I believe all routes should be bolted, I am specifically refering to Table Mountain. If Table Mountain was bolted, people could still trad climb it however it would then allow sport climbers to climb it without having to go out and buy R8000 worth of trad equipment. It would also make climbing Table Mountain safer.

They say bolting is environmentally unfriendly, I don't think it is any more environmentally unfriendly than the cable car, using chalk or mountain biking on the mountain.

I believe there is a school of though of climbers that don't want to make climbing affordable or accessiable to everyone.

John

e-mail: john.sterianos@gmail.com

Yip I think you got it spot on, well done.

Well I wonder who's going to foot the bill and actually get out there and do the work? Do you have any notion of the efforts and costs that would be associated with retro-bolting all the classic lines on TM? Not to mention all the new friends and admirers you're going to pick up along the way (better stay out of dark alleys mate).

I wouldn't touch this one with a 10 foot cheat stick

On a more serious note, there seems to be a fair amount of accessible climbing scattered around the country and I'm not so sure that Sport climbing is that much cheaper then trad climbing. It's not all that hard to find a traddie and go climbing with him/her (a really cheap way to get free use of a rack).

The main environmental impact of bolts isn't now when they're new and shiny but 50 years down the line when there's an unsightly mass of rusted anchors and empty drill scars all over our crags. Just because some knobbers have put up cable cars doesn't mean *we* should stop treading lightly.

Yes guest, I'm a bit of a greenie!

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You have an opinion, so do I. When these differ, please don't confuse your opinion with the truth, nothing is absolute.

Trolling again Yanni? I think you'd have a really hard time convincing everyone of this one mate. TM is an international heritage site, protected by some pretty serious regulations and laws. Besides trad is kinda cool in that you leave the rock exactly as it was when you have finished climbing, Nature provides us with such awesome playgrounds why stuff them up?

We will just have to satisfy our lust for steel security on some of the 1500+ existing sport routes elsewhere in the country. If thats not enough routes for you then start saving for that overseas trip, Europe holds more bolts than you could ever possibly clip in your lifetime. I completely disagree with your ascertation that traddies are trying to be exclusive, The MCSA is crying out for young members and even if you dont want to join you are welcome to attend their meets and get onto all that TM rock with an experienced leader. Once you've met a few people talk them into taking you more often, voila - free tradding!

I think once you stop whining and open your eyes to the endless climbing possibilities on this planet you will begin to see just how pathetic your complaints sound. Get out there and climb, theres nothing stopping you - at all!

Ha Ha...\"I believe there is a school of though of climbers that don't want to make climbing affordable or accessiable to everyone.\" That is exactly it. We are trying to keep the whining sport climbers off some of the areas.

Don't take up trad Nanni...its really crap. You would hate it. Terrible stuff!

Thank you all for your feedback. You have raised good points such as the how expensive it would be to bolt every route and that there is plenty of sports climbing around and that table mountain is a national heritage site.

I heard there was a heated debate years ago between sport climbers and trad climbers about whether to bolt everything or not and a compromise was reached that some routes wouldn't be bolted. Does everyone agree with this compromise?

Hi Yanni, first off my apologies for calling you a pathetic whiner, a bit over the top and not really necessary.

Agree with the compromise? no, because I dont think a compromise was reached. Bolts were simply banned from TM despite there already being quite a few in place on its flanks. I feel there is room for both types of routes to exist side by side. Check a crag we developed, Hellfire in Du Toits Kloof, there, by and large, we let the rock dictate what happened, until the general bolting ban that is! (Moves are afoot to have the ban at Hellfire lifted but dont hold your breath, these things take time). I feel that at that crag at least there has been a happy compromise.

The split between trad and sport on the peninsula was a political decision plain and simple. It did not take into account the nature of the rock or needs of climbers. Parks officials and others in power have little interest in climbing and I feel they simply wanted to keep the ugly bolts away to exploit the mainstream ecotourism possibilities of the mountain.

Thus we have trad lines bolted over at lower silvermine and perfect hold covered, crack and rail free, faces on TM that will never be lead climbed (nothing stopping us going and toproping them though, although this style of ascent is so out of favour as to not be regarded as a real ascent [go figure? If you toprope a previously virgin face its been climbed right?]).

To address your original statement directly: No not all routes should be bolted. There is space and rock enough for both styles to co-exist. Traddies are climbers too so lets leave them something to play on. A route should only be sport if the rock does not take gear well and the style of climbing (preferably steep and sustained) makes sport a desirable approach. Also its pointless bolting a great line in the middle of nowhere, it will never get repeated; so that narrows the list down to crags that are accessible (both in proximity to a road and a large population of people) with quality steep closed (no nasty cracks) stone. Quite a tall order that not all of our sport crags match up to. Most SA sandstone takes some gear so where do we draw the line? Tricky! A trickyness the law makers were obviously keen to avoid when they zoned the peninsula climbing areas.

My advice: take up bouldering! It doesnt have all of these stupid ethical dilemnas and Cape stone is generally so shattered from the folding process that the rock is way more suited to bouldering than anything else.

I popped down to CT this weekend and bolted Roulette - I just thought the risk of all your gear ripping out of that stonking crack on the crux was unacceptable. And I really battled to find that cool hands-free rest, so I bolted some bits of chain on to make a nice seat halfway up. Also, the traverse is much better now cos instead of having to make that awkward move to change rails, you can just clip a bolt and swing across. But if you wanna go climb it on trad, thats still fine. Its not like the bolts will be in your way or detract from the quality of the route or anything. I'm busy working on a bolt-on galvanised roof to cover the route, so it can even be climbed in the rain...

heh heh, dont forget the lift from the cable station to the ledge!

To address Yanni's query about some \"heated debate years ago between sport climbers and trad climbers\":

Yes, this debate did take place - in about 1991. It was not so much between climbers of different factions as amongst all climbers, regardless. The idea was to try to pre-empt access problems by policing ourselves. It was also a serious ethical debate, of course.

Anyway, a very reasonable agreement was reached, with certain areas being \"classified\" as bolt-free areas. Table Mountain was one, as were the big cliffs in the Cederberg (e.g. Wolfberg, Tafelberg, Krakadouw). Whilst others were sport areas (e.g. the Mine and the Hole).

The problem was that we forgot to consult with the land owners. So when nature conservation officials got wind of bolting at various places in the Cape, they banned it (e.g. Rocklands) i.e. there was no compromise, as Greg states. This situation became re-inforced in Cape Town with the declaration of the National Park.

However, the \"ban\" now has been reduced to \"tight control\", and one CAN bolt routes in the National Park, or in CapeNature reserves, so long as one follows a process. Contact the MCSA to find out more about this.

Theoretically, you MIGHT be allowed to bolt routes on Table Mountain provided you follow this process. Whether or not the appointed committee agrees to allow this is a different issue. You can always ask.

(Please note that I distance myself from any attempt to bolt routes in the established trad climbing areas on TM. I am merely play a kind of devil's advocate.)

Yanni

I'm glad that you believe that. Everybody is entitled to stupid beliefs.

Why don't you just trawl through old trad vs sport forums on this site or on www.rockaddiction.co.za instead of rehashing a debate that is such a waste of time and emotions. Even if eveyone on this site says yeah, let's bolt tm, it's still not going to happen., it's a world heritage site. Start messing with that and you will get all climbing banned on tm and it's periferals (including all the sport crags in ct).

There are over 1500 sport route, why the heck do you want to bolt tm? if you don't have the balls for trad then accept it and become a hardend sport climber and go climb at the really beautiful sport crags in ct. i love climbing sport crags and there is so much to climb in cape town why do you want to bolt tm?

When you've climber every single sport route in the cape and bolted every bit of boltable rock then come back and talk about tm.

On this topic, why dont we just go bolt the Cango Caves? Yeah man i can think of some sick routes in there... and even some boulder problems.

Yanni, you are a fool.

Bolting in Cango caves would trash small areas that Nature Conservation has not been able to trash so far. I'm sure they would be very keen. I'm suprised they don't have big screen TVs down there...to watch the rugby on.

Hi Grigri

I except your apology even though it is was no big deal buddy. I sometime am a whiner.

Regards John

All you okes are old fuddy duddies!
Get with the program, trad is for crazy sucidal tossers who wanna die young.
I wanna live till 100, lets bolt the place top to bottom and make it the premier sport venue in the southern hemisphere.
We can all make a living by becoming climbing guides taking tourists with loads of american dollars up tm.
I can tell work to sod off and get lost, bloody waste of time

Hi Yanni,

Stop been a Sissy, i am a dedicated sport climber who has the pleasure
of Trad Climbing.

You wanna be a real climber and have no limits to where you can go in
the world for climbing then get some balls and become a trad climber.

It took me less than six months to set up a very respectable trad rack and
believe me i certainly do not have a healthy pay check... but i still managed
to do it.

You really want to have the full experience of climbing at its best then learn to do trad... otherwise take money out of your pocket and get
off your lazzy A** and go up and down bolting Table mountain.

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persistence is failing 99 times, then succeeding on the 100th try!

for me Paarl is a perfect balence. Both trad and sport they are all there and the best part of it is that some of the routes are a mix of bolts and trad. each line has been looked at and bolted acording to the merits of the route. cracks are unbolted while the friction or very badly protected routes have bolts. bar a few. and i think that a lot of the climbs around the cape can be bolted in this mixed style. thats my 2 cents worth
cheers

I still feel more scared taking a run-out above a bolt placed by someone I dont know, than above a stonking piece I placed myself. Who knows if the bolt was placed correctly, how old it is, how much salt has managed to get in etc etc. Why do people accept cranking hard moves when they have no idea of the chances of a bolt failing, but refuse to crank hard moves above a peice of trad gear where the risk can be assessed very accurately? You know when a peice is good or not if you place it, and the risk can be calculated and an informed decision made.

If we're bolting everything... can we have via ferrata ladders too, please

What is via ferrata? - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Via_ferrata

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Climb ZA - Administrator

Better then a huge cable car and power lines visible from km away?
Also Hector I hear your point but I think that stats prove that bolts stay strong for a long time. How many falls are taken onto bolts every weekend compared to the number of bolt failures. I think there has been one in the last couple of years.

This really is dredging up old discussions, Steel bolts rust and are not actually safe for that long, at least not near the sea. It is possible to make everlasting bolts from titanium, however the one company in the world that made these has ceased production (probably due to lack of profitability and to concentrate their efforts back into the aerospace sector was their main market originally). Someone else could pehaps make them if they were really needed but they are way expensive. Equipping routes with them would cost about 8-10 times using steel. (Ouch!)

Its a nice thought, sport on TM, Ive spotted many many lines there including a whole crag that would rate better and harder than the Hole. But alas....sigh! Use pegs instead? Also a pretty expensive solution but at least they are legal.

The day that all lines are bolted is the day that I quit climbing. It would be the saddest day I could ever think of.

It really has to be one of the dumber ideas I have heard for a longtime. Especially in a country where most of the climbing already seems be bolted. Then to say that you could still trad climb if you want to, is rediculus. I have been on routes that I climbed before and after they were retrobolted, and it changes them completely, even when I didn't clip the new bolt.

One of the things I love about climbing is the diversity in the types of climbing, the types of people who climb, the different enviornments that you can climb in and the history. I love climbing old routes, especially the ones that pushed the standard at the time. In particular the ones that push the standard in the community and in my mind. Having a bolt every few meters would take that away.

And if it is access that you are looking at improving where does it stop? Do chip and drill holds on all the harder routes so that people can get up them. What about the aid lines, definitely you would have to drill the heck out of those, not that many people can afford wall racks?

May I suggest something, buddy up with someone with a rack if you can't afford one. Get out there and try it. Then get your priorities straight, stop spending your money on stupid things and buy yourself a rack. If you need to, partner with someone where you buy half and they buy the other half.

I guess the only thing more stupid than your post is those who's only reason not to retro-bolt Table Mountain, is it would be too expensive. It is really sad to think that is their only reason not to retro-bolt that area.

And just so you know I not a old fuddy duddy that only trad climbs. I like it all sport, bouldering, trad, aid, ice, but for the most part what I started with and what I love the most to climb is trad.

hey jeanpant u crazy man lol...

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Love is: not our love for God but His love for us

talking about schools of thought - I read an article on one of the top US mountaneer / trad climbers a while ago - he seemed to think that he had as much of a right to chop bolts as others had to place them...
Who's going to go for their gun first?

Like there is a shortage of trad around.
Enough trad climbing within 250km from Cape Town to keep any mortal busy for an entire lifetime.
TM, Montague, Cederburg, Milner, Du Toits ect ect ect.
Opening up a world class awesome sport climbing venue would benefit large numbers of people.
Tourism, climbing shops, accomodation ect ect ect.
I guess the place would get crowded and over-run with sport climbers. Maybe a certain style of slightly run out bolts would help keep the spirit alive and the crowds away?