It might be that ½ day canyons are all I can do now!

Posted on December 21, 2025 by marilyn

BLUE MOUNTAINS – 21 December 2025
It used to be that I wouldn’t get out of bed for a day walk – well gone are those days, I can’t believe I just travelled 3 hours to the upper Blue Mountains to do Grand Canyon, and then travelled another 3 hours back home.  And as nice as Grand can be, still cannot believe I did 6 hours travelling for a 1/2 day canyon.  WTF is this my life now?(Apologies for my crap photos, didn’t want to risk getting my phone wet!) Continue reading →

Posted in Abseiling, Bushwalking, Canyoning, MSS | Leave a comment

No, no, don’t put that knife near the rope!!!

Posted on December 14, 2025 by marilyn

LOWER BLUE MOUNTAINS – 14 December 2025
When watching the 2011 movie Sanctum and seeing (actor) caver take out a knife to cut her hair free of her descender, almost everyone I know who watched the movie joined the behind the scene actor yelling out “no, no don’t do it”.  And then when she fell to her death I thought, “yep you should have done what you were told to do – don’t put a knife near a rope”.  So, when I facilitated a workshop on “cutting the rope”, it was a little nerve-wracking. Continue reading →

Posted in Caving, MSS | 2 Comments

Finally the Borenore trip is behind me

Posted on November 23, 2025 by marilyn

BORENORE RESERVE, NSW – 22-23 November 2025
Organising this trip was challenging as the goals were varied.  Initially the trip was conceived to repair some broken stalactites in Cathedral Cave.  Then, around the virtual campfire at Ning Bings, a case of scope creep took over and the trip ended up as an opportunity for three different cave clubs to network over the weekend. Sounds good? But trying to manage so many people and the permits was a nightmare. Continue reading →

Posted in Bushwalking, Caving, MSS | 10 Comments

Back on the horse!

Posted on November 2, 2025 by marilyn

MOUNT WILSON – 2 November 2025
After my fall a few months ago, I haven’t had the opportunity or the inclination to get back on the horse so to speak.  And in the back of my mind was David saying I should “reassess my life choices”, but with no abseiling trips on the calendar, there hadn’t been the need to do any reassessing. And then this trip came up, just a day, not too far to walk, and I’d done at least one of the canyons before.  Continue reading →

Posted in Abseiling, Canyoning, MSS | 4 Comments

A mini adventure off the Wish List

Posted on October 26, 2025 by marilyn

CENTRAL WEST, NSW – 26 October 2025
We were out in the Lithgow/Oberon area for the MSS 60th Anniversary Celebration for the weekend.  On Saturday we checked out the Lost City ½ day walk, so I thought “why waste a Sunday” and decided that we’d do a short walk to check out another ½ day walk, Slavens Cave. As most of you know, I rarely get out of bed for a day walk, so driving that far for a ½ day walk was just not even conceivable.  But, we were only 30 minutes away so, the trip was ON. Continue reading →

Posted in Bushwalking, Caving, MSS | 2 Comments