nic and toms excellent adventure: Raising the dead, practising the black arts and conversing with Satan....

Captains log stardate 23.9 rounded off to the nearest decimal point.
Well actually the date was 06/06/06 so we decided to abandon civilisation in fear of the four horseman of the apocalypse spreading general chaos across the land and plunging the earth into eternal darkness,ohhhhh.
With enough supplys to last us for a few days and carrying all our climbing gear we set off into the unknown of the Kahurangi national park in search of virgin rock that we knew no one had climbed before.
We also had a little help from our friend Chris who talked us into this mission in the first place.
With packs that wieghed in at 25 kilo's + it took us well over 5 hours to reach our hut which would be our base camp for the next few days. Kitted out with bunk beds and a woodburner living wasnt going to be to bad!
The next day was an early start and fueled up with a good breakfast we headed out in search of new climbs. We hiked to the top of Sentinal rock which gave us a panaramic view of the whole area at height of 1600m. Spotting out a few lines, we went to check them out. The first was this prominent crack that sank deep into the rock and went up for about 20 - 25 meters, Nic was up first to check it out and after being on the climb for a few meters I realised that i had forgotten the climbing gear and had to down climb it to retrieve the gear!! Woops! So the first climb was all most a complete success, once we all got to the top the climb was named 'Gear Amnesia'. (The general rule in climbing is that if you climb it first its upto you what the name of the route should be.)
On the walk down we spyed out our next conquest, an obvious line straight up a face with numerous channels to place gear. Chris was on lead and soon made short work of the line cruising to the top without any worries. Due to previous Fast Show episodes the climb was titled 'Channel 9'. Also due to a debate between who is hotter out of Paris Hilton and Angelina Jolie we named the wall 'Paris vs Angie Wall'.
And it just keeps getting better, the next day we took on this huge scary slab. We decided to break it up into seperate pitches, 3 in total. Chris took the first pitch and climbed it with great style as he took on the direct bouldery start. Then it was Nic's turn on to claim the second pitch a good line of channels with good gear but spaced well apart. As i climbed higher the channels got a lot wider than expected and places for gear got very thin so i stepped across to a good side pull jug and managed to thread a small sling through a gap to protect myself from a fall. The next break in the rock was over 15m away and nothing but a blank slab to climb to get to it, very slowly i worked my way up the slab and to be honest i was terrified of the thought of a huge fall but with good foot work i made it to the next belay and let out a welcome sigh of relief!
The weather was starting to close in on us so speed was essential to get to the top, Chris took the next lead up easy ground and we all followed safely to top out and titled the climb 'Scorchio' (another fast show moment) and hence the name of the wall 'The Fast Wall'.
With us all safely back on the ground we stood back to gaze at what madness we had just done. Choice one!!!
All that was left for us to do was spot out future projects and get the hell out of there.
We hiked back to the van and to our surprise civiliastion was still there, obviously the four horse men were on holiday in Hawai sipping margaritas by the pool. Satan was not impressed!!