Better Times

Well, the cool weather arrived right after the torrential rain and showed me just how much of a difference conditions make. Heat and humidity rob me of around 2 or 3 grades :(.

I have moved to the Grampians and spent the last few days at Taipan Wall. Arriving under the wall and looking up was an awe inspiring experience, I can't remember the last time I stood at a cliff and felt soul sapping fear before I had even found the routes. I "warmed up" with an on sight of first pitch of Seventh Banana (23) and then took 2 days to redpoint The Invisible Fist of Professor Hiddich Smiddich (26). The latter is what Australians call a "sporting sport" route, i.e. The first bolt is 6 metres up and there is 4+ metres between every bolt thereafter. After this, I chickened out of trying anything harder on Taipan wall and instead scared myself at least as much on an adjacent cliff trying a feindishly technical slab route where my feet sloshed around my shoes in a bath of sweat and the sun burned me off the cliff.

I am now off to either Bundaleer or the Gallery for some more steep sport nonsense that the cooler and showery weather should fit in with just fine.

Being on holiday for such a long period has forced me to stretch my culinary skills beyond the ubiquitous pasta + sauce of most previous holidays and for posterity, I shall include here a sample recipe from my camp cooking repetoire:

Sausage Suprise
(Serves 2 real men)

Ingredients:
6 lamb sausages, chopped into short pieces.
1 jar apple sauce
2 large onions, sliced.
200g mushrooms, sliced
Several cloves Garlic, sliced
8 medium sized potatoes
paprika
salt
olive oil
runny honey

Recipe:
1) Put the potatoes in a pot of salty water and simmer.
2) Fry the sausages in olive oil till nearly done, then add the onions and garlic and fry till onions soft, then add onions and fry for another 2 minutes or so.
3) Add the apple sauce, a pinch of salt, some paprika or whatever other spice is to hand and a generous squeeze of honey to the sausages. Continue to heat till whole mixture is hot.
4) drain potatoes, add the whole lot together and eat. Best served with clearskin special Aldi red wine (or slightly green looking rain water from the camp tank.)

Water, water everywhere...

...but most of it full of mud! Hmm, think I fudged that quote, nevermind. Last night there was a truly superb thunderstorm, the downpour was of an intensity I have not seen often and at its height, constant thunder was accompanying lightening that flickering with less than a second between strikes. The rain continues, somewhat abated, today and there are floods everywhere. The positive side to all this is that the temperature should come right back down and be vaguely suitable for climbing once more.

I have managed to get some routes done most days recently, despite the rain but the conditions are not really lending themselves to anything very hard so it has been pretty much mid grade classics all the way. The massive humidity levels are difficult to adapt to, heat alone is avoidable but with humidity at 90% the whole time as well it's a bit of a misery fest.

Swimming in the river one day brought a bit of relief from the heat, not really what I expected though, even the rivers in Australia are incredibly warm. Apparently I need to learn how to give out better negative signals to girls I only want to be friends with as well (who would have thought it) because the alternative is horribly awkward!

Hide and Seek

Well, I've been having an amusing game of hide and seek with the weather recently. The storms that occur out on flat plains are a pretty exciting experience for me. Unlike Scottish weather that generally does the same thing over quite a wide area, the storms in Victoria are extremely localised, often only a kilometer wide, they float across the plains soaking one area and leaving others dry and sunny. Trying to climb in these conditions with several storms floating around every direction you look in is pretty entertaining and sometimes very wet! On the positive side, the temperature is chronically low for this time of year, which suits me just fine.

Almost everyone I was having fun hanging out with and climbing with has left in the last few days, the pines campsight overall is looking rather deserted infact. There are still sufficient partners to climb with though, which is a lucky coincidence as I have a few climbs I would rather like to tick before I leave. I have been back on Jet Lag, 29, on the sport wall and with the help of a little beta I can now do the route in about 2 links, stringing the whole thing together though will remain quite a trial.

I should be Arapiles for another couple of weeks and then off to Melbourne for a few weeks before heading out to Buffalo to do some climbs with a chap in the Victoria Climbing Club in the latter half of January.