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Wayne Maher

hero

26-Jul-2018
6:07:06 PM

It is with sadness I obliquely find out of the passing of Wayne Maher. Have known him since he graced the cover of Screamer 9. A stalwart of Victorian climbing.

BA

26-Jul-2018
6:45:05 PM

That is sad news. He was a great help when I did the North Gramps guide (and others that I had worked on) as he had developed many of the areas it covered and had climbed at lots of other areas as well.

armstp

26-Jul-2018
9:03:18 PM

Very sad indeed. I knew he was sick, but this is unexpected. We had been in touch over the past few years comparing notes on various Halls Gap cliffs we were developing, and always talking about getting together for a drink that never happened. I’ll certainly raise a glass to one of the last of the great obsessive new routers, and one of the great undergraders!

dalai

27-Jul-2018
1:02:47 AM

Very sad news and definitely a loss to Vic climbing!

Wayne was a huge part of local new routing scene over the years. Not matter where I went climbing or how obscure the location, Wayne had been before and picked the plums!

Condolences to all that knew Wayne!

JamesMc

27-Jul-2018
1:37:06 AM

Very tragic. Wayne was a huge part of my climbing life for over thirty years.

His death was not unexpected- he wrote up all his outstanding new routes in time to get into the latest Argus!

No funeral is planned but we might have a climbers' memorial get-together in the Grampians later in the year.

James Mc

gfdonc

27-Jul-2018
2:26:42 AM

Hero, you beat me to it.
James, thanks for the phone call. As you know I've also spent quite some time with Wayne over the past few years and grieve his passing.
In his honour we went and repeated the following route today in lovely winter sunshine. It was written up without a star but absolutely deserves one:
*Epic Master 28m 17
Tackles the middle of the main orange wall by good, sustained climbing. Climb groove with chicken heads on the R side of the bulgy pedestal near the middle of the wall 2m R of Lost in the Bush. This leads to the foot of an orange ramp and weakness which heads diagonally up L to finish steeply straight up. Wayne Maher, Chris Baxter 8.6.92

Vale.

robbie

2-Aug-2018
6:14:47 PM

Very sad news. A memorial get together would be a fitting tribute to such lovely bloke.

gfdonc

2-Sep-2018
8:15:45 PM

A memorial get-together is being planned in the Grampians over the weekend 15/16 September. If you knew Wayne, get in touch with me or James McIntosh for details.
regards

rossco

4-Sep-2018
6:41:54 PM

We don't normally promote the magazine on Chockstone, but the latest issue of VL has a great tribute to Wayne by Glen Donohue: https://www.verticallifemag.com.au/magazines/

I climbed with Wayne a lot in the early 1990s when he was discovering a new cliff in the Serra Range every weekend, and I always found him a gentle and generous person to spend time with, while on the rock he was always getting himself into positions that always looked terrifying from the ground.

Jamesmc

5-Sep-2018
4:00:33 AM

Thanks for that rossco.
JamesMc

Jrc

6-Sep-2018
7:17:19 PM

So sorry to hear of Wayne’s passing.

I met Wayne in pioneer hut NZ when he was climbing there with Paul Anderson in early 1980. I climbed both with Paul and with Wayne in arapiles and the Grampians which were definitely Wayne’s realm. Fitting camping and climbing gear into a Celica was a challenge though!

I’m sorry I won’t be able to join you this weekend but I will be thinking of Wayne and his cheerful demeanour early next month when I’m planning to be in the Grampians with my son.
I will make a point of getting to the Asses Ears at last- maybe we could call that Mt Maher?

BA

7-Sep-2018
1:50:29 PM

I'm another one that will not be there. I'm in London at the moment and will be somewhere in France at that time (probably asleep!). Wayne was of those "always there" people. When the Summerday Valley was being hammered in its early days Wayne would be on a new route and another mob passing by would get their rope taken up the climb, meanwhile Wayne and who ever he was climbing with would disengage from that climb and go start up another new route and another mob would join in. He has credits from Gippsland to Buffalo and lots of the Gramps. But it's little known areas like the Mount Cole Forest area with the probably unrepeated Coronary Country (20) that will separate the men from the boys.

Raise a glass for me if you happen to be there.

There are 12 messages in this topic.