Climb On

There is a weekly publication in Queenstown that allows you to advertise anything for free. Within its pages you'll find offers of apartments, lamps, kittens, pretty much anything. I put in my own ad looking for a rock climbing partner, and right away I got a text message from a Kiwi named Andrew, so last Saturday we met up for some outdoor cragging. Andrew is a 26 year-old mountaineer who grew up on the far southern tip of the South Island. He studied civil engineering in Christchurch, and since then has been traveling all over the country climbing big mountains. We drove three minutes down the road from my apartment to the trailhead, hiked another ten, and then we were there. It's nice to have a rock wall right in your backyard. Here's the view from our first belay station:

There are 6 bolted sport routes at this area, and we climbed 5 of them. None were really spectacular, as the nature of the rock often gave you too many choices, but here and there you'd find some cool moves. We were lucky to be climbing outdoors at all; it's been pretty cold lately, but Saturday was rather pleasant. New Zealand uses the Ewbank rating system for climbing, which you can get an idea of on this comparison table. Don't take those numbers as fact, though. Andrew led a climb up a pitch rated 20 in our guidebook, which is supposedly a 5.10c in America, and he had to take a rest at the crux (aka the hardest section). After he finished it I tried the route on top-rope and got totally owned. You've gotta throw up a big heel hook and muscle your way through a wicked overhang, it's pretty tough. Definitely not 5.10c, more like 5.11a. Here's a picture:

Sometimes I like getting stumped on a climb. It humbles you, and makes you want to come back again for redemption. After a few hours of climbing we called it a day and cracked open some beers. Refer back to the top picture: not a bad spot to relax with a cerveza, aye?

Our book described another crag adjacent to the one we'd climbed, but we didn't take the time to check it out. I went back alone a few days ago to explore it and counted 11 more bolted routes. Some looked crappy, but some looked pretty fun, so we might return there soon if it's ever warm enough.

...Which it might not be. Winter is definitely closing its grip on the Southern Alps. Luckily there's an indoor climbing wall at the Queenstown Events Center, about a ten minute drive from town. Andrew and I took a trip there last Thursday to get our climb on and check out the local scene. The wall is pretty small, but relatively tall. It takes up a corner of a gym filled with netball courts, which were hosting active games while we were there (netball is like basketball played with a volleyball using ultimate frisbee rules). The wall has some decent climbs, but overall it isn't stunning, so I don't know how often I'll be going there this winter. I guess I'll just have to focus all my energy on snowboarding. Pity.