Scatterplot Grading: Climbing in the Bluey's

Doug and I are back in the Cave in Loftus after a couple of weeks hiking and climbing in the Blue Mountains. The Bluey's – Australians have a penchant for shortening names and adding a “y” - are close to Sydney and feature literally dozens of crags spread across the big sandstone escarpments that wrap around all the major rivers in the area. There are short climbs and long climbs, gear climbs and sport climbs, and lots and lots of carrot climbs. Carrots are those mysterious Australian protection bolts that began life as a machine bolt hammered into a hole drilled slightly too small in the sandstone. They have no hangar, so each climber has to carry a chalk-bag full of hangars (of different styles as not all carrots fit all hangars) to fit over the bolt head before clipping the bolt with a standard (wire gates not recommended) quick draw. The old carrots are frighteningly manky affairs rusted brown with age while the new ones may nor may not be stainless steel glue-ins.

Australian's use, what at first glance, appears a very simple grading system named after it's originator John Ewbank, and, called fittingly enough, the Ewbank Grade. This starts at one and is open ended. Apparently, the Ewbank system is meant to take into account exposure, length, rock quality and protection as well as technical difficulty, and also includes unspecified “smaller factors” in the rating scale. It's unclear to me how all such factors can be rolled together into one grade. Would a technically easy but hard to protect, long exposed climb on bad rock get a higher rating, while a technically hard route on solid rock with good protection gets an easier rating? Is the protection rating dependent on how big a rack you have or does it assume some standard but unspecified rack, perhaps containing a dozen number two cams without which the route will be desperately run-out? Hazards clearly abound with such an idea. For example, inexperienced climbers might find themselves on desperately hard routes with ridiculously easy ratings simply because someone thought the route wasn't “exposed”, or was short with good protection.

Initially, I thought the Ewbank system would be the perfect solution to the thorny issue of grades that plagues the Yosemite Decimal System (YDS) grade system that was truncated for years by the idea that 5.10 was the hardest climb. But, after a month of Aussie climbing, I've revised that opinion as Ewbank grades, whether this was their intention or not, are scattered across the map – and the map is pretty large. As an example, at one tiny crag (where most of the routes were done by the same first ascencionist) we climbed an 18 that was easier than two 14's and a 15, a 20 that was easier than a 17, and backed off an 8 (theoretically equivalent to a 5.3) because the moves up to the first dodgy carrot bolt were difficult and dangerously exposed. All the routes had similar protection (either carrots or ring bolts), similar exposure and rock quality (except the 17 had poor rock while the 20 had good rock), and were exactly (to a metre or two) the same length. Throwing darts at a board would result in more accurate grades. 

Doug preparing to rappel down to the climbs 

at Mount Boyce