(For full description of the route, click the title above, and scroll down in "The Fortress.")
Typical Blue Mountains' sand stone route opened this year.
This is starting point to abseil down 3 times. Before going down make sure no one is below you, and shout "ABSEILING" as the basic rule, since our 1st abseiler dislodged many rocks with the sound of a landslide.
Left side vertical wall of the video below is "Wind Cries Mary."
At the end of 3rd rap we could not find starting spot of P1 of "Wind Cries Mary." which was shared with "Tom Thumb." Took long time to realize that we mistakenly stopped abseiling at the top of P1. better to memorize the guide about where to stop.
At our 1st pitch which was P2(45m, grade 18) needed 8 hangers and 3 cams, we learned that most foot holds were so soft that the leader must be very cautious to protect himself and his belayer by placing his toes carefully on the wall, but not on holds. This style converts grade 18 to 19, and 19 to 20.
After leading P3(pic below, 35m, grade 19,) George is belaying with 3 new carrots.
To lead P4 (30m, grade 18, pic below) needs to use a tree for this overhang start as there was no protection with fall factor 2. If a hand hold comes off at the overhang start, the leader will hit the ledge without spotting as the belayer was hanging still far below at the 3 carrots. So keep the tree alive.
Knowing the risk that I might hit the ledge if a hand hold snapped, i went the overhang start. As the second i would not go to the valley that what I thought. As soon as off the ground I shouted "take" to my leader who was top belaying at 30m above me and hardly hear me. I could NOT yell loud enough to reach him as I was overhanging that was out of my calculation. The lucky thing for me was to have the another team "Pom" who were climbing Tom Thumb and taking our pix sometimes, echoed my small yell to my leader. The slack had gone.
Though without the slack I was still not sure that I could avoid hitting the ledge if one of the 2 handholds had a problem as the pitch was 30m long.
I would not climb here again just after rain. These sand-stones are soft after rain and easy to break off if not getting enough sun light to dry, which normally takes 3 dry days.
I am not training. This chunk was moved when I touched and pulled myself up, though just managed not to drop into the valley, yep kept it on the ledge for anyone climb here to enjoy.
