Rock Climbing in the Blues

First climbing trip, Blue Mountains, Australia

From our house in the far western suburbs of Sydney, it's a relatively easy 1-2 hour drive to the Blue Mountains. The Blueys aren't a majestic mountain range like the Rockies or the Sierra Nevadas- most of the "mountains" in the Blues don't exceed 2000 meters. However,  what these modest mountains lack in altitude, they more than make up for by being rugged and craggy. Sandstone cliffs in the 100 to 200 meter range are everywhere. 

One of many tempting outcroppings

Katoomba cliffs, with the three sisters in the distance to the right

The Wollumai wall of Katoomba Cliffs, with a nice waterfall

With so many cliffs in the area, it was a bit difficult to choose an area for our first climb. I bought a guidebook which describes ~3000 climbing routes in 45 areas, which the book describes as "just a small percentage of the quality rock in the Blues". That is a lot of rock to explore!

We settled on a climbing area called Mount Boyce, just outside Blackheath, because it had many highly recommended easy routes, and the guide had this to say: "Majestic Boyce. What a place. Expect to sample what the Blueys are all about; classic orange and grey sandstone walls with one or two pitch routes of just about every type and grade. This place will bring a smile to your face, and give you a chance to feel the soul of Blue Mountains climbing."

So we rented a car, drove the 80 km up to Blackheath, bounced along a gravel road next to the train tracks at the top of the cliff line, and parked at this majestic view.

Mount Boyce- cliffs everywhere. I was like a kid in a candy store.

Carrie at the top of the escarpment, at the rappel entrance to the climbing area

One of the many new things about climbing in the Blues is that most of the cliffs are accessed at the top, so you start your day by rappelling down to the cliff base, and then climb back out. This makes it particularly important to plan an escape route- you don't want to rap down into an area where all of the climbs are too hard, making it too difficult to get out. You can always climb up the rappel rope with prusiks, but that's not easy either. We weren't too concerned about this because we knew that there were many easy routes on this cliff.

The start to our day- rap down the pink rope.

We spent some time orienting ourselves to the cliffs and selected our first climb, a relatively easy 2-pitch route called The Eyrie.

Our first route in Oz- a two-pitch mixed route called The Eyrie (grade 12)

Carrie relaxing in the shade at the cliff base

Racked up and read to climb

The Eyrie was a blast- the rock was quality sandstone that took solid gear and had lots of fun features to climb. Chicken-heads and jugs galore, which was a stark contrast to the smooth granite of New Hampshire and Yosemite.

Somewhere on pitch 1. I was having a blast!

Carrie was belaying for me from the bottom while I lead and installed the gear for our protection.

Carrie's down at the bottom, belaying in the shade

The first pitch ended in a cave (!), where I set up a station to belay for Carrie as she climbed the pitched and cleaned our gear. We finished the second pitch, rapped back to the cliff base, and scoped out our next climb.

Snickers and a climbing guide book. Ahh, good times.

We decided to do a bit harder climb next- at grade 15 called Another Man's Juliet. According to the book, this climb has a "scenic belay" and a pumpy overhanging second pitch.

John at the belay station

Silliness at the belay "ledge"

Together at the belay ledge. Without planning or coordination, Carrie and I managed to buy the exact same shoes- La Sportiva Mythos in orange. Yes, we are dorks.

Another aspect of climbing in Australia that was new to us was the carrot bolts. Many climbs all over the world have been bolted, which means that someone (normally the first ascensionist of the route) has installed very strong bolt hardware in the rock to make it possible to climb more safely. In the US, we're used to stainless steel expansion bolts or glue-in ring bolts, both of which have a fixed hanger, so all you have to do is clip the bolt with a quickdraw and you have a very secure piece of protection. Bolts in Oz are different- they often just a steel machine bolt hammered into the rock, called "bashies" or "carrot bolts". These don't have a fixed hanger, so you have to bring your own.

The rusted bit is the carrot bolt. I installed the steel hanger around the bolt, then clipped a quickdraw biner to the hanger, twisted the top biner so that it sits gate up, and then clipped the rope through the bottom biner.

Two bolts for our belay station. A modern glue-in ring bolt (left) and an older carrot (right)

A secure belay. Two bolts in the rock clipped with locking biners.  Double slings are rigged to these biners in a self-equalizing arrangement and then connected to a big central locking biner. Two additional locking biners are used to secure the climbers to the central biner.

  

The start of the pitch 2 overhang. Carrie took this photo while belaying for me, which is either impressive or scary, depending on how you look at it.

I did not appreciate the extra step of installing the bolt hangers on this overhanging pitch. Imagine that you've climbed 5 m above your last solid piece of protection, your forearms are screaming with lactic acid, and you're desperately trying to clip the next bolt. If you drop, you'll freefall for at least 10 m before the rope begins to catch you. You first have to unclip a fiddly little hanger from your rack, manage not to drop it, slip it over the bolt, and twist it around. Then, you need to unclip a quickdraw from your harness, clip the hanger, and rotate the biner to sit gate-up. Then you have to pull up some slack on the rope and clip the rope through the bottom biner of the quickdraw. My forearms are burning just thinking about it.


We were worn out after two longish climbs, so we took a well-deserved break and enjoyed the view. We'll definitely be back for more.