The Shifting Sands

Saddling up in the pond for the main channel with the conveyor belt to to top of the channel behind me My old Army mates, Dan and Cam, needed a little bit of R and R from the challenges of life in Dubai.  So a trip to Wadi Adventures seemed like a great boy's day out given that our families had absconded to cooler climes. We started with an hour of surfing in the wave pool with the intermediate wave which is an A Frame. This means we were able to have multiple surfers on the wave where "one guy can break right, one's left simultaneous"  (just like Apocalypse Now but without helicopters, mortar fire and napalm). Unfortunately, I don't have any photos as no one wanted to miss a wave to get the camera. Thank goodness it was only an hour as, with 90 seconds between waves, my arms were very heavy by the end of the session.   The photos show the middle third of the main channel. Plenty of angles and crossing currents W

The old city centre of Nuremburg on a drizzly morning After the best part of two weeks in Paris, my European work trip ended with a visit to the Siemens offices in Erlangen in Germany on a Friday.  Fortunately for me, Erlangen is just on the edge of the Frankenjura, a legendary climbing area which is home to the red point and Action Directe, the world’s first 9a. The main market square, a good place for a breakfast pretzel I had hoped that Jeremy would be able to join me but he was busy with a Buck’s party at Hossegor.  As Kate was in Australia with the girls and the temperatures in Dubai were touching 50 deg C, I decided that it was still worthwhile to check out the Frankenjura even though I didn’t have a climbing partner. Compared to the Fiat, a much more masculine Golf out front of the apartment in Wolfsberg and you can just one of the many crags in the Frankenjura in the distance After my meeting finished, I picked up a hire car at

One of the great things about an early morning ride on the Al Qudra bike path is the sense of solitude (unless you are cycling with a group).  Sure you see other cyclists passing in the opposite direction but, for most of the time you are alone with your thoughts. It was a week day morning and there were not many people out on their bikes and when you are alone it comes as a little shock when you see thing out of the ordinary.  This was for the case for me when I started to build up speed on one of the two decent downhill sections for the 49 km ride when two Arabian Oryx wandered across the track in front of me. I stopped and grabbed my mobile to take a few snaps before I noticed that further down the track was a somewhat dispersed herd of about 20 O ryx grazing on the sparse shoots of green grass. I was able to get a few photos before getting back on the bike.  Not wanting to be late for Kate and the girls who needed the car. It is

Fixin, by French standards it was a little hard to locate the routes and route finding on some was interesting I had two weeks work in Paris with my last meeting in Nuremburg on a Friday.  Kate and Ada were in Melbourne and Lucy was on the Gold Coast so I had two weekends free in Europe.  Needless to say, my thoughts turned to climbing. My first option was a return to Beaune, where the family and I had conducted an unsuccessful and very cold reconnaissance of the rock climbing during Easter the previous year. The problem with Europe is finding a climbing partner if Kate is not with me; however, I had recently discovered that one of the team working with me, Jeremy, was a keen climber.  So I suggested a weekend climbing trip to Bourgogne and made the necessary bookings a few weeks in advance. French countryside.  The view from a restaurant in Fixin while we were enjoying a post climb drink. As with Chateau Verte, I had forg