I had been thinking about this project for a long time, just needed to con the right mate to come along unsuspectingly. It was time to push the boundaries again, nudge them a little, just enough to upset the quotidian. Every year it is a kind of rite-of-passage, a baptism of fire to repeat one of the classics at North Head, just to test the head as much as the body. Every year we try to repeat The Fear one of Sydney’s most iconic lines, with extra lashings of gravity, forbidding, uninviting and strangely mystical with a bonus sucking void thrown into the mix for good measure. Paradoxically the attraction to this place is as strong as the repulsion and your head has to be just right. Once a year it is calling us. Today was that day.

"I am a thousand winds that blow,
I am the diamond glints on snow,"

In the midst of winter on the coldest day with pods of whales migrating South, the swell bumping and a strong northeasterly, the shade of the South face at North Head was cold and dark. I promised Will something special never done before, “a first” that I had planned for a very long time. Little did I know that he also had plans.The are several notorious lines at North Head with the most famous one being The Fear but there is another line right next to it much more scary, more exposed, more technical and a funky mixture between rusty bolts with huge diameters and trad gear. This is the Bolt Ladder, hardly repeated these days but still there begging to be repeated although much less frequently and again your state of mind has to be just right.

The Bolt Ladder

Bolt Ladder Panorama	Bolt Ladder crux	The Traverse Pitch
The Fischerman descent	Top of the Bolt Ladder	Will wrestling with the slab
Bolt Ladder bolts	The bolts in space	Will exposed

"I am the sun on ripened grain,
I am the gentle autumn rain."

This was the project: to link them both together in one session. Usually you go home after doing one of them, back to the safety of the nearest coffee shop to boast or to the pup to tell your mates but not this time. It was going to be the “double whammy” link both the Fear and the Bolt Ladder in one day with two pitches of ridiculously overhanging chossy sandstone pitches above more void than you can dream of. It would not be enough.

We were going to get the Bolt Ladder out of the way first. I led the first variant pitch with the sandy unprotectablestart to the crux corner crack protected by a single carrot bolt. I was still cold and the moves were hard but lead to easy jugs through space to the hidden corner belay ledge with the inaccessible memorial plaque of Richard Donald, which is slowly fading away. I brought Will up and he got to work on the featureless slap, worked his way up to the exposed hanging arête, into the hanging corner stance just below the traverse roof started. The last pitch was all mine: an endless line of exposed underclings protected by massive bolts some rusted through, some with bits of old tape, some useful for slinding Nuts onto. The holds felt good this time, the foot placements friendly and the void smiled, I relaxed and started to slow down, placing more gear, taking my time. The final crux lost in space felt easy and I was at the all natural belay corner filming Will before I knew what happened. The Bolt Ladder had never felt this right before.

The Fear

Second Pitch Belay Cave	Belay cave	Will on the slab below the cave	Will pulling the corner
The Crux	Exposed headwall just before the top	Magnificent views from the top

"When you awaken in the morning’s hush
I am the swift uplifting rush
Of quiet birds in circling flight.
I am the soft star-shine at night."

We dodges the tourist and raced down the fisherman descent, most bolts are chopped now, but there are a few bits left to hold onto. The ladders are half rusted through with the rungs barley holding on - just like last year. Across the nasty step-across to the bottom of the Fear, a sip of coffee and the first pitch was mine. I eased into the starter crux to get to the jugs, traverse sharply right into the corner. The second crux past the book corner and continue stuffing lashings of camelots into the finger crack above, up and onto the belay cave. Sydney's city scape shining brilliantly behind us. It was cold now with the wind embracing us and spurring us on. The famous second pitch was Wills. The crux move of the belay ledge was still there teasing Will straight over the raging waves below. The roof is steep here and keeps getting steeper until Will disappeared around the corner to tackle the exposed headwall. Then nothing until I felt the rope being pulled up. There was only silence punctuated by the hauling wind.

I trusted that I am on belay, communication impossible and climbed through the roofs, pull the corner onto the exposed overhanging head wall. Five meters of the best exposure in town right in front of me and there is Will perched high above me smiling, relaxed and perfectly at ease. Past the remnant of the famous piton now almost completely eviscerated and the final mantle to admire the brand new memorial stone to Alex Duncan right next to were the last bolt used to be.

The double whammy was completed. But Will wanted more how about throwing in Word War Three for good measure? The whales were still breaching and the void was kind to us today – Why not.

World War Three

Will Bunker Ledge	Bolt remnants	Pitch One Arete	Roman past the crux
Will pitch two	Poor old rope	Collapsed bunker	The crux crack
	My secret boulder	Will high and exposed

Once more down the Fisherman descent, we would have to rap the last ladder broken in half, but found a new one in place - thank you fisherman. Racing along the bottom to the East Face past my favorite boulder in Sydney. No Name yet, no ascent yet, too high, but I will be back, I promise – one fine day this life.

We geared up again, there are two options to start WW3 and we took the harder layback crack start. Short and sweet, only about five meters long but fingers just don’t fit and laybacking works a little better, tough and surprisingly steep (grade unknown ?) but rewarding and then lots of jugs with a few rusty bolts and lots of friends to the bunker ledge. Something new here, the bunker roof had finally collapsed under its own weight leaving a mess of exposed steel and concrete blocks.

Traverse around the ruin and pitch two was Wills again. A beautiful horizontal hand traverse that teases you out over the abyss once more and onto a soaring fist crack straight through an ocean of sandstone. Topped by a hanging pinnacle just before the final belay. Will was floating on air, drifting and seemed to move effortlessly now.  I followed and could not believe that we just completed three classic North Head mutlipitch horror shows in one day. It normally took a year to come back ?
Something felt different?

"Do look down at the edge sometime we are down there somewhere and just went for a climb."

It had been a long day in animated suspension, we spent our time in space and it felt like a perfect moment in time. I think this was a first, perhaps not, but I am not sure if I can ever do this again? Carpe Diem