Expert at Nothing

The problem with being hyperactive is that you never really get good at any one thing. It's a focus issue, I can't sit still so I rarely finish anything. Take my climbing for instance. This last weekend in rainy Nowra was the usual mix of trying too many things and wondering why I end up smashed on routes I onsighted 15 years ago. Started out by driving solo down the two hours to the crag at 6am to meet up with Bundy and Rick at their new Darkside crag. An interesting place on first appearances. Big, black and steep, with a bizarre band of suss looking conglomerate at the 15 metre mark on most routes. They assured me it was bomber, but later in the day someone ripped a junk off which quickly killed my faith in these welded in pebbles. The moment I arrived I ran the length of the nearby crags to suss out any new route potential and quickly found a nice pocketed wall with a fun looking flake at the start. I promised myself I'd do some climbing before bolting (for once in my life!). Enthusiasm takes hold of me all too often and I struggle to not get distracted by the latest and the greatest. Focus Neil! Repeated a few of Rick and Bundy's route which were great - all felt 2 stars and were nice and long - a style I really enjoy. I even surprised myself with an onsight 2nd ascent of Bundy's new route Yaksitive (23?). Really wicked route up a steep wall with a few crimpy bits. Top 1/3 was a bit too easy and juggy to get it the full 3 star treatment. After doing these token routes I grabbed my drill and set about bolting two sport lines at the new pocketed wall I had foudn earlier. Both needed a bit of brushing (something I very rarely do these days, but it was something we did a lot of in Queensland back in the 90s!). These short winter days are doing my head in! By the time I had finished bolting it already felt late - but I wanted to climb my new routes! Problem was the other guys at the crag had strung draws up on about 5 routes and were also bolting things with various degrees of success (Adrian forget the hammer and was smashing in bolts with a rock). I manically climbed a few other routes to clean them of draws then in the fading light attempted one of my new routes (i kinda hoped the glue was dry!). Did all the moves, but it was quite a bit harder than I expected due to a section of tough little crimps over a bulge where your footwork is a sort of chimney move between two horizontal blocks. Funky - maybe 24? It was solid dark before we knew it and the explosion of gear scattered amongst three crags took a while to clean up. No rest for the wicked - I headed over to Rick's place to talk about the new Nowra guide. We agreed it should be photo topo based and symbol based like the Rockfax guides. Rick wants it to be funny and funky like CRUX - I hope he can write like that! In my usual anti-social way I decided to bivi in my car at the top of Thompons Point rather than struggle with the pleasantries of party central camp life over the river. I needed the sleep anyway. Up early at first light rearing to go. Was supposed to wait for a phone call from Lucy to let me know where they were climbing. She's not an early riser so I knew I had some time to kill. Headed down to the crag with my camera to shoot some test topos for the new guide. Ended up walking the whole length of the cliff and shooting good topos for every climb. TP is such an amazing cliff for it's variety. It's a true benchmark crag and one that I always compare other crags to (to their detriment). I was hyped for some climbing and the sky was blue! By 10am I still hadn't received the elusive phone call from Lucy about climbing plans. An SMS prompt in her direction got a terse response about a peaceful breakfast. Looks like I still had time to kill even though I'd been up 3 hours already. Checked out Thompons' Sunrise crag which is a newish developed cliff near TP. One word to describe it - JUNK. One of the worst excuses for crag development anywhere. Very short, mossy and loose. Reminded me of the worst bits of that poxy little Queensland sandstone area Brooyar. Since TP was only 5 minutes walk away why bother?? Finally I convinced Lucy to drag herself away from the full buffet breakfast and to get cranking! By the time she arrived there was fifteen cars in the carpark and the weather was looking iffy. By the time we made it to the crag it was raining. From there it was a bit downhill. The crowds swarmed into the caves and I got spanked on pretty much everything I tried. Even routes I had onsighted fifteen years ago were breaking me apart like a coconut hurled on a rock. Had a dog fest across Top One Thommo (27) - which is a route I have lusted over ever since Noah was a lad (1992 to be exact when i saw a pic of it in an old Rock mag and couldn't believe how steep it was). Surprisingly the moves were quite reasonable but the linkage would be killer. I think all my roof climbing prowess has withered since moving to NSW. I was once the king of the roof swing - but now my arms feel like deep fried pastry. I'm inspired though and will be queuing with the punters next weekend hopefully. Everyone one else was cranking off 27 and 30s all day. Even the fragile girls were punching as hard as the boys. Quote of the day would go to Frenchie (the french climber girl). "I can't climb routes like that as it would harm my career." - when questioned she explained she couldn't climb roof routes as it builds her shoulders up and she is a model and they don't like big shoulders! Last climb of the day for me was Pulling on Porcelain which obliterated me into a crumbling mess. Weak and disgusted I drove home with a side stop of the lonely hardmans club - donuts and hot chocolate in Berry.