Ascents in Oceania as trad by Scott Godwin

Repeat. With Nate. Climbed in about 6 or 7 hours as 9 (or maybe 11? We lost count.) pitches at a very casual pace. Still a great scramble with some really cool exposed climbing interspersed with a lot of scrambly bits. Would probably have worked well to simul with 30 m of rope between us, but it was nice to take our time on it.

Really good. Some tricky bridging on the first pitch, and some really annoying shrubbery in the crack on the second. Amazing weather on this trip. Absolutely still, clear skies, and mild temperatures. I don't think I've ever experienced such silence on the Ben.

The first of the Trinity for me. Great adventure. Somehow felt much bigger than the 4 pitches that it is. An excellent route for connoisseurs of thrutch. Bloody hard work for those like us who are not well schooled in the art of the wide stuff. We brought two #4 and two #5 camalots, and used them a lot. Pulled on the gear a couple of times to get through some wet slimy sections. Started climbing around lunchtime after walking up but all the slow shuffling and some shenanigans with belays in the wrong spots ate up a lot of time. Got to enjoy an awesome light show while I was sitting at the belay at the top of the third pitch. There was a bit of smoke in the air over the central plateau and the distant peaks showing through the haze in the late afternoon light were amazing. When the sun dropped a bit lower the Fingal valley gradually filled with cloud and the shadow of the mountain was cast against it. We topped out just on dark, just in time to see an incredible orange full moon rising through the smoke haze above a sea of cloud. Wandered around the scree in the moonlight for a while before eventually finding the bivi spot at Tranquil tarn. Very happy to have scored dead calm, clear, warm conditions in late March.

P1-Cam, P2-me. Both pitches were good. Nice consistent slabbing on the first and cool funky bridging corner with great gear for the second. Skipped the DBB at the ledge near the end and kept going straight up the nice hand crack for another 5m or so. Good trad belay at the top.

Spanked on a 17. Oh the shame. Cool line though. Steep finish!

Really good. Burly moves on mostly big jugs.

Awesome. Followed Cam on the first pitch. Way more pumpy than it looks. Had to work hard, and shredded my hands in the painful jams.

First 'real' trad pitch post surgery. Ankle felt pretty good on the walk in and out. No problem with the climbing. Great looking crag. The approach is pretty long for a day trip. I'll be back to stay for a couple of days next time. Note. Bring a spare 3m tape or cord for a rap anchor.

First proper jamming test post surgery. Ankle felt stiff but ok.

Sean sent me up this one for my first climb outside post surgery. I got to the same place he'd bailed from, realised that I didn't have it in me and bailed as well. Maybe next time.

Really good, albeit a bit sandy. First time back on real rock in 5 months.

Pretty good. Trickier than it looks down low, then easier than it looks up high.

Awesome pinnacle.

Slippery and tough for the grade, but really nice. Like a mini slippery Yosemite granite fingercrack. Revealed my lack of fitness from lack of climbing in the last year or so. Replaced the dodgy cord on the rap 'anchor'.

Really good.

Holy crap the middle pitch of this is amazing. Unfortunately the crag was quite wet. We skipped the approach pitch. Ultra classic 2nd pitch. Endless steep perfect hand crack forvever. Didn't do it very good style though. Ended up making a semi hanging belay at about 30m when I realized I was going to run out of gear. Second half of the pitch was very wet. Pulling the steep crux with both hands and both feet covered in wet slime wasn't going to happen. Pulled through on the gear. Rapped sideways from the belay ledge to get back to our fixed rope and jumared out to avoid the dripping wet and vegetated upper section.

1st pitch only. The second looked great but it was getting late in the day. Really engaging face climbing. Not great protection in parts.

Awesome. Cam led the first pitch. I got the classic second pitch and the very nice third. Felt pretty solid for the grade. Got pretty pumped.

Zillionth lap, but still classic. Got a bit pumped.

Another unsend? Slipped off down low. Fell onto a good rp. The rest felt much harder than I remembered.

Got scared of the dirty top out. Clipped a draw on our fixed rap line that was hanging conveniently close.

Good climbing up an indistinct line. Started up Solaris but I think we ended up on Giant Vibrator in the top half. Interesting featured rock. Far less chossy than it looks, but still quite a few dodgy loose blocks to tiptoe around.

Tried to go ground up but got completely shut down by the high step/rock over move at the crux. Aided through and had a few goes on top rope, but still couldn't manage it. Doable by reaching out left into Roxanne, but that seems like cheating.

Hard to walk past this without doing a lap.

Definitely deserves more traffic. Awesome traverse pitch that would be worth five stars if it wasn't so mossy. Still felt a bit heady even with the two retrobolts. It would have been pretty bold in its original form. We had planned to rap down but took one look at the shitty twigs with slings on them and decided to climb two more pitches to the top instead. Topped out and rapped down Winning Streaks.

Really good, steep finger locking, albeit a bit painful. Felt like a sandbag though. Probably more like 21.

1st pitch to ledge so we could get a rope on the unprotectable offwidth next door.

Offwidth practice with John. Twice on lead and once on top rope to unstick the rope.

I thought this was pretty good. It certainly wouldn't be everyone's cup of tea....

Really good. Tough at the bottom.

Fell off pretty promptly at first bolt. Couldn't figure it out and pulled through to last bolt. Seems pretty tricky.

Definitely not 22 as the old guide suggests, but 19 seems a bit stingy. 20 seems fair. Probably harder if you have fat fingers.

So hard. The moves seem fairly obvious, but I couldn't do them.

Screwed myself by stopping to place gear mid crux. Cool little route.

Really good. Worth coming back for.

A couple of late afternoon TR solo laps.

Repeat lap. Classic.

Had a play on top rope. Did the crux moves but the shoulder wasn't happy about that gaston. Seems very contrived to keep going straight up to the last bolt rather than traverse across the horizontal break to Death Row.

Repeat. Always good.

Repeat. Nice to do the second pitch again too.