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The Shaker - Mount Arapiles 18-Jul-2016 At 9:47:02 PM kieranl

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On Saturday I was out with a noted guidebook editor, on his endless, perpetually unsuccessful, quest for classic new beginners climbs. Typically these are sought in beautiful, isolated spots where no-one ever goes. The problem is that the the reason no-one ever goes there isn't that these idyllic glades are remote, it is that the rock and climbing is awful.

But I digress. We were there, in Hunger Gully, on a glorious, sunny winter's day (well, it was sunny out of the shady gully we were in). We had unpacked and after one look at the climb and another look at the rack and rope I nominated my companion to lead. The rope, I was assured, had once been 50 metres long and was now "about 47". The rack had been proposed to be a basic trad affair but somehow that had got left at home. What we were left with were a few wires, 4 slings, some hexentrics with cord that could the Indian rope trick, and three cams which appeared to have been rejected by Ray Jardine in the mid-seventies.

My companion was happily sorting his gear when I noticed something. "What is that?", I said, pointing at a what appeared to be a wonky letter S in a pocket, apparently sketched by a finger dipped in a paint-pot.

My companion first looked surprised and then a bit embarassed. "Oh, that was me" and "It's The Shaker, I must have put it in the wrong gully in the guide". He went on to explain that when he was young he had visited the Blue Mountains and seen the painted initials marking the starts of many climbs. He thought this was a good idea and when he returned to Arapiles began to initial climbs. Mercifully he started with Hunger Gully, with pretty crude results, initialled a few more at Mitre Rock and then decided that this was not a good idea.

So the correct location of The Shaker has been re-discovered after about 45 years and it doesn't matter because it's complete rubbish. Our climb was abandoned and we went and did Diapason, which was the only reasonable option given our rack and rope.