Our trip to Bulli was an escape from normality, the hum-drums of mediocrity and a venture into the unknow of the quotidian – still working from home but including some play time and of course climbing, but in an entirely different nouveau setting. The original Aboriginal name for the area was Bulla or Bulla Bulla, meaning "two mountains" (Mount Kembla and Mount Keira). Originally inhabited by Wodi Wodi Aboriginal people, who were the traditional Custodians of the Illawarra Land. Their dialect is a variant of the Dharawal language. European wood cutters worked in the area from about 1815. The area was once abundant in Red Cedars, these are now still seen but thinly. The first permanent European settler was Cornelius O'Brien, who established a farm in 1823.
Visiting a friend’s house near Bulli Beach we had one week to explore the local area with its natural beauty and relative isolation. The name Black Diamond Country came up a lot and refers to the fact that it housed one of the world’s largest coal mines. The Faustian bargain of coal as black gold that brings short term prosperity, but long-term misery is one of the key legacies that began in the Illawarra that has spread to the rest of the country. I was reading Hugh Mackay’s Reinventing Australia at the time which left a deep impression on my subconscious being in Australia. As it turned out the house itself was an island of solitude amidst a sea of the verdant Bulli pass rendered by the escarpment as a backdrop. The owner is an expert community gardener and wherever you looked there were secret gems hidden on the property.
We discovered that a native beehive of Tetragonia Carbonara takes care of pollination in the backyard. This endemic sting-less variety of the Australian bee is tiny and very friendly. Right around the corner we found a bush of lime fingers aptly named as Citrus australasica, the local aboriginal version of high vitamin C bushfood. Discovering the natural wonders all around us city slickers saw the albatross around our necks take flight. However temporary the relieve was from the entrapments of modern society and the existential questions surging throughout our minds – the temporary relieve into the garden of eve was an amazing sensation of freedom. Add to this an early morning yoga class at Bulli Surf Life Saving Club with view of the ocean, where the pursuit of the third-eye was the theme of the ashtanga sweat session; and all of a sudden Lao Tzu dictum that if you do not change direction, you may end up where you are heading, did not seem so misplaced anymore.
Despite these epiphanies every morning began with a ritual – its hard to do without them really! This time it was a short walk to the deserted beach with unpeopled point-breaks beckoning for my surfboard, followed by a short jog to the empty fifty-meter ocean pool, then back to a steaming mug. All this tranquillity however stopped as quickly as it submerged with the arrival of the next generation. First one carload than another and before we realised the place was overflowing with youthful splendour. It was adventure time.
There is a surprising amount of climbing and bouldering around the Wollongong area. There has been a dramatic increase in route development at Mt. Keira with several three-star routes in every grade. Multiple boulder areas strewn throughout the forest such as the Book Boulder, Lower Boulders and the Lonely Boulder and not to speak of the various multi-pitch climbing areas on the Scarborough Cliffs with its fun low grade routes (see the photogenic Whale of a time); the Scarface Buttress with its long mixed routes; the imposing and aptly named Fear Wall with its multi-pitch trad lines. We also explored new areas near Kiyama at Bombo beach: including Bombing Boulders and the remarkable Bollock Wall. Secret note to Will, Jason and Mark – no need to go to Tassie anymore, there are dolerite columns all over the place here. And after all that, there is NOWRA only a stone throw or two away.
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