Had a big 3 days with Sunshine recently. Firstly, we went canyon in Empress again - this time doing the big walk out along the beautiful National Pass Trail.
Sunshine dropping off Empress Falls.
If you look closely you might see the National Pass Trail half way up the cliff, on the right hand side. The Trail actually traverses this entire cliff line, half way up!
Then we drove down to Sydney to meet Mum for YumCha and to pick up a new laptop.
Then we spent the night in the van overlooking Shelly Beach at Manly.
It was our first night sleeping in the van and it was comfy. It rained all night, but with so much room inside we were not affected by it at all.
In the morning, while a beautiful sun rose over North Head Sydney harbor, we opened the door to let Mistisa (our dog) out. She ran after some joggers not even to return 2 hours later...
we picked her up later that morning at the Manly pound!
We drove home that afternoon and headed straight out to Narrow Neck to climb a 3 pitch, 67m, 3 star, grade 13 climb called Cave Climb. Getting the the bottom of the cliff was a real drama. The guide we had was more than 10 years old and when it described steel ladders to climb down, all we found were dodgy, rusty things that looked a bit like ladders with a water fall falling over them. While it was a bit of an adventure going down them, it was actually quite beautiful.
Cave Climb was a fare old hike from the base of those ladders, but when we eventually found it we weren't disappointed.
The starting pitch was a challenge but we both did it with the aid of a little tree.
The second pitch was adventurous, stepping out under over hangs and across big open cracks, finally reaching an amazing belay anchor in a huge cave.
The 3rd pitch unbelievably went up into the cave, popping out through a little hole in the top, and stepping out onto an amazing view over the impressive reach of cliff we had climbed.
Onwards and upwards to the top for a beautiful sun set, and a starry eyed walk out.
So ended a great 3 days with Sunshine. And what better way to end it than with another one of our afternoon sunset climbs.
