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Tonight the crew gathered for their regular Monday night social climb at Kangaroo Point cliff, Brisbane. Some climbing highlights of the evening:
Meanwhile Nicey, The Bruiser, Monny and the Grasshopper attend to the BBQ. Kangaroo Point barbeque’s are always set to low heat which makes for a very slow cooking process. Equipped with a torch (the park lamps are inadequate), they inspected the sausages and chicken pieces until it was well cooked – probably 3 gas button pushes later (about an hour). The meat was served with bread rolls, potato salad, green salad and various condiments. To wash it down the crew had soft drinks, beers and a white wine. Everyone pitched in to provide for the BBQ and cooking process. It was very much appreciated, as proof there was only 2 snags left from a full tray of food. This is probably the unofficial Urban Crag Xmas party to see 2007 out. But as usual the crew will keep climbing Monday night’s. Continue reading Kangaroo Point cliff Sausage Sizzle "It’s all good, it won’t rain at KP", the Grasshopper ensures the crew. "The BOM radar shows rain in the north and drizzle in the far west ranges. CLIMB ON." Indeed, despite the gloomy sky, the weather seemed to hold off at KP. By 5.30pm the Teacher was setting up top rope over Chubba Chip Mods and Gilligan was deciding to lead either Juice or Vegemite. He chose Juice so the Giggler and the Chock could improve on their past performance on this climb. The Giggler belayed Gilligan as he lead the route. He easily cleaned the climb to set up a top rope. Meanwhile, the Chad and Rudy popped in at the cliffs to pick up a DVD and his harness. The Chad was still sufferring the ill effects of alchohol poisoning from the weekend. Later that night, Rudy had to pamper the Chad while he watched Dean Potter solo up El Capitan in the Masters of Stone V. The Teacher saw the start of CCM and knew it was going to be tricky. The wall is slightly overhung with awkward holds on an otherwise smooth face. An obvious ledge must be reached and then mantled to finally have a moment of rest before a smooth arete is negotiated. The crux is next: a high mantle that offers only slopers for hand holds. After this its easy climbing to a crack line running up the headwall. Holding on, the Teacher peered up towards the ledge. "I can’t let go to reach that hold or I’m going to fall off", the Teacher thought. "Pull in the slack tight", the Teacher said. The Chock started pulling in the rope through the belay device. The Teacher peeled off and the stretch in the rope was enough for him to bounce off the ground with his legs. The Chock was dragged a few steps towards the cliff. A few people watching offered some beta: "Use the undercling" was the common tip. The Teacher stood staring at the rock, studying every rough edge that was available. This trance like state lasted for about 10 minutes, before he approached the rock again. The Teacher took the advice and held on to the rock using the undercling. "Yeah. Thats the way.", encourages Gilligan. Not wanting to sound like a bunch of holy christian climbers, the Grasshopper heckles the Teacher, "Your going to come off!" This was the "encouragement" the Teacher needed. He lunged towards to the ledge and was able to stick to it. The second hand came up to offer more support. A bit of a scramble with his legs gave him more height. But now the Teacher was in his usual Fazspastics contortionist routine. One leg was on the mantle. A hand placed palm down on the ledge and the other two limbs dangling in the air. All while his body is near horizontal. The laws of physics were broken tonight. Henceforth, this defiance of gravity shall be called the Art of Fazitation (ala levitation). To use in a sentence, "The Teacher approached the crux, and Fazitated pass the mantle". Kids don’t attempt Fazitation on your own. Crab walking up a cliff is more dangerous than soloing. Even the Teacher lost control of his Hero like abilities… Without realising how fast the Teacher was Fazitating, his flabby arm parts got caught in the anchor as the Chock was desperately trying to keep up with the belaying. "Argh Fawwk! Gimme some slack.", the Teacher yelled. The Chock fed some rope back out. "More! More! Argh Fawwk". The Chock then quickly let the Teacher down. Giving far more slack than the Teacher really wanted. "Argh Fawwk. Slow down. Slow down", the Teacher yelled with a hint of panic in his voice. The Chock slowed the descent and the Teacher touched down softly to the ground. The Gilligan gave CCM a go. His go-go gadget arms helped him overcome the hard start. But it was still hard going for him. Gilligan even went to the next climb, Cross With No Name (22) and with some determination cleaned this climb too. The Giggler who had belayed Gilligan lead Juice, remembered the route taken, in particular the crack start. As always in any sport, watching is easier than actually doing it. The Giggler was in form tonight, providing much material for tonights blog and spraying profanities out. Though not as bad as the natives nearby who swore, punched and chased someone across the park. During some of the hard moves (actually the moves really just required walking across a ledge or stepping up on a block), the Giggler started talking in the third person, "Nicole is not going to fall.", she repeated this to herself. "Nicole doesn’t like ledges". Throw in a few giggles too and she managed to talk herself across and to a section of wall with medium size holds. The Chock had a good go on Juice’s start. The layback technique was taught to him to move up the crack line. However, the arms were too spent and the Chock decided to traverse around to the right. Meanwhile, the Giggler got a strange tingling feeling in her bung knee. She told us rain was coming. Indeed, within moments, the first few drops of rain fell. Not quite enough to stop climbing but still for those watching to seek shelter. Henceforth, a webcam will be pointed at the Giggler’s knee cap and streamed across the internet. No longer shall the Grasshopper rely on BOM for forecasts or even radar images. Here is the Knee barometer reading for reference:
http://kneebarometer.com/ (park it now – it will be a gold mine). Girraween National Park Jenesse Valentine, Melissa Rose Horne and Dennis Mellican left Brisbane and arrived at Girraween arou The Faz family (John Farrelly, Kylie Farrelly, Rikki Farrelly and Jade Farrelly) arrived soon after. John and Kylie immediately unpacked and started setting up their camp next to Dennis & Jenesse and Mel Rose. While the Faz’s were busy, Jenesse & Mel Rose went to Ballandean Estate Wines to pick up a few bottles of Summertime (a sweet White wine) and a Merlot. Meanwhile Dennis entertained Rikki and Jade with some skipping, hula hoops, footy, and some rock scrambling. The girls then wanted to dress him up as a girl, put make up on and do his hair. He promptly sat down, had a beer and ignored the pleas for the rest of the afternoon. As night fell, dinner was being prepared by everyone. The Faz family must’ve forgot their camp food and had to eat rabbit food. Dennis, Jenesse and Mel Rose had Gnochhi with cream sauce (after battling with their portable stove for 15 minutes).
At this stage we were wondering where Matt, Aileen and Natalie Moores were. They were expected to be at Girraween before sunset. By 9ish, Nicole Keegan, Dylan and Luke arrived. Luckily the full moon was up and this provided some light in setting up Dylan’s tent. Their friends Keith, Nadia and her cousin decided to camp near the school group as they arrived earlier but did not know how to find us. Still no sign of the Moores’ clan. There was no mobile reception to locate the Moores’ and someone suggested they must’ve arrived on sunset and setup wherever they could find before dark. The night was very cold, easily down to single digits Celsius. People shivered in their sleeping bags. Frost had formed overnight.
Nicole and Dylan decided to jog towards the First Pyramid. They caught up to the rest near the base of the rock. Here it is all a very steep slab, but the coarse texture of the granite gives enough friction to walk up without much worry. Sometimes pretending to be an aeroplane helps. The group made it to summit where Dennis pointed out the Second Pyramid, famous rock climb route: Scimitar 70m 21. Faz thought the big cracks to the left could be done as a solo to the top. Dennis wasn’t that nuts and even if he was, a busted finger would not get him up. Faz successfully recruited Dylan and they soon were scrambling down the side of the First Pyramid to the base.  Not wanting to watch, the rest of the crew headed towards the true summit. Here the obligatory group photos were taken. As the crew admired the 360 degree views, Faz was spotted running around on the summit of the Second Pyramid. Dylan was no where to be seen. The crew clambered back down to the Balancing Rock to observe Faz down climbing the crack section. Dylan was finally spotted. He was stuck trying to bail out of an arete onto the slab. Not confident, Dylan would keep placing his feet onto where he wanted to move but hesitated each time. Dennis directed Faz to a safe exit towards Dylan, where Faz helped him successfully down climb this section. Before this Faz was heading down a vertical crack line! His family looked on in amazement. The group arrived back at camp and the Moore’s family decided to relocated their camp over to the main group. The Faz’s went off for a drive while the rest of the crew had lunch and then took two car loads and headed off to the wineries. The first few winery stops were in the Balladean area and then Felsberg at Glen Alpin, before returning to Balladean for a tour at the Balladean Estate Wine. The group had a few tastes before joining the tour. It was long but informative. Dennis’ patience had run out and he blew a fuse. We had left the wineries with plenty of Mead, semi-sweet varieties and some reds. The group arrived back at camp and the Faz’s were back but were on another hike, this time to Castle Rock. They returned not long after. Rikki had sustained a sting on the foot, possibly from a nine legged flying spider (as witnessed by Rikki). But she recovered well and played with Natalie and Jade. The adults joined in with the rocket balloons.
Matt polished his Mead off very quickly. He had wished he bought more than just one bottle. The usual banter over a camp light was heard over wine, cheese, chocolate and toasted marshmallows. Faz is going to look up his score on Rate My Teacher. Kylie read the children a story and the adults listened in keenly. That night it wasn’t so cold. Some people woke up sweating. The next morning, everyone had the same idea: have breakfast first and then pack up. Later that day it stormed very hard across South East Queensland. The group were lucky to have good weather in between stormy periods. Photos of the weekend can be seen on the Picasa: http://picasaweb.google.com/meltaxa/Girraween2007. Continue reading Rock & Grape Tour "Its not broken!", the Grasshopper exclaims. "See, I can bend the first knuckle". The finger is shaped like a swan neck. The middle left finger droops down unnaturally. The Grasshopper winced as the finger is bent. A roar of laughter bursts out from the crew who are surrounding him. Back in the day, Dr Faz Almighty explained he would have yanked it an attempt to fix any dislocation. Thankfully he is not allowed to do this anymore. Dr Giggles just laughed hideously, snorting in between somewhere. Dr Pockneebone made some crude comment about spots. Dr Giggles stopped laughing but nearly choked on her last snort. Dr Rambo wasn’t impressed with the Grasshoppers so-called war wounds. He had seen worse and suggested the finger be splinted with the adjacent finger. But the Grasshopper was fresh out of headbands for a make shift splint. Dr Chad just shrugged his shoulders, "Pfft! You can still belay right?" Patient Chock was still thinking he is climbing with Seinfeld and his cronies. A new patient Macca was admitted by Dr Rambo. He thought The Teacher was Kramer. The Grasshopper was George. The Giggler was Elaine. But he couldn’t make his mind up who was Jerry, Newman or any other character. Gilligan lead Juice (20) with not much difficulty. Route finding was put to the test. A bit of a zigzag up but Gilligan managed to clean the climb to setup a top rope. The Teacher got to the head wall of Lesbian Printshop Workers (22). Here balance is the key. First a sloping ledge must be negotiated then a very awkward lay back up a thin crack to get through the crux. The Teacher had a few shots at it and finally nailed it with great relief and elation. The Giggler shimmied up Samson’s Pillar with no dramas. Juice’s start involved some traversing to pass the overhung start, but the time spent route finding sapped her energy. The Chad was complaining that his diet of Icebreaks was not improving his climbing. He cleaned Samson’s, but struggled on LPW, reaching the face. New to this climb, the sequence must be worked out indeed. Rambo climbed much the same as the Chad (minus the Icebreaks). No difficulty on Samsons or Juice but LPW’s head wall presented a good challenge. The Chock sporting his Red Chilli’s almost preferred to go barefoot complaining they were slippery. The Chock seemed to climb the grades backwards, by starting on the hardest and ending on the easiest. He did negotiate the start of LPW quite well as opposed to Juice’s start. [Ed.: How did you go on Samson's?] Macca had never climbed on real rock before. Samson’s proved to be challenging. The Grasshopper watched on and attempted to boulder, but his attempts were in vain. The next day, X rays revealed a Mallet finger injury with the top tendon pulling a bone fragment off. He is now out of climbing for the next 6 to 8 weeks. Continue reading The Earth Dies Screaming Tie in. Belay On. Enjoy the climb. This story joins the Grasshopper, Gilligan, the Teacher, the Giggler, Bigfoot, Rambo and the Chock at Kangaroo Point cliffs, Brisbane. They have setup top ropes on Olos and Snake in the Grass. Gilligan is preparing to lead Surrender. Meanwhile, Bigfoot is being attacked by a swarm of angry sand flies. The Grasshopper descends to the bottom of the cliff to rescue Bigfoot. He offers him a bottle of insect repellent, but Bigfoot angrily discovers the spray nozzle is missing. "Enough is enough! I have had it with these motherfucking flies on this motherfucking cliff!" He tells everybody to "saddle up", because he is "about to climb some fucking rocks" After everybody gets prepared, the cliff lights go out. This incites Bigfoot into extreme climbing. Within a record 15 minutes, Bigfoot has successfully cleaned Snake in the Grass! If you thought Bigfoot’s profanity at Snake was obscene, the Pineapple girl was in full trash talk mode tonight. The poor Grasshopper was the brunt of many jokes. Fired up, the Giggler had a score to settle with her nemesis: Snake in the Grass. She climbed with confidence, pausing only a couple of times gathering her thoughts. The Evil Ledge of Death was traversed successfully due to the absence of light. The Giggler is now a couple of metres below the anchor and Bigfoot says, "Do as I say and you live". Now Bigfoot tells the Giggler about the undercling which she grabs hold of and successfully cleans the climb! The Chock watched and studied the ascents carefully. Despite the lack of footwear, the Chock under careful instruction of the Giggler and Bigfoot successfully climbs past each difficult section. Now Bigfoot tells the Chock that if he does as Bigfoot says, he will live. Chock protests "Where do I go? There are no more holds!". Bigfoot reminds Chock – "Do as I say and you live". The Chock lived. Meanwhile on the adjacent climbs, Gilligan was leading Surrender and the Teacher was top roping Olos. Gilligan clipped the first pro backwards (the rope was running over the top of the draw). Just then all sorts of profanities was being screamed out nearby (this was Bigfoot howling at the flies, arms in full helicoptor swings). This sent a chill down Gilligans spine, which had put him off momentarily. Despite the awkward and frightening start, Gilligan cleaned the climb to setup a top rope. The Teacher asked for an audience on Olos. He was to demonstrate how to clean Olos successfully. As with all demonstrations, things did not go as planned. The traverse onto the slab proved difficult. No amount of Faz gymspastics was enough to contort himself up the headwall. Rambo was back (he found his headband) and decided to try the Olos Slab. He did remarkably well to get a couple of moves off the platform. The holds are very thin, flaky and the series of cracks are spaced in such a way balance is also a factor. Despite the Grasshopper’s painful toe nails (they are falling off) and the trash talk he was copping for it, he resisted the Olos Slab taunts and cleaned Surrender before attempting the Olos (corner). Following the Teacher, the right traverse onto the slab proved difficult. The right toe was complaining too. A few failed attempts proved too much and the Grasshopper descended off the slab. During the night, the following insightful banter was discussed:
Continue reading Snakes on a Cliff |
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nd 1ish. They stopped briefly at Aratula for Mel Rose to relieve herself, then at Bellbird Grove at Cunningsham Gap to listen to the wildlife, then Stanthorpe to pick up some Winery brochures and a chocolate stop at 
The next morning everyone arose early with the plan to climb up the First Pyramid (3.4km, 2 hours return). On our way through the camp ground we found the Moore’s. They indeed setup camp to beat the sunset.
Just before sunset, dinner was being prepared over a few glasses of wine we had recently bought. The flies came in plague proportions and were very annoying.
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