Booroomba Day with the Canberra Climbing Association

We all met in the car park at Tharwa shops at 8am on Sunday. There was a great turnout, with somewhere close to forty people in the group that was milling around. Zac Zaharias (El Presidente of the Canberra Climbing Association and general climbing legend) called us all together and gave us a run down on the agenda for the day. He went on to explain that it was an introductory climbing day for Booroomba Rocks, those magical granite slabs in the Namadgi National Park (Australian Capital Territory, Australia - if you're not sure - Google Map it!!). The people standing behind Zac were club members and Booroomba Old Hands - he told us to pair off with one of the club members and make sure we sign up and pay our membership dues for the Canberra Climbing Association before departing.

I'd turned up with my cuzzi bro Brett, so I figured we could climb as a group of three and zeroed in on one of the older guys who was standing there. When doing these kinds of things, I always prefer being with an experienced Old Hand. I'd learnt this with the Canberra Cross Country Ski Club when I skied one day with Paul Krebs, who was in his early sixties. We were climbing hills and doing downhill and I was a bit too full of beans, so Paul asked me if I knew the story of the old bull and the young bull. I replied that I didn't, so he told me: "there was this old bull and young bull walking down the road, when they spotted a paddock full of cows 'lets run down there, jump the fence and f@#% a couple of those cows', said the young bull. 'Nope', said the old bull, 'were going to stroll down there, slowly push under the fence, and f@#% the whole lot of them' ". He was referring to hills of course, but I've had greater respect for my elders in outdoor pursuits ever since. So we ended up climbing with Keith, who has forty years climbing experience and is a walking Booroomba guide book.

We set off from Tharwa and met in the Booroomba car park, sorted gear, had routes allocated, and headed off up the hill to the top of the crag. Everyone always grumbles about the walk up the hill at Booroomba, but it's certainly a good warm-up for a day of climbing. We dumped our packs around the logs at the top of the hill and got our kit together. Keith explained we were going to do the first pitch of Denethor (14), most of Counterbalance (14), and Ivory Coast (14), which were mostly on the Northern Slabs. To access the bottom of Denethor we had to scramble down a steep sort of gully, then bush bash for twenty minutes along the bottom of the crag. Keith was pointing out the various routes along the way, when he spotted a mate of his that was leading another Booroomba noob. "Hey Keith, are you going to the Henry Barber talk?" his mate asked. "Yeah, for sure" Keith replied. "I haven't seen him since 1975 and it would be nice to catch up with him". Goddam, I though, this guy's climbed with Henry Barber. "Yeah" Keith continued. "I haven't seen him since I did The Nose at El Cap". My goddam turned into a Jesus Christ and I wondered if we should be climbing with this guy. I had visions of him dragging us up routes with crimpy little crystal holds with wild exposure and twenty metre runouts. As we walked on I asked Keith if I had heard properly and had he climbed with Henry Barber. He said he had, but that Barber was in a league of his own because he used to climb all day every day. "And you climbed The Nose?" I asked. Yep, he said. "How long did it take?" I probed. "About a day and a half" said Keith, "we made it to camp six on the first day". I calmed down a bit by then and was impressed by our leader's experience. Maybe it wasn't going to be so scary.

We arrived at the bottom of Denethor and had to wait a few minutes for the team in front of us to move up, and then we climbed the small slab to the bottom of the first pitch of Denethor. Keith was to lead, Brett heading up in the middle and dragging up the second rope, with me coming up behind and cleaning. Denethor wasn't too bad, though a bit wet and slippery at the bottom. We followed the crack in the corner up to the next belay ledge. Keith then explained we were going to head over to the left and head up Counterbalance.

Scoping out Counterbalance

The old Fear Factor started to creep in a bit as I watched Keith traverse over the slab and then look up at the never ending, seemingly featureless, granite slab in front of him. He carefully placed pro and moved off up the slab. I watched his moves carefully so that I could beta Brett. Once Keith called 'safe' and 'on belay' Brett headed off, albeit a little shakily. I gave him some beta and the route that Keith took, and he started moving strongly once he was on-route.

Keith heading up Counterbalance

I experience the pangs of the lonely fear of the tail-end bunny once Brett was away and out of sight, and before I knew it, it was my turn. The traverse across to the bottom of Counterbalance was a bit sketchy, but once you start up the route there are a series of juggy holds, followed by a bit of standard slab technique.

That's me getting slab technique under control - Counterbalance

The rest of the route up to an ample, shrubby belay ledge was nice climbing, with our brains and bodies finally starting to get the hang of moving over granite. I felt like Spiderman as I finished our third and final pitch of Counterbalance. By then Keith was starting to warm to us aswell. We were obviously not complete bumblies and were rising to the challenge.

Brett on our last pitch of Counterbalance

We then moved across the broken, shrubby terrace between Counterbalance and Ivory Coast. We couldn't see the climb from the belay ledge, and as we watched Keith make the first moves up we were making copious mental notes about which holds were where as the start looked and felt very exposed (repeat to yourself: "it's only a bouldering problem"). Brett headed off, with me giving him heaps of beta, then he was gone. When my turn came, I started a little left of Brett's start, as the corner that was there looked like a better option, but I then had to traverse right to clean out the pro in a very exposed position. I wanted out of that spot and up the slab as fast as possible. Once I started moving up I felt much better, and then I spotted the flake of all flakes. Up the middle of Ivory Coast is a most beautiful granite flake. For some reason the guide book says it is delicate, but I whacked it and gripped it hard and pulled and it felt like it was made out of steel. Hand over hand, with feet smearing the champagne bubble granite to the left of the flake's edge, I moved up strongly, gaining confidence with each movement. Before I knew it, the flake was over, leading to some standard slab movement to reach the top. I almost wished I could rap back down and do the flake again, it felt so good.

Brett moving to the top of Ivory Coast

The rest of the climb to the top was more or less easy scrambling over steep, bouldery ground to the top of the crag. I insisted to Keith that we stayed roped together because if anything happened to Brett, I would die twice. His mother (my wife's aunty), five foot nothing and from a matriarchal tribal group in the Solomon Islands that Captain Cook called "the fiercest head hunters in the Pacific" would kill me, then his father (an Aussie) would dig up my body and kill me again. We gained the top with no dramas, and were all happy to drink our last reserves of water and put some comfortable shoes on. For the last couple of pitches my big toes had been killing me, and the relief was wonderful.

We trouped back through the bush to where we had all dumped our packs, and chatted to some other noobs (and Old Hands) that were experiencing that post-climb euphoria (hi Iceman!!). We thanked Keith and made a promise of beers at the next CCA meeting and headed back down to the car. The people who returned to the car were not the same people who left that morning. We had popped our Booroomba cherries.