don't believe the hype

I've left it a long time again :) Anyway the trip to the US went well, got a lot done work-wise and saw a few cool things in Washington. At the IBM conference they hired a theme park (Universal) for an evening so we could go on all the rollercoasters without any queues - pretty good fun!

This last weekend was pretty good despite being on call for work... didn't do much Saturday, spent most of Sunday working and then on Monday arvo went to Felltimber. 3 of us led Bullfighter (17) and then we spent a little while toproping a grade 22. First few moves felt easier than last time and I went past my high point, I think there's only a couple of moves to go.

Should be heading to Mt Stanley on Sunday... yay!

Well a lot has gone on since my last post... we had my little blue Ford Laser stolen (we got it back the same night), and after that we sold it. We now have a very nice white 2002 Mazda 626.

I did a bit of climbing in April, Mt Stanley twice, Mt Pilot, a little bit in the Quarry, some stuff at Felltimber (getting close to doing Pimp Daddy Superstar).

April 28th, Kylie & I went to Melbourne briefly last weekend to pick up our new kitten (Maggie) and for me to buy some new climbing shoes. That's Maggie in the picture.

My new climbing shoes are La Sportiva Barracuda's. They ROCK as I found out today at Mt Pilot. Ben & I went out, first we went to Flake Off for Ben to put some unfinished business to rest (he has grabbed the draw twice on this climb). He led it in good style and was pretty happy. I wanted to check how well my new shoes went on the top-rope line next to it, a grade 23. I have never been able to get past a spot about 4m from the top, but this time I managed to do all the moves except one (I did take a few rests in between). There's basically no handholds and the footholds are microscopic so you need decent shoes to do it. So I was already happy and it wasn't even lunchtime yet! After that we went over to Bakery Wall and tried to do the grade 18 on the far right... after watching Ben on the part I have previously struggled with, I saw how to do it and got higher than I've been before. But I would really like to top-rope it to check out the top-out to make sure it's not too bad, you would fall onto a bit of a slab if you came off and it would really hurt your ankles. In fact the best idea would be to put a U-bolt right at the very top for people to lower off as there is a lot off moss & stuff up there that is easy to destroy if you stand on it.

After that we decided to have lunch. Next climb was Chicken Salad Roll, and after my first attempt failed at the second bolt, I lowered off to give Ben a go. He got to pretty much the same place. My 2nd time was much better, I managed to get a little past the 3rd bolt to what seems to be the crux move - you have a nice big two-handed hold but not much else.

We finished up trying Beechworth Bakery, it was great fun and good practice placing gear etc. Such a nice finger-crack in the middle section of the climb! The bottom is pretty tough though and it's going to be a while before I'm good enough to lead it.

A great day all up even though I didn't finish a single climb! Hopefully this is all making me a better & stronger climber.

The next few weeks is packed, we're going to Cirque Du Soleil (Varekai) next Saturday (12th) and the next morning I fly across to Mount Olive (New Jersey). I arrive there at about 12.05am on the Monday morning, assuming the place is not delayed (unlikely!). Then I have about an hour taxi ride to get to the hotel, and I have to work in the morning. I'll be there for 3 days, then heading down to Pennsylvania (West Chester) for 2 days, and I'll be checking out Washington on the weekend. Sunday night I head to Orlando for the IBM IMPACT conference (Websphere Transaction & Messaging Conference is part of this). Then back home, I leave Orlando the night of Friday 25 and arrive in Albury Sunday morning.

So it may be a little while before the next post!

OUT

overland-track

Well, I walked the Overland Track in Tasmania last week with my mother. It's a 5-night, 60km walk (not including side trips) from Cradle Mountain to Lake St Clair. The walk goes through the Tasmanian World Heritage area and it's spectacular country! Here's a trip diary...

Sunday 11th March: Drive to Melbourne, catch plane to Launceston. Walk around Launceston trying to find Shellite for my stove. Coles doesn't have it, and neither does the service station. Ring Cradle Mountain Visitor Centre. They have it so we decide to buy it there. Enjoy last normal meal for a while...
Monday 12th March: Catch 7am bus from Launceston to Cradle Mountain via Devonport. Arrive Visitor centre at 10am. Buy fuel, register for walk, catch shuttle bus to start. Begin walking at 11.15am (18 months after first deciding to do the walk). 700m of boardwalk leads to a pleasant climb through rainforest (150m of altitude gain). Pack starts to feel heavy. Pass Crater Lake (very pretty) where people are swimming. Climb another 50m to a lunch spot. Climb a steep section which chains to grab onto the plateau and stop at Marion's Lookout to get great views of Dove Lake and Cradle Mountain. Walk across the plateau to Kitchen Hut. Stash packs there (glad to get them off). From here the climb to the top of Cradle Mountain is 250m of altitude, it's pretty steep and most of it is over a jumble of boulders. Return trip takes 2.5 hours. Mum stops about 3/4 of the way up. From the top the rest of the day's walk is clearly visible. Walk back down and have a bit of a break before picking up the packs again. Skirt around the west side of Cradle Mountain until past it and turn towards Barn Bluff (track here is pretty bad due to large rocks and rotten wood). About half way between Cradle Mtn and Barn Bluff, the track reaches a junction where we turn left (south) and drop into Waterfall Valley. By the time we reach the hut I am feeling real tired. Lucky tomorrow is only a short one!
Tuesday 13th March: Follow good track skirting around a ridge that runs SE from Barn Bluff. Once past this, we reach a wooden platform to put our packs on while we make the 1hr return trip to Lake Will, which is tucked in just south of Barn Bluff. The weather is unbelievably good and we take our lunch. We eat it on a small beach (complete with sand) on the shore of Lake Will. After returning to our packs, we hike another hour to Windermere hut (next to a lake). Mum is feeling pretty wrecked. We get to the hut at about 2pm which gives us some good recovery time. I manage to finally convince Mum to dump some of the food which she put in at the last minute (just in case). Unfortunately you can't really afford to carry extra kilos when you're as small as her. She is also not sleeping and one of the group of nurses sharing the hut with us gives her a quarter of a tablet to help. Hopefully she will feel better tomorrow, or it will be a long trip!
Wednesday 14th March: Mum is feeling much better after getting 6 hours of sleep (instead of 2 like she has been). Today is a long day, 5 hours of walking, so we get up early and are on the track shortly after 8. When we saddle up, she comments that her pack is much lighter, so it looks like we'll be OK. For the first couple of hours, the track heads SSE across the plains toward Mt Pelion West. This is easy walking, pretty flat with just a couple of short climbs and descents. There is a lookout about 200m off the track where we later find out one of the nurses stumble while trying to put her pack on, and was saved from falling over the edge by one of her friends who grabbed her! I get really hungry and eat lunch at about 11am. Once we get to the slopes of Mt Pelion West, the track enters forest and skirts around the eastern flanks of the mountain. We know we need to lose about 200m of altitude to get down to Frog Flats (in the valley) and then gain it again on the way to the hut. We walk for another hour and a half through forest without feeling like we're going downhill, and then suddenly we're at Frog Flats, which comes as a surprise. We stop for a brief break and then continue as we figure we might as well get the day finished and it's only about 12.30. We re-enter the forest on the other side of the valley and walk continuously uphill along muddy track to reach the Pelion Plains. From there, I figure it's only a short hop to the hut and I speed up. Half an hour later I'm still walking and I am slowing down! But eventually the hut appears and it's a big new hut with 6 separate sleeping rooms (sleep 6 each) and a big kitchen/eating area. Not to mention a fantastic view of Mt Oakleigh from the porch! Very nice! Since we started walking so early, it's only about 2 and we have all afternoon to lounge around.
Thursday 15th March: We are on the track by 8 again as it was really good to get going early yesterday. The track goes pretty much directly south today, over the Pelion Gap. To get to the gap we walk a couple of kilometres along flat ground, and then we have a steepish climb that seems to go on forever. This section take an hour and a half. James (who is also doing the track with his mother) and I team up as we both want to go up Mt Ossa today which is a four hour side trip. Once we reach the Gap, we dump our packs, have a quick break and then set off. The track climbs very steeply up the side of Mt Doris (which is a rounded peak next to Mt Ossa) and then skirts around the South side of it to get across to Mt Ossa. You get great views here, there are lots of dolerite cliffs around and you can see back north to Barn Bluff and Cradle Mtn from the saddle between Mt Doris and Mt Ossa. After this saddle the track becomes VERY steep and climbs about 300m up to a small saddle between two dolerite stacks. By the time James and I reach this point my legs feel like rubbish and we get a view of the other side - where the track descends briefly and then goes up again! I have to admit that while I was walking up that section I had to rest about every 20m. The mountain has a surprisingly large flat area on top (the size of a paddock) and follow the track across this to a pile of boulders which is the summit. We sit there for a little while and marvel at how high it is compared to other peaks (Mt Ossa does NOT look like it's the highest peak from the track so it's surprising). Then we head down which feels much better as it uses different muscles. After descending we have a longish break for lunch and then set off for the hut. As we descend from the Gap, clouds come over. We reach the hut at about 3.30 and shortly after that it starts raining. Well, we knew the weather was too good to last the whole trip!
Friday 16th March: Still raining when we get up, and it seems to have set in. Oh well, break out the raincoats. We have decided to go to the end today, skipping one hut, as we need to catch the 9.30 ferry on Saturday. The morning's walking is tough - we spend 3 and a half hours trying not to twist our ankles or fall over due to the slippery tree roots. We are walking through wonderful rainforests with huge mossy trees - it feels like it's straight from Lord Of The Rings. We also cross Du Cane Gap in the morning, it is not as tough as Pelion but we are tired now. It's the last uphill section and it will be good to get it done. I get ahead a little and arrive at the top of the gap (easy to miss as it's only marked with a small metal Land Survey marker stuck to a boulder) with my shirt soaked in sweat. I wait for 5 minutes and then decide to continue as I am wet and getting cold. We have been walking today with a girl called Maude from Quebec and so Mum will have some company. I continue until the Windy Ridge hut where we will have lunch. As soon as I get there the rain comes down, and I put some water on for the others so they can at least get a hot drink. The water boils and I wonder where they are but they eventually arrive, very wet. We have lunch and are glad that we aren't going to be sitting in this hut with 12 others for the whole afternoon. The rain eases and we set off again, it's all downhill from here to the end. As we pass down the valley the weather gradually improves, and our pace quickens. Toward the end we are feeling very sore and our legs move slower. When will it end? We reach a suspension bridge and we can now tell it can only be another 20 minutes or so. Finally we reach the hut, it is the oldest hut so far. We'd hoped that it would be more or less empty due to people catching the ferry this afternoon. It is not very full and the people seem nice. We rest for a couple of hours and then after dinner a game of 500 starts. We play a few hands and then 4 guys show up just before dark. They have come all the way from Pelion hut! Turns out they ran out of cigarettes and decided to finish ASAP. One of them has twisted his ankle and looks like he's been in pain for a while - his face is very drawn. They decide to sleep in the kitchen to avoid making it crowded.
Saturday 17th March: Wake up, eat, catch the ferry (it was late) and head to the Visitor Centre for food, drink and a spot in front of the fire. Catch the bus to Hobart. That night I lost my mobile phone in Hobart which was rather annoying.
Sunday 18th March: Fly to Melbourne, drive back home.

You meet some really cool people walking the track, and you share the huts with the same people most of the time. We got to know a few. The ones I remember most are:
* A group of 4 Americans - 15-year-old, his grandparents and one of his great uncles. The grandparents had spent the last 14 or so years riding the bikes in various parts of the world and had done about 40,000 km. The kid was home-schooled and had been travelling with them for 4 months.
* Another mother and son (I mentioned them above)
* A German couple who walked in the Arm River track, did Mt Oakleigh and Mt Ossa and then walked back. They always carried their packs as she had gotten lost and spent a night out before.

So, all in all it was good fun and great views.

It was a relatively cool weekend so on Sunday, Ben, Adrian and I headed up the mountain for the first time this year. There is a fair bit of fire damage on the western slopes and in the area around Eurobin Falls. We did not go up to the plateau.
By the time we got to our first climb, Fantasies Of Gail, it was 10.30 and Ben setup the abseil and headed down. Adrian followed and I went last with a backup prussick, intending to get some photos of Ben climbing from just under the overhang. I took a few snaps looking down to the belay but by the time Ben got going I was really uncomfortable. Since I was using my other prussick as a safety loop for my camera, I spent a while trying to get weight of the prussick which had locked off quite firmly. After I overcame that hurdle, I abseiled down to the slab and took a few snaps.



After Ben led, Adrian followed but the rope from the abseil wasn't quite long enough to go down to the belay ledge and then back up to the end of the climb. So I climbed a few moves and clipped into the first bolt. Still not long enough. Went to the second bolt. Still not long enough so Adrian got himself safe and put me on belay while Ben released the other end of the rope (still attached to the original abseil tree). I finished the climb, using the less obvious sequence which, if I'd used it on lead would have saved me having to downclimb to clip a bolt (Ben made the same mistake which you can see in the photos).
By the time all this had happened and we finished the climb and got back in the car it was 1.30. We had a quick lunch at Bent's lookout and then I suggested we head down to Home James. I wasn't keen to lead it but I climbed it fairly easily on toprope. Such a great climb! Ben was next but couldn't commit to stepping across the gap on the traverse section. He said he was busy looking down into the gorge - I must admit I felt a little intimidated starting the traverse but managed to focus on the climbing. Adrian seemed to do it no worries and really enjoyed it.
Next we top-roped Thin Wall Special Pineapple Delight, which is a little tricky. I managed to find a non-obvious way of attacking it which seemed to make it a bit easier. A lot of the time I struggle to find sequences so I was happy about this one.
On our way home we stopped at the Ovens pub and met a German guy who was waiting for his buddies who were doing Angels. We'd seen them doing what looked to be the 3rd last pitch while on Pineapple Delight and they took quite a while to do that pitch. We were thinking they would finish in the dark if they didn't hurry up. Apparently their tents were still in the campsite too! I guess their friend was in for a long wait.
All in all it was a great day out - super-keen to get back up this weekend.

Well, a lot has happened since my last post...

• I got married on Dec 2nd (pics)
  
• We went to the South Island of NZ for our honeymoon from Dec 4-14 (pics)
• Christmas
• New Year

What can I say about getting married? It was great. We had great weather and the day ran pretty much according to plan, despite Marcel trying very hard to be sick. The ceremony was very nice and everyone has been saying they had heaps of fun at the reception. Was extremely tired by the end of the day.
Our honeymoon was really good too... one night in Dunedin, 3 in Queenstown, 1 in Wanaka, 1 in Haast, 1 in Fox Glacier and 3 in Christchurch. Highlights were the whitewater rafting on the Shotover River, Arthur's Pass, Queenstown in general and seeing some real mountains (Mt Cook and Mt Tasman). One day when I can boulder properly I will go to Castle Hill...
After all the wedding gifts we had heaps of money and ended up getting a Saeco coffee machine (which I use every day now), a Bose sound system (Lifestyle 18 Series III) and a sandstone outdoor setting (2.4m long with 6 wrought iron chairs). I am still setting up the sound system as there are many features.
Christmas was also very generous... I got a ThermaRest (old one is leaky), battery-powered lantern (which is surprisingly bright), quite a few books for my SF collection, the 19" widescreen LCD screen I am currently looking at, Hard Grit and E11 (climbing DVDs) and some other smaller presents like calendars and boxers.
New Year I'd intended to spend sitting under the stars at Mt Pilot and doing some night climbing... but the weather was not good enough. So I pretty much stayed at home.
Jan 6-7 saw us in Hobart for Steve Irrgang's wedding. Saturday morning we went to Salamanca markets where I bought some books and we got parked in... The wedding was very nice, and the reception was in a rowing club right on the water. Water taxi is a very stylish way to depart! On the Sunday we went for a drive up Mt Wellington... there had been a crash and apparently one of the drivers pulled a knife! On our way down the fire department, police and ambulance had all arrived and the road had been shut.
Last Sunday Ben, Nikki, Andrew, Adrian and I went to Mt Stanley and I led my 2nd trad 16 (which I was happy about). Also got on a 19 (Western Exposure) which I hope to lead next time out there.
The bushfires are pretty bad and when there's a southerly it gets very smoky... I hope Mt Buffalo doesn't get burnt out again.
Trying to do more training (pull-ups, curls, sit-ups) but it is very very hot even until 10.30. And I am not a morning person. Maybe I just need to bite the bullet and get up early (but not tomorrow since it just went past midnight).