Climbing publications the world over are full of stories and photos of top climbers cranking down on insanely tiny holds or desperately steep routes. To the average weekend warrior, plugging their way up their latest project, these features make for great eye candy and motivation to improve. However, it doesn’t necessarily help plan for this or even next year’s great adventure.
Unless you’ve been hiding under a rock, you’d probably realise that Tasmania has no shortage of the stuff. It is a paradise to climbers, who come from around the world to get even a brief sampling of the routes available. Part of the allure comes down to the range of styles and difficulties available in uniquely beautiful and rugged settings, including alpine, wilderness and coastal. It is on these sea cliffs that you can find some of the most rare climbing experiences out there, particularly if your goal is one of the dolerite sea stacks of the Tasman Peninsula.
A view of the Moai from the shore.
Based out of the Fortescue Bay campsite, one has access to the three most popular and easily accessible of these improbable pieces of rock: The Candlestick, The Totem Pole and The Moai. Accessible is used in relative terms here, because no matter which of these you choose it will be a day to remember.
The Totem Pole is no doubt the most well known of the trio. With its slender form emerging directly out of the seething ocean and its selection of superb climbing routes, it attracts many suitors. These climbing tragics all have a couple of things in common: they can either climb grade 25 (Ewbank) or have enough gear (and the inclination) to aid their way to the top.
The Candlestick – at first glance – seems like a much more realistic proposition with routes graded 16 or 18. That is until you realise there is a 10-metre swim through “shark-infested water”; then various rope and gear trickery; a 110-metre four-pitch climb; and finally more rigging complications to get back to the mainland. A worthy adventure, if you have the gear and experience.
So what does that leave for the average wannabe-hard-core-trad-climber, who has stowed a handful of cams, a rope and a harness into his carry-on because he was too stingy to pay for check-in? The Moai! Which, despite being the most accessible, provides mere mortal climbers the chance to experience the exhilarating, memorable and definitely still adventurous style of these sea-stacks…
…The story continues in Wild issue 147. Subscribe today.