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Grampians Bouldering Guide - Feb 22nd

widewetandslippery

19-Jul-2010
1:34:59 PM

On 19/07/2010 Eduardo Slabofvic wrote:
>Why does anyone need a guide book to go bouldering anyway?
>
>Don't you just wander around untill you see a nice bit of rock and then
>go and get on it?
>
>

I rarely use a guide when going bouldering. I recently went to the gramps and used the new guide. I'd been to the cave, trackside, loopyys, kindergarten before but quite a while ago. The guide for a traveller is pretty bloody good. A whole bunch of cleaned up boulders in a small area and good access info in a pretty book. Maybe I wouldn't buy the guide if I was local. I'd know where things are and be happy to deal with sheets etc. But as is I'm a blow in, that book was great. I kind of like all development isn't in the guide, keep us kook tourons in our place.


alrob

19-Jul-2010
6:34:32 PM

Some of you people are absolute tools. I've been bouldering in the gramps for over 5 years, so I think I'm one of the more qualified climbers here to speak on the subject. Firstly, good job on shooting down the authours hard work to produce one of the best quality guides to climbing in Australia. Be proud of yourselves. Secondly, I can tell you with confidence that the online guide has maybe 50% of the content the book has, and 50% of that is inaccurate anyways! Now I know steve Kelly worked hard on it, and so did I, but our collective knowledge is still a far way off what Dave and Chris were able to gather from various sources around the country and the world. And as for there not being a need for this guide when there is one free on the net, what a load of shit! How many incarnations of the grampians and arapiles routes guides are there? And yet we still all buy the new updated versions which contain maybe 10-20% new content. Stop bashing the efforts of others just cos you don't find the guide relates to your climbing choices ie route climbers living interstate now.

kieranl

19-Jul-2010
9:12:48 PM

On 19/07/2010 alrob wrote:
>Some of you people are absolute tools. I've been bouldering in the gramps
>for over 5 years, so I think I'm one of the more qualified climbers here
>to speak on the subject. Firstly, good job on shooting down the authours
>hard work to produce one of the best quality guides to climbing in Australia.
>Be proud of yourselves.
Sorry for the offense. I've been bouldering at Stapylton since about 1978 but haven't been bouldering for a while due to injury (another word for old age.)
My problem is with what the authors called the guide. If it was sub-titled Northern Grampians or Volume 1 or Stapylton Area, I would not have a problem with it (well a couple of quibbles about spelling but nothing major).
Quite frankly, just because it's a great effort doesn't mean it is beyond criticism. The title is a major flaw and deserves to be picked out as such. Maybe it was about branding for the website or maybe they didn't think.
Anyway, I shouldn't have had to read the book to find out that the title isn't correct.

Mr Stu

20-Jul-2010
8:28:56 AM

On 19/07/2010 kieranl wrote:

>My problem is with what the authors called the guide. If it was sub-titled
>Northern Grampians or Volume 1 or Stapylton Area, I would not have a problem
>with it

*Sarcasm Font on*

Yes Al, personally I think that we should go further and report Dave and Chris for breaches of Trade Practices Act for misrepresentation.

*Sarcasm Font off*

You guys are unbelievable.

kieranl

20-Jul-2010
8:49:44 AM

On 20/07/2010 Mr Stu wrote:
>
>You guys are unbelievable.
>
>
>
I guess that I'm one of those guys in your book.
Is the bouldering community so insecure that it cannot accept criticism on its merits?

Mr Stu

20-Jul-2010
9:18:43 AM

To me, criticism of the title holds little merit. Its says 'Grampians Bouldering' on the cover and includes information on bouldering in what I suggest the average guide book buying punter considers to be the major Grampians areas. Was anyone under the impression it was going to a comprehensive guide to every boulderable bit of rock or choss in the entire region?
Anyway, to avoid a full recall, maybe Dave and Chris should just send the unhappy punters a bottle of liquid paper and so that they can adjust the title accordingly.


nmonteith

20-Jul-2010
9:48:10 AM

You can call me a tool any day you want, but no one has answered the question on why major areas such as The Tower were not included? Constructive criticism (rather than personal slagging off) is very valuable for publishers. I really appreciated this sort of feedback when i edited Crux.

Is there plans for a guidebook which does include these areas in the future?

What i find amusing is that people say that the ACA guide is inaccurate and missing routes - but they don't go and fix it themselves! I get a bit annoyed when someone uses a resource like the ACA guides as a solid starting point for their own work, discovers some mistakes, puts the fixes in their new print guide but then doesn't go back and fix the mistakes in the original ACA guide!

kieranl

20-Jul-2010
10:07:10 AM

On 20/07/2010 Mr Stu wrote:
>To me, criticism of the title holds little merit. Its says 'Grampians Bouldering'
>on the cover and includes information on bouldering in what I suggest the
>average guide book buying punter considers to be the major Grampians areas.
>Was anyone under the impression it was going to a comprehensive guide to
>every boulderable bit of rock or choss in the entire region?
>
Fair enough if you don't find the title an issue.
There was certainly nothing in Dave Pearson's initial post in this thread that the guide applied only to the Stapylton area.
It doesn't surprise me that they didn't cover the whole of the Grampians in one book but it does surprise me that they didn't convey the scope of the book accurately. I have to get most of my bouldering pleasure vicariously these days and I was quite looking forward to some more detail on some of the areas listed in the back of the Mentz/Tempest guide and it was pretty disappointing not to find any.
Had I known it was just the Stapylton area I would have still handed over my money and would have been very pleased with the deal. As it is, I'm pleased with what I got but disappointed that it wasn't what was advertised.

Mr Stu

20-Jul-2010
10:21:49 AM

To be fair to Dave, his original post pointed people at the website. Under the 'Guide' section on the website it states the areas included in the guide. As such, it *is* providing what was advertised.


..::- Chris -::..

20-Jul-2010
11:11:04 AM

I'm sitting on the fence. I must admit i was similar to Will Monks, I just grabbed it off the shelf and read it later.... at the time it was a no brainer...... Grampians Bouldering guide... I love bouldering, love the grampians a guide would be handy......

The book is awesome my only critism of it was that it didn't cover the 'rest' of the grampians... I remember flicking through thinking I'm 3/4 the way through and still not onto South Grampians....

Great Book defo would buy again, but next one (Personal opinion) should be Northern / Southern or Grampians "Selected" Boulder problems.

Just to make it clear I'm a fan of the book (content / layout etc)... just wish it covered more of the grampians....

Cheers
Chris.


Garrath

20-Jul-2010
11:20:58 AM

I'm another who just bought it without looking and I was somewhat surprised at the narrowness of the areas included. Having said that though I think it a great effort and kudos to those behind it.

f_abe

20-Jul-2010
11:58:05 AM

I reckon the guide does a great job in promoting vic ranges bouldering...as in grab a pad, head bush and climb what you find. There are enough instruction manuals in todays world, sometimes a little adventure's great. And as for writing a guide to some of these areas, good luck, especially given the lack of tracks and spread out nature of the problems (as opposed to stapyltons consumer goodness). Just my 2c worth.


nmonteith

20-Jul-2010
12:14:31 PM

On 20/07/2010 f_abe wrote:
>I reckon the guide does a great job in promoting vic ranges bouldering...as
>in grab a pad, head bush and climb what you find.

err - strange logic. Don't you buy a guidebook so you have the info? If you wanted an adventure you wouldn't buy the guidebook.

>especially given the
>lack of tracks and spread out nature of the problems (as opposed to stapyltons
>consumer goodness). Just my 2c worth.

I've seen hand drawn topos and word docs of The Tower and the Shire areas - the information is out there in basic form. It just needed to be crafted into a proper layout (just like they did for Stapylton). The Gallery area is similarly easy to navigate with some basic topos.

The guide does a fantastic job of covering the Northern Grampians - it just needs a southern equivalent.


phil_nev

20-Jul-2010
1:58:33 PM

Why do you care Neil, you dont even boulder?! :)


nmonteith

20-Jul-2010
3:01:48 PM

On 20/07/2010 phil_nev wrote:
>Why do you care Neil, you dont even boulder?! :)

I went bouldering TWICE in the last week Mr Phil. As I've said before I don't see the point in bouldering when i could be route climbing. Lucky for me in Sydney I have excellent bouldering with 3km of my house. :-)

I was really looking forward to seeing a proper write-up for the Tower boulders in that guide, but alas it wasn't to be.


pmonks

20-Jul-2010
4:37:27 PM

On 20/07/2010 nmonteith wrote:
>Lucky for me in Sydney I have excellent bouldering with 3km of my house. :-)

I see your conversion to Sydney fanboy is proceeding nicely, grasshopper!

dpearson

23-Jul-2010
3:24:08 AM

I am extremely thankful to all who have helped with technical and grammatical fix ups over the last few months since the guides release. I am always open to criticism, just please direct it to me in some way that i can actually affect a change in the next edition. It has always been possible to contact both Chris and myself through the guides website www.grampiansbouldering.com

Some valid points have been raised. Some were addressed in previous posts and some weren't. I'll do my best to answer them here:

Lower Ground Control Caves not included -
Rumours abound about the great potential of the lower cave. It is true that futuristic projects do exist but the 3 or so established lines were inspected thoroughly and judged to not be worthy of inclusion, in large part due to the potentially life threatening access. If future development leads to quality lines it will have a place in the next guide

Flying Blind and several of the Stapylton area crags have been omitted -
All of these areas were visited and assessed and the problems did not make the grade. Its that simple. They are not of a standard to compete with the other sectors.

The Grampians Bouldering Guide does not include all the southern crags -
Sounds like a fair call at first, until you do the leg work. 95% of established quality boulder problems in the Gramps are found in Stapylton. Over my 6 solid months of work in the grampians i visited and climbed at every sector, large and small, that could be found listed or publicized online, in print, or on the grapevine. After much effort was put into searching out all these Victoria Range, and Halls Gap sectors i can honestly say that the majority of them would never find there way into ANY bouldering guide. Three gems down there do stand out from the rest but for various reasons were not included. These are:

The Tower -
More of an adventure crag with some small but great sectors spread a fair way apart in the crags leading up to the Tower. We were on the fence about adding this to the current guide for quite a while but due to the need for further development, the wishes of the main developers to keep it out of the guide so the area can remain wild and unaffected by crowds, and the relatively low number of problems at each sector, we decided to leave it out until the next edition. We have however given basic instructions on how to get to the sectors.

The Gallery and nearby sectors -
More Development of quality lines is needed before this crag can get a full write up in a guide. It is likely that this will happen for the next edition. The quality and number of lines does not currently justify inclusion

Mt Talbot -
Has great a setting and some really interesting blocs but lacks the density and quality of problems to warrant a full write up. It is well worth the visit and hopefully after a few more lines are done it can be included in the next edition.

I am glad to see that people are getting out in the Victoria ranges and putting in some days to uncover new rock. Over the coming seasons I suspect there are going to be some big finds.

Since before the guides release I've been in north america bouldering. The website will be soon getting a much needed update as soon as it starts raining in Squamish and i can't go climbing for the day. There are several updates on: completed projects, new lines, new crags and revised grades and descriptions.

If anyone has anything to add/alter in the next edition then please get in touch with us and have your say

Thanks again

David

23-Jul-2010
5:43:21 PM

Thanks for the objective reply ... (unlike some others'). All perfectly good reasons to include/exclude crags ... but still leaves the title a little bit naughty imo.

If you'd like another proofreader shoot me the text and I would be happy to mark it up. (You can ask Kevin if my proofing is any good, as I proofed most of the Buffalo guide for him.)

dpearson

24-Jul-2010
6:41:58 AM

Thanks Will, A good proof reader would go a long way. I'll keep you posted for the next guide.
I can live with "little bit naughty", but unless people have already out-climbed all the world class lines in the north then i wouldn't get too bent out of shape about the relatively undeveloped south. We will take it all onboard though and make the next updated edition more comprehensive. At present though Gallery to the Tower and Mt Talbot are the only sectors worthy of inclusion unless someone strikes the motherlode of new development.

Thanks Again
David

krumpit

7-Jul-2011
8:56:24 PM

so all this crap aside, where is the best place to post new boulder problems?? I have established an awesome problem that I want to share, and it is 5 minutes walk from bridge in HG. And I totally agree with the comments about it now be the whole gramps, should be called northern gramps, but love the guide regardless...just a bitch there isnt anything about bouldering in HG, would be useful for a climber desperate for some training during this wet winter. Cheers.

There are 43 messages in this topic.