Spring has arrived!

Well! What a stretch of fantastic weather it has been! All of last week I awoke to beautiful blue skies and gallahs screeching away at Stapylton Campground. Each morning I would rouse from my car, put on the coffee, and smile. I pretty much had 7 days of this, aside from one cold cloudy morning and one night spent at Arnies Acres. I wont bore you with every minor details of the week as each day was something different, be it sending some new boulders, trad climbering while Josh was bolting, bush bashing and exploring or spending a great day with rad people climbing easy sport routes at the Sun Deck. Every day was a fresh injection of a different reason to go climbing. Damn it sucked when the week came to a close.

Anyway, my time away was spent with some pretty cool people at various points. Joshy and our mate Tim Nelson came up for a couple of days of taking photos and hanging out to begin with. Arnie made an appearance too camping with us for a couple of nights. 6 weeks after a knee reconstruction and the old master is already back out climbing. We both had a lovely day out at the Sun Deck climbing a whole heap of suprisingly fun sport routes. Each route when climbed was proclaimed to the pick of the day, until the next one was. Joining us were some awesome folk from Sydney. Ren and Meg, and Rowan and Jules. It was a pleasure to get to share coffee in the mornings and beer of an evening with these guys for the week. Old mate May and new mate Blake rolled into Ararat on the bus for a few days, then ole' blighty Tom Haigh appeared at the end of the week.

I finished off a couple of projects at the new boulder I found, now dubbed the 'Jungle Boulder'. Below is a quick topo I drew up on paint.

To find this cool wall, walk up the tourist track past Trackside. When you get to the Butchers Choice Boulder, continue along the track for approx. 100m. When you get to a small boulder in the middle of the path with a yellow triangle painted, look left. You should be able to see the back side of the boulder, which is a big slab. I've also built a little cairn here and a little path.

Conga Fury V8, sit starts with left hand low on arete and right on a rad crimpy pinch in the face. Hug and slap your way to the top!

Liza Machete V7, starts low, right hand on big high edge and left hand in slopey seam. Pounce to the pocket and topout left.

Steak Knife V1, stand starts in pocket and traverses the lip to a funky rollover manouver.

Inca Steppa, V9, starts low with obvious left hand edge and small right edge. Gastons, sidepulls, and front stepping is the dish served up here.

Above: Me almost exploding my brain on an attempt at Inca Steppa V9 (Photo: Tim Nelson)

So, whats next? Well I'm booked out with other stuff for the next few weeks, so it will just be a whole lot of training. Uni assigments are coming thick and fast too, so I better get them sorted. And its just hit spring! So time to put the pad under the bed and get the rope out for some routes! The hype is still up on Punks. Rowan knocked it off the other day, so psyche has built again. Had a crack at Bossanova on Afterglow wall too. Man it felt good to be doing a lot of moves in a row again, and getting some air time lol.

I think thats it. I can't find my phone which has some more photos on it. When I do I will upload them. Now though, its back to studying organic chemistry nomenclature for tomorrows test......

-TheBigAl