Around 10:45pm we arrived to The Pines campsite and easily set up our tiny tent while watching Steve erect a massive tarp equipped with table, stove-top, gas-run fridge, and other luxury camping amenities. Above us, there was thick sea of stars swirling in the black sky...clear skies - the first in a while! We woke up to a view of orange cliffs towering behind us. Swallowing down our usual camp breakfast of oatmeal and fixings, we racked up and headed off to the Organ Pipes to reacquaint ourselves with trad climbing (where you place your own gear in the rock). We scrambled up three beautiful, moderate one and two-pitch climbs (Piccolo, D Major, and Muldoon) and called it a day. During the climbs we watched black lizards shuttling over the rock and through the cracks; in fact, on my first one, a lizard emerged from a crack directly above my left hand!On our way back to the campsite the ground was alive with crickets jump out of our path, on us, and all throughout the air. Clearly, there was a lot more wildlife going on in Oz compared with the mundane wasps and sandflies of NZ.
Saturday night in the campsite consisted of our cooking a typical quinoa camp meal next to Steve who had whipped up a chicken korma curry follwed by a fig and date cake with butterscoth sauce for his friend Joe's birthday (another bloke who randomly offered us a ride up and happened to be Steve's buddy!). Feeling especially lucky that we were taken on by Steve, we enjoyed all of his delicacies including wine and champagne.
Over the next week we contended with gigantic (I mean GIGANTIC) spiders and webs as we bushwacked to various climbs, struggled to stay cool in the heat (finally!), tiptoed through the million milipedes in the campsite and up the bathroom walls (I generally opted for the woods), and spraying away the persistent mosquitoes that somehow decided to target my buttocks...through my pants. By Wednesday, a very rainy day, we were ready for a shower. Robbie, our newfound friend and campsite neighbor, drove us to the caravan park in town to disinfect our bodies. An old-timer to the Arapiles, Robbie has been climbing there for years and is now in his 60's; despite having battled prostate cancer last year, he is still lead-climbing anything up to a 5.8 on the Arapiles various walls. Back at camp, we had a new friend Bija, a fellow American who spends half of the year working in Antarctica as part of a team of 1,000 people supporting the scientists! We all shared a meal and some vino under Robbie's tent Wednesday night to escape the unrelenting rain that brought on an unwanted rest day.
Thursday morning we woke up to a cold and blustery day and decided to pack it in and head back to the city. Our tent was caked with dirt and debris inside and out and we had not been sleeping well due to weather and/or noisy campers bumping music throughout the night (appalling behavior for a campsite!).
My brain is faltering after a day of nonstop planning, walking, and watching devastating news from Japan...so I'll pass the pen to Nolan.
~ Dimity
Everything that Dimity said is the truth. For all my climber friends or anyone who is interested in climbing, the stone at Arapilies is AMAZING! There are over 2,000 climbs in less than a kilometer that is right on the campsite. It is a super solid sandstone that is different shades of yellow/gold, red and grey. Most climbs are multi-pitch routs with the longest being around 6-8 pitches. There are also very short routes and places to set up top rope on hard climbs. There is excellent protection on most of the climbs and the the routes eat up nut placements with bolt placements where the the pro gets thin. All in all it is some of the best climbing that I have ever done, and I highly recommend it to everyone who wants an epic climbing adventure.
Some of the other pro's to climbing there is the campground... The campsite is located at the base of the cliffs (the furthest spot to climb at is about a 20 min walk) and is heavily shaded by tall pine trees. It has running water and toilets that flush!!!! The local climbers are a tight knit crew and are all very friendly - most will offer you coffee or beer (depending on the time of day) just to sit and have a chat and give you some local knowledge. Most everyone we meet was either in the guidebook or knew someone who is in the guidebook.
Some of the things that make it a wildcard of a place to climb is that the weather is unpredictable and variable. One day you will be melting and only climbing in shade, then by night you can be freezing in your sleeping bag. Or vice a versa... Keep an eye out for spiders... Huge. No joke. Seriously. Big spiders. The other funky thing is that you have to bring your own bolt plates for the bolts and the bolts are only in the hardest parts of the climbs. But that makes it just that much more fun.
Now we are going to have some beach time and then more climbing in the Blue Mountains and Point Perpendicular closer to Sydney.
Till later, Nolan
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