How not to climb at Kangaroo Point cliffs

We did get all our kit together, and we did go down to Kangaroo Point after work one evening, and I had spent my lunch hour that day picking out climbs from the guide book that'd be good starters. But. Once at the cliff I learnt something about Australian climbing that wasn't mentioned in the guide book. They have different bolts here. Doesn't sound like a big deal, but when these different bolts require you to slip a plate over them as you're climbing to be able then clip a quickdraw into them, it does make rather a lot of difference. After re-appraising my list of climbable routes with the new criteria of which of the bolted ones have normal bloody bolts, we were left with only a single route So, we stepped up to it to find that the first bolt was bloody miles in the air. Perfect. Undaunted (well, outwardly so!) I got started up it. About halfway to the first bolt Elvis got the better of my left leg, and discretion proved to be the better part of valour I downclimbed as much as I dared before leaping backwards off the wall. I had another crack at it, but again the commitment to reach that first bolt was beyond my out-of-practice ass. We did at least have a barbie afterwards, so the evening wasn't a complete loss :)

So - I'll be off to the shops soon to get some bolt plates (whatever the hell they are) and then we'll be back to show that bloody cliff what us Englishmen are really made of :)

Anyway - I did take rather a nice panoramic photo of the location which I thought you might like to see.