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Chockstone Forum - General Discussion

General Climbing Discussion

 Page 1 of 10. Messages 1 to 20 | 21 to 40 | 41 to 60 | 61 to 80 | 81 to 100 | 101 to 120 | 121 to 140 | 141 to 160 | 161 to 180 | 181 to 182
Author
Bolting at Piddo (+ easy sport climbs)
rockotter
10-May-2011
9:22:51 PM
This isn't mean't insult anyone effort's toward's immortality but is the new ring bolted route right of Yellow Crack on the walk down Horne's Point really necessary. It's a pretty ordinary 15 or so route, and Piddo is the home of trad in the Bluey's. I love sport climbing but from my few contribution's to millions of routes on the planet, bolting takes time, effort and money. There are many places for great, new, bolted routes all over the Blue Mountains, putting in mediocre filler routes at Piddo I can't really understand. Again, this is not meant as insult someone's efforts but as a thought about what climbing is about Quality or LCD consumerism, thanks.

nmonteith
10-May-2011
9:48:32 PM
I don't know anything about the route in question - but I can't think of that many grade 15 sport routes in the Bluies. There is however thousands of grade 20+ sport routes. So really, the climbing community probably needs more grade 15 routes and less harder ones!

IdratherbeclimbingM9
10-May-2011
10:01:48 PM
On 10/05/2011 nmonteith wrote;
>I can't think of that many grade 15 sport routes in the Bluies. (snip)
>So really, the climbing community probably needs more grade 15 routes and less harder ones!

... but not at Piddo.

Mt Piddington has an abundance of trad routes in that grade.
It is also the spiritual home of the Ewbank Grading System, as many of it's early routes are benchmarks for the grading system in the sub 20 range.
In my opinion it would be blasphemy to put up filler-style sport routes between them.

nm, I think that you missed rockotter's point of
>Piddo is the home of trad in the Bluey's.
&
>There are many places for great, new, bolted routes all over the Blue Mountains,
>putting in mediocre filler routes at Piddo I can't really understand.

I agree with rockotter.
rockotter
10-May-2011
10:05:42 PM
The start is actually quite bouldery, probably beyond the average 'just climbing' grade 15/16 climber, then its' kinda rambling up on big incuts, huge breaks and some large scary flakes. the bouldery start is unprotected too, what gives?

ChuckNorris
10-May-2011
10:08:00 PM
Awesome thought provoking response Neil.

IdratherbeclimbingM9
10-May-2011
10:32:56 PM
On 10/05/2011 useful wrote:
>Awesome AWESOME thought provoking response Neil.

Thereyago useful, fixed that for you!
Heh, heh, heh.
patto
10-May-2011
10:37:23 PM
Bolting routes at piddo should be a capital offence.

ChuckNorris
10-May-2011
10:49:36 PM
Piddo shmiddo. I'm gunna do the climbing community a favour and ONSIGHT - ONLEAD - U-BOLT the line 5m right of tiptoe ridge.

To think I could be the one to help the kiddies punch through the 4 barrier.
Dr Nick
10-May-2011
10:54:00 PM
Even waiting for the glue to set you'll probably do it quicker than the bumblies on tiptoe ridge.
Samuel
11-May-2011
8:46:19 AM
Start is protected by first ring. Grade is 16/17 and it is next to Mike's Yellow Wall climb
on carrots. Other than that there is one grade 14 trad route on this wall.

Agreed, nothing futher down should be bolted.

Considering that the carrat patch next door has been there for years, Do people have an issue with this climb ?

nmonteith
11-May-2011
9:00:41 AM
I'm not sure why the worry. About 100m right is the gridbolted Sporting Complex. Then on the main section of Piddo are heaps of bolted routes - things like The Plunge, SSSC3, On Edge, Psychodrama, Desiree, Thin Time, Flaming Youth... all well trod established classics. The difference is these are all grades in the low to mid 20s. Having a couple of easier sport lines just adds to the cliff in my opinion.

rodw
11-May-2011
9:24:14 AM
One mans abomination is another mans classic..........its not a bolted crack is it?..as said plenty of sport stuff at Piddo so hardly an issue.

tnd
11-May-2011
9:26:09 AM
This is really just a "me too" filler on some quite poor rock which was adequately served by Mikl's carrot climb beside it. While I generally agree that sub grade 18 sport routes are a welcome addition in the mountains I think this one is pretty worthless.

dave h.
11-May-2011
9:30:47 AM
On 11/05/2011 nmonteith wrote:
>I'm not sure why the worry. About 100m right is the gridbolted Sporting
>Complex. Then on the main section of Piddo are heaps of bolted routes -
>things like The Plunge, SSSC3, On Edge, Psychodrama, Desiree, Thin Time,
>Flaming Youth... all well trod established classics. The difference is
>these are all grades in the low to mid 20s. Having a couple of easier sport
>lines just adds to the cliff in my opinion.

I've only done SSSC3 out of those ones. (Isn't that a 14 or 15? Or am I confusing it with a different route, the one I'm thinking of has some moves on an arete.) From memory the bolts on that (at least in 2006) were scary trad carrots. Not bomber U bolts. That distinction is relevant to my mind at least.

Anyway, I love Piddo. My favourite mountains crag. I don't care about what happens up around the wall just below Horne's point. But if someone went and put in filler routes lower down at the main area of the crag I'd be angry.

nmonteith
11-May-2011
9:39:26 AM
On 11/05/2011 dave h. wrote:
>I've only done SSSC3 out of those ones. (Isn't that a 14 or 15? Or am
>I confusing it with a different route, the one I'm thinking of has some
>moves on an arete.) From memory the bolts on that (at least in 2006) were
>scary trad carrots. Not bomber U bolts. That distinction is relevant to
>my mind at least.

It's a grade 22 arete. I think it's now on ubolts? Mike has been doing quite a bit of rebolting of his old routes down there.

>Anyway, I love Piddo. My favourite mountains crag. I don't care about
>what happens up around the wall just below Horne's point. But if someone
>went and put in filler routes lower down at the main area of the crag I'd
>be angry.

Why? Providing the new bolts don't effect the already established classics I fail to see the problem. People can argue over the 'trad ethics' of the place - but the reality is there is heaps of bolts there - and always has been.
maxdacat
11-May-2011
9:51:12 AM
On 11/05/2011 tnd wrote:
>This is really just a "me too" filler on some quite poor rock which was
>adequately served by Mikl's carrot climb beside it. While I generally agree
>that sub grade 18 sport routes are a welcome addition in the mountains
>I think this one is pretty worthless.

So maybe just putting rings on the carrot route would be a better idea.

wallwombat
11-May-2011
10:02:04 AM
If the route in question is the arete, on the right (looking at the cliff) edge of the big block that has the Yellow Crack on it, then I recall mentioning to widewetandslippery that it looked like it would make a fun little sport route. It looked like it had a bouldery start on the face before going over a small overlap and swinging onto the juggy arete. (well, that's how I would have bolted it)

There were no bolts on it then. I think that was 2 or 3 years ago. I didn't actually consider bolting it myself but it's current existence as a easy sport route isn't going to keep me awake at night. As Neil said, there has always been a lot of bolts at Piddo.

evanbb
11-May-2011
12:41:55 PM
On 11/05/2011 tnd wrote:
>This is really just a "me too" filler on some quite poor rock which was
>adequately served by Mikl's carrot climb beside it. While I generally agree
>that sub grade 18 sport routes are a welcome addition in the mountains
>I think this one is pretty worthless.

Plus 1 here. That's a terrible piece of rock and only helped by proximity to the carpark.

dave h.
11-May-2011
1:17:33 PM
On 11/05/2011 nmonteith wrote:

>Why? Providing the new bolts don't effect the already established classics
>I fail to see the problem. People can argue over the 'trad ethics' of the
>place - but the reality is there is heaps of bolts there - and always has
>been.

I don't mind the occasional good additional ring-bolted route. (There's that excellent ~21 with about 3 U bolts/Rings around the Flake Crack area - very happy for that to be there.)

But I'd be angry if Piddo were turned into an over-bolted sport crag. But then so would we all.

I guess I think that having rows of shiny U's everywhere would "effect the already established classics" a bit.

How much of an effect does a bolt need to have before it affects a classic? Sighted at a distance while on a classic route? Sighted nearby but significantly out of reach while on a classic? Near, but just out of reach for a tall climber on a classic route? Clippable from a classic?

I don't know what the answer is. I guess I'm OK with the first, probably with the second (let's not quibble over how out of reach something has to be before it's "significantly" out of reach), and becoming increasingly unhappy with the third and fourth hypothetical.


Anyway, my preferences aren't based upon logic. I like the place the way it is. I have good memories of climbing there with my dad ~9 years ago. Dad climbed there back when John Ewbank was guiding, and Piddo was the place to get scared on a 15. Back when men were men and sheep were scared :P

Keep it as it is for the sake of nostalgia. I think it's great that we have areas that serve as a monument to the style of the day. Shipley & the Glen are monuments to modern sport-climbing. Cosmic is to some extent a memorial to mixed climbing. And the style at Piddo (happy to be corrected, plenty there I haven't done) is predominantly trad, with some carrots here and there. Although I guess there's an evolution from pitons, to bash-ins, to glue-ins too. But I think the point still stands.

nmonteith
11-May-2011
1:24:51 PM
On 11/05/2011 dave h. wrote:
>Keep it as it is for the sake of nostalgia. I think it's great that we
>have areas that serve as a monument to the style of the day. Shipley &
>the Glen are monuments to modern sport-climbing.

Shipley was certainly a mixed crag when I first started climbing! Almost every route you had to place cams in the horizontals. It was heavily retrobolted in the late 90s/early 00s. So it has really changed in the last 20 years. Even The Glen has changed in style. It used to be the home of heavily chipped juggy climbs - but these have all been erased. I remember climbing a couple of great grade 24 routes right where Better than Life is these days.

I guess the point i'm making is that its rare for any crag to 'stays the same' - they all slowly morph into something else over the years. Fashions come, fashions go.

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There are 182 messages in this topic.

 

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