I'm not against having some bolts at Arapiles (in unprotectable parts only). Just so long as they last almost as long as the rock does--in other words that they would only have to be replaced a couple of times over a thousand years or so. (Does anyone know about this with modern bolting methods?). If we have already replaced a bolt on Trojan 3 times, how many scars will be there for the climbers in 200 or more years time?...enough scars to create new holds I guess...or maybe enough to cause the whole chunk of rock they're drilled into to fall off with climber attached. At least someone will be able to claim a new route then.

I'll bet there will be many more folks into climbing in 200 years time and I'll bet they will have stopped bolting due to too much damage, or they will have found very sustainable methods. All that stuff in these threads about the rights of the first ascentionist and other ego stuff bantered around won't make a rats of difference in years to come--the discussion forums will all be about how to fix past mistakes.

Obviously, charging around and chopping bolts in a self righteous manner is not going to fix it...the damage is already done, and yanking it out will possibly just do more damage. I think it is best to leave these in until they need replacement (obviously, past fixed wires and other rubbish obviously needs to go).