My last couple of days in Oz, and finally I’ve got some info on the past. Whether it’s true is anyone’s guess.

As far as I can muster the 1^st boulder problem in the Grampians was the Taipan wall traverse (or part of it as it now exists) done by Mike Myers in the late 80’s shortly after James Falla pronounced it impossible. The same duo along with Edwin Irvine had a bit of a look round the Gramps and decided "there was no bouldering".

So this was the end of Gramps bouldering shortly after it started. That is until Nic Sutter spotted a large boulder at the trackside area which yielded the 1^st hard problem in the area called "Sick Nutter" (V4). The fact that this boulder had lines all around it resulted in it being named the Amazing boulder. Shortly after Nic headed off to Europe and the likes of Dave Jones, Gordon Poultney and Stuart Wyithe took up the challenge and started developing areas such as Loopeys, Kindergarten, Citadel,the Titanic and Andersons. On frequent trips through the Hollow Mountain Cave on the way to other areas Dave Jones did a couple of stand up problems in the cave thinking that one day problems from the bowels of the cave would go, even though Gordon thought it was too blank.

Then Sydney strongman Paul Westwood appeared and added the Happy Camper (originally V9, now V8) which took over the mantle of hardest problem in the Gramps. It was also about this time that Dave Jones added a stand up V8 with a tricky mantle at the Citadel thinking it might go from lower. It did eventually, but at an arm numbing V14! Then a huge bush fire in 1997 took out a lot of scrub revealing more boulders at the campsite area and also the titanic boulder was revealed.

And then in 1999 on a 3 month mega trip Klem Loskot and Toni Lamprecht kicked ass ticking almost every available line in old and new areas alike adding sit down starts as though there lives depended on it. Thanks to these guys and there entourage of fans the climbing websites were being updated on a daily basis a la soap opera. The print out topo was born.

The nature and style of climbing in this area, much like Taipan wall itself means the standard of bouldering here is pretty high. Unfortunately, unless you are climbing V4 and above there really isn’t a lot to do here. If this is the case then the boulders at Mount Arappiles will be much more suitable where the rock is less steep and often requires a dam site more technique.