Hard projects in Swinburn

The Dyno on the right most route to the crimpy looking sloper

Warrick on the matches and bounces on the incut crimps of the right most route

The cut loose on the left most route

the hard start to the tiny crimp on the right most route

The Warrick going for the tiny crimp just before cutting loose on the left most route.


Last weekend I was down in Durban for my uncle's 50th birthday. My bro and I were staying in Hilton which is 15 minutes away from Umgeni valley, so naturaly we planned to climb there on the Saturday but things didn't quite work out that way. We woke up to mist and rain, which is typical midlands weather. Being the most psyched climber there I naturaly tried to convince my dad and bro to come at least check out if the rock would be dry (I mean you might aswell try). They were having none of it and refused to check it out. I wasn't impressed so I played cards with my girlfriend instead.

Anyway on the Sunday while driving home I asked my parents if they could stop in Swinburn for a while so I could at least get an hours worth of climbing. They said yes and with the mattress in the back of the bucky my bro and I went bouldering for an hour. We decided to hit the reservoir boulder, seeing it was one of the closer boulders with some harder lines on it. I had done all of the lines on this boulder except for the two projects next to the reservoir.

So we started on the left most one (there was cow crap underneath the right project so we didnt wanna dirty the mat) . This project is super hard right from the start, I dunno about the grade but i would say hard! It starts with a sweet left sidepull and a shallow mono for your right hand. (the feet are terrible!) You go up with your right hand to a tiny edge, your feet cut loose and you have to smear your right foot on nothing, then half campus off this tiny edge to a bar looking grip which isn't bad then loong pulls of tiny edges to the top. Its also high about 6+ metres.

Not making it past the bar grip we moved on to the right project(with cow crap underneath it). This one is a little easier off the ground. (Oh we covered the cow crap with rocks) So it starts with you matched on a heavily incut crimper, you then go up a series of crimpers bouncing and matching your way up the wall. Then all of a sudden the crux hits you and the next crimp is super far away, and all you thinking is crap! And it gets even worse what looks like a crimp turns out to be a sloper. So you dyno up to this crimpy looking sloper thinking you might get it but in actuall fact i need to get so much stronger.

Both these projects once done will be ultra classics with no loose rocks or dodgy holds. Which is a rarety for Swinburn. Ill be back again to try them, hopefully alot sronger.

Go crank hard!
Wes b