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Chockstone Forum - Crag & Route Beta

Crag & Route Beta

Area	Location	Sub Location	Crag	Links
All NSW	(General)	(General)	(General)

Topic Date User

Walhalla - Wolgan Valley 7-Feb-2013 At 9:10:43 PM Estey

Message

On 7/02/2013 Penny wrote:
>That's a really sad story.
>
>Are they describing the type of belay where the climber has a loop of
>rope tied around his waist and the partner is waist belaying? I had always
>assumed that these belays worked because people made sure they never fell
>on them. Does anyone know what its like to fall, or catch a fall, like
>this?

Hey Penny. How you doing?

Reading this 50 years on still makes your heart sink. I can't answer your questions but the following extract from the history section in the 1984 Guide offers a bit of insight.

"There were two main reasons for the decline in popularity of the Wolgan in those days. One was Bryden's influence on where the club climbed. He didn't think much of the rock in the Wolgan, preferring the longer routes of the Grose Valley and the Warrumbubgles to the mini-crags nearer home. The other reason was the death of Paul Griffiths in 1962. Paul was killed when he fell whilst leading Walhalla (13) on the Old Baldy cliffline. So far this has been the only tragedy to mar the climbing scene in the Wolgan and since then, bowlines have been replaced by figure of eight knots."

I've heard quite a few Wolgan regulars talk about checking this route out. I've never heard of anyone climbing it. It looks pretty out there from across the valley.