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Mount Buffalo Guidebook


IdratherbeclimbingM9

13-Oct-2003
1:24:28 PM

On 10/10/2003 nmonteith wrote:
>From memory they write something like this at the end of the route description.
>
>Gear 1" - 5"

This description would cover most things (except slabs) at Buffalo!!


IdratherbeclimbingM9

18-Nov-2003
2:47:05 PM

I was up at Buffalo on the weekend sussing out more climbs to do, with the current guidebook in my hand.
I found it quite confusing trying to differentiate climbs on the South side Gorge Rim from the Pulpit Rock area looking back towards Sewer Wall/Waterfall area, as there is no over-view schematic diagram for this part of the cliffline.
I for one would find it a blessing if a line diagram spread could be included for this area, (similar to that which exists for the North Wall) showing where climbs start & finish, in the next guide.
Also a close inspection with binoculars reveals a number of climbs in this area that have obviously been done, but not included in the present guide.

jjobrien

18-Nov-2003
4:07:53 PM

Does anyone know that story about the guy who fell through the bottom of his porta ledge? Goes something like: it was raining and his ledge was filling up with water so he thought he would carefully poke a little hole in the bottom of it with his pocket knife. As soon as the blade touched the fabric it ripped from end to end, and he was left hanging in his rigging in the middle of the night in the rain. I laugh every time I think of it. Who was that? The story should be included in the history.

18-Nov-2003
5:04:01 PM

It's an old story and it is true, but not as described above. It was Reg Marron on one of his solo ascents of the North Wall, and it was a long time before portaledges. If my memory serves me correctly (which it seldom does these days) it was Chouinard Hammock and as it was made out of "ripstop" nylon he figured a little hole wouldn't expand under the weight of an 80kg climber. But Reg was always prepared, he had a spare! Well, wouldn't you? I'll see if I can chase up some more details of this, and other stories, from the old copies of Argus that I have and send them off to the guidebook people.


Fe

19-Nov-2003
10:49:12 AM

The VCC are hosting a forum at the next meeting to discuss the new guide. We'd love anyone who wants to, to come along and participate.

There's been lots of great feedback from everyone here, but nothing beats a bit of face to face discussion. The meeting is at 8pm on Thursday 27th November (next week) at the Australian Gemmological Association, 380-382 Spencer Street, Melbourne. We really hope to see some of you there.

And please don't forget that there is a club trip to Buffalo on December 6th/7th to get the new guide started. Please contact the trip leader, Mike Wust (H) 9752 7623, if you're able to come.

Thanks
Fe


Paulie

20-Nov-2003
1:59:37 AM

Rupert...make sure you get hold of Bob Cowan and John Schwerdfeger, they'll have a lot of excellent suggestions and interesting things to comment on. I don't think I know of anyone more active than those 2 on the mount over the past few years. Email me if you need their phone numbers or email addresses.

Cheers,

Paulie

gfdonc

20-Nov-2003
5:17:22 PM

a5 wrote:
> Its probably neither here nor there, but I reckon there could be something queer about the 'stated 40m' third pitch length of Ozymandias. I have run it together with the 6m pitch to Big Grassy on a 45 rope and still had enough left over to tie off to a cordelette belay.

Umm .. sadly I beg to differ from personal experience. I tried to do this once, at the end of the first day, with daylight starting to fade, and two Big Wall Virgins in tow. Ran out of rope just when about to ease my body onto Big Grassy. Shit! Only needed 2m more rope to reach the anchors. So what do you do? Unclipped one of my home-made etriers, *untied* from the lead rope, tie the et into the end, clip into the other end of the et, then ease up onto the ledge and fix the haul rope. Don't try this at home.


IdratherbeclimbingM9

21-Nov-2003
1:56:11 PM

On 20/11/2003 gfdonc wrote:
>a5 wrote:
>there could be something queer about the 'stated 40m' third pitch length of Ozymandias.
>Umm .. sadly I beg to differ from personal experience.

Fair enough, ... I will have to get my mate to measure his short rope again.
Obviously gfdonc you also were using a shorter than standard rope, and it could all come down to a metre of length +/- ... ??

We used cordalettes on every belay (would have helped with stretching pitch length ?); and on the pitches referred to, I extended a lot of placements with medium (or longer) runners to avoid ropedrag, as we heard from another party they had a mini epic getting onto BG for this reason.
They untied off the lead line also, and led the last 6m on their static haul-line. They seemed to think the problem was more with rope-drag than rope-length.
That leader did not have his headtorch with him and was groping the wall looking for bolts in the dark to set his belay. (His eyes were still as big as saucers describing this experience 2 days later when they got off the climb!)


gusc

26-Jan-2004
4:35:04 PM

Has anyone climbed "Silver Girl" at The Castle? I reckon the current guidebook has it at 1 or 2 grades harder than it should be. It felt easier than Peroxide Blonde. A lovely climb, though.

adamk

26-Jan-2004
7:57:30 PM

Oweng wrote
"I remember a few years ago having a hell of a time using the description in the guide to find the Buckland Slabs."

Went to buckland slabs on a 37 degree day. Heinous walk in, guide book states 45 minutes. It took us 5 hours. Did half a climb and decided to get out of there before it got dark. Now that we new the way it only took an hour and a half too get out. Still some sick looking climbs there so if you dont mind adventure scrub bashing through horizontal carcoal sticks you could have a blast...

kieranl

26-Jan-2004
11:22:02 PM

The main problem with extending the third pitch of Ozy to Big Grassy is rope-drag. People have been doing it for donkey's years. I think A5 is right in suggesting the use of long runners on your placements. At the top of the pitch you go sharply left for a couple of metres and then go up again. That creates a lot of drag and you can easily lose a few metres of useable rope if you aren't aware of what's happening


IdratherbeclimbingM9

30-Jan-2004
12:04:27 PM

More feedback.
(Probably should post to VCC?, but this is the easy option).

The Sentinel.
Pain & Happiness. 12m 20
There are nil bolts on this route. I visited it 23/01/04 and found that someone has removed them. They appear to have been hammered off and have left a scarred location for where they used to be.
Not good. (I think leaving them would have been better -> less visually intrusive).

The Sentinel.
Ethical Drum. 12m M6 (A3+/4)
Takes the incipient seam just left of centre on the 30 degree overhanging Sth face.
Finish up right of centre after turning the lip.
Mostly natural (thin) gear. Hooks essential. 1st ascent used a knifeblade just below the lip to protect against groundfall and a rurp above to turn the lip.
Rod. & Andrew 23/01/04
... Note: Descent by abseil off ground anchored rope as the 'horn' on top is dangerous (has a hairline fracture) and is a timebomb accident waiting to happen.

>deadpoint 10/10/2003
>Tend to agree on The Pintle, did this in Jan, they day of the fire evacuation. The variant left of the >bottomless chimney is awesome, although the flake is a bit thin at points.
A weighted skyhook is an excellent protection option on the top of the flake; (which drums and would probably spit any nuts that would take major contrivance to 'stick' at that point).

gfdonc

30-Jan-2004
12:13:02 PM

> A weighted skyhook is an excellent protection option on the top of the flake;

You are a scary man Mr A5.


IdratherbeclimbingM9

30-Jan-2004
1:06:20 PM

On 30/01/2004 gfdonc wrote:
>> A weighted skyhook is an excellent protection option on the top of the
>flake; You are a scary man Mr A5.

The flake is only as thick as the internal radius of a skyhook, so the hook sits securely over the flake rather than 'on' it, ie nil tendancy to rock or to skate off, = bomber for a hook placement, and more secure than any nut in the same location.
When I led it recently I 'weighted' the hook with a large hex & cam to stop ropedrag from dislodging it by upward loading, (even though I had a quickdraw attached), however its still runout to the belay location on the top of the block, where a very long 7mm prusik cord (if you carry one), makes an excellent thread to form this belay.

9.15pm edit for clarification;
The flake is hollow and drums with a dull thud, but its good for a downward load. In my opinion any pro placed behind it would help lever it off the face.


IdratherbeclimbingM9

2-Feb-2004
11:05:34 AM

The present guide indicates that double ropes are required for descent from the Eastern pinnacle of the Cathedral after doing Maharajah etc (into the slot behind it).

Not true.

A single 50m rope is sufficient off the abseil shackle. It only reaches the ground with half a metre to spare on the tails (unweighted) for the 25m abseil, so your rope needs to be its full length.

++++++++++++++++++++++
The next guide could be improved also with some schematic cliff diagrams of the Og, Gog, Magog area to enable locating of climbs.

adamk

2-Feb-2004
12:17:54 PM

Other things to note on the cathedral, the guide book states that the second pitch belay on Sultan has two bolts. There is only one and it rates very highly on the rusty manky meter. The rebolting fairies may wanna check this out next time your up Buffalo way. I found there was heaps of natural gear too set up the belay anyway but the bolt was very helpful on the traverse around, it may have been set up for the traverse as opposed to the belay but the guide book makes this a little confusing. Jump on Sultan and have a go, sooooooo sick!!!!

2-Feb-2004
12:28:14 PM

Congrats to Rod. for getting up Ethical Drum. I fell off it back in the early '70s, got to to lip and had a dickens of a time trying to get something in over the lip. Sat back down and the tie-off on the last peg must have slipped back a bit, next thing I knew I was back on the ground on my bum. A couple of the pegs went flying into the bushes and were lost for all time. I thought it was about M6 on pegs, strange that it went at the same grade on mainly passive placements.


IdratherbeclimbingM9

2-Feb-2004
4:48:58 PM

On 2/02/2004 BA wrote:
> I thought it was about M6 on pegs, strange that it went at
>the same grade on mainly passive placements.

I am new to trying to grade aid climbs and am not yet familiar with the subtleties of the M 1-8 system.
I graded it by comparing the original M grades for other climbs that I am familiar with in the current guidebook to how hard it was, and then knocked a grade off because I used the piton and the rurp, as I tried to do it cleanly on nuts and hooks.

I may be wrong, however I reckon a piton ascent is outrageously easy compared to a nut/hook only ascent.
In this example I was losing my nerve at the time I placed the knifeblade, because the equalised #1 RP and 'crackenup' below had disintegrated (fell out) after I stepped up two moves above them on marginal hook placements.
After that (whacking in the short knifeblade), I felt comfortable getting high enough on a single hook move above to look over the lip and find the rurp placement. After that it was a small wire then hooks to the top where a larger (but marginal) wire could be obtained.

If you have any pointers as to what constitutes the M grades then I am all ears!

I do not envy your groundfall from that location. You did well not to hurt yourself badly. Also your original attempt must have been very ethical for its time (ie tying off blades as shallow placements), because I did not notice any previous scarring of the rock. (In fact I found it hard to get RPs to stay put due to lichen and almost no 'bottlenecks' in the seam).

Treejumper

3-Feb-2004
11:35:06 PM

hay there all ! I get up to Buff a few times a month and would be happy to help with any info ! I think there are a lot of places that need rebolting and was sort of interested in how that goes about , as in national park laws and that ! I also think that more photos would be great colour ones would be better though ! Info was also an issue with the last guide , Im finding a lot of run out climbs that arent stated in the guide and innacurate routes that make for scary times when exploring ! Can anyone help me with rules on bolting ?

Daniel


Paulie

4-Feb-2004
4:45:35 AM

Try talking to Bob Cowan re: rebolting at Buffalo, he's done quite a bit up there over the years.

Always remember local ethics and the position of the 1st ascent party,

email Neil (Monteith) re: ethics, going about getting permission etc, he's probably one of Oz's most valuable sources of info on this topic!

Email me if you need Bob's details: paul.martin@encams.org

If anyone cares, Scotland's winter season has been average, had some great ice last week, I can post some photos if that's appropriate on an Aussie site :D

Paulie

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