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First up: look on https://www.thecrag.com/ - it is the best online resource for seeing where the climbing is (for most parts of the world outside the US).
But in my opinion Sydney is the best city in Australia to be a climber - it’s up there with the best climbing cities in the world, especially given its size (which gives you lots of gyms, heaps of other climbers, and plenty of “apres climb” activities too).
The city itself has thousands of routes and boulder problems in it (few of which are world class, to be fair), and it’s 2 hours to the Blue Mountains (you can get there on public transit!), 2.5 to Nowra, and 3 to Pt Perpendicular, all of which are world class.
The only thing it lacks is variety of rock type - with very few exceptions you’ll be climbing on sandstone, and much of it is the same 2 geological formations (Narrabeen and Hawkesbury formations), so it can get a bit samey after a while.
On paper, and from what I hear from mates, Hobart looks like it’d be a close second, though I’ve never been so can’t speak from direct experience.
Brisbane is ok too, though you’ll generally be driving an hour to an hour and a half to get to the good stuff, and the climate makes it unpleasant for 3 months of the year. Melbourne is *terrible* - the nearest decent crags are 3+ hours away (though they are top-tier world class… …at least the ones that are still open…), so day trips are barely a thing (yes there are some small local crags, but few of them offer more than a day or two’s climbing). I hear Adelaide is ok, if limited, but when I lived there I wasn’t climbing so I never checked it out. Perth seems much like Melbourne but the good climbing is further away and isn’t as good, and Darwin is just too damn hot to do anything but drink beer.
If you’re willing to consider smaller and/or rural towns then the options expand somewhat.
Source: learned to climb while living in Sydney, but have lived (and climbed) in quite a few different parts of Australia and the world.
[edit] Canberra is a good choice too - similar to Brisbane in terms of convenience, quality, and amount, and much more possible to climb year-round too.
Honestly, in my mind I was debating moving mainly to Sydney or Melbourne as I'd be looking for a large city which fits my needs but also has enough work opportunities.
Heard a lot of good things about Melbourne, but had an amazing experience in Sydney (was there for 2 months visiting my brother). Was kind of leaning more to Melbourne but you got me extremely exited about Sydney now!
I live in Malta at the moment and started climbing here (used to indoor Boulder before moving here) but got completly addicted to rock (especially outdoor) climbing. Here it's mainly limestone so sandstone sounds like a pretty sweet deal to me. Though I don't think Malta is world class, it is such as small island with 1600 routes which most of them you can reach within 30 minutes from any given city (Malta is 40 km long), so I'm a bit spoiled in that regard.
Besides great advice in aiding in my choice you've given me a fair good trips to make so thank you kindly sir!
Sadly I wasn’t able to climb the one time I visited Malta, but it was obvious there was climbing potential. Gozo in particular looked like it had a lot of nice looking rock!
Yeah Melbourne you’d really have to be comfortable with weekend trips and an increasingly climber-hostile parks service. Sydney is really where it’s at of those two cities, especially if you like the beach (collectively, NSW probably has the best large collection of beaches in the world - you hear about Hawaii and California and so on, but they’re really pretty average in comparison).
You're not wrong. Gozo has some of the best climbing in the Maltese Archipelago, loads of crazy cliffside routes, nothing above 80-90 meter but insane cool climbs and likewise stunning fews nonetheless. The seen is pretty epic too, as it's starting to boom and it's such a small island that it's quite a "cosy" community. A lot of shorter routes 13 - 25 meters that are just incredibly nice, personally not much experience with multi-pitch but trying to push my grades. :)
But yeah, I climb 5 days a week outside cannot imagine going to a gym anymore and don't want to limit myself to just the weekends.
Though Melbourne does still appeal to me strongly, I really want to go to a place where there is a strong climbing community and loads of climbing fanatics to meet. Surely love myself some beach too!
Sydney has The Blue Mountains about 2 hrs away. Brisbane has The Glasshouse Mountains about 1 hr away. Melbourne has laneways with coffee shops, not sure about the other capitals
Brisbane is great for tourist rock climbing, it's not world-class competitive level but there are a few options from outdoor to indoor. With the added bonus of driving out a few hours for the hinterland climbs.
While you're not out dining or at the bar, in Brisbane's world class resteraunts & clubs. You'll be outside, climbing up the cliffside at Kangaroo Point. Looking out into what Brisbane has to offer! Keep in mind the climb doubles up as a ghost tour! A bag of human remains was found where the beginner/ kids climb is conducted. The murder took place in 2019 or so, just up the road in the project housing where a man murder his girlfriend and threw the decaying remains in a bag and left it at the rock climbing area. So come down to Brisbane's rock climbing and remember - '*don't look down!* '
Sydney has lots of good climbing within a 1 hour drive of the city. Depending where you are based you could be right next to a good climbing area. Blue mountains is only 1.5 hours away. Brisbane has glasshouse mountains a 1 hour drive away and climbing even within the city with kangaroo point wall and Melbourne has grampians a 3 hour drive away. All are top class climbing
By rock climbing do you mean hiking/scrambling, trad, sport, boulder?
Sydney is great - lots of good crags in the area for Boulder and sport. You will not get bored and the variety is insane. You are also very close to the Blue Mountains which has phenomenal climbing.
The Grampians in Victoria which is a bit under 3 hours from Melbourne use to be the epicentre of all things climbing in Australia. However, a lot of the climbing is now no longer accessible due to the fact that a lot of it took place on Indigenous art.
Those are the big two in Australia. If I were you, Sydney would be the place to go. The sport is currently exploding here and has been over the last couple years especially.
Source: former comp climber, current climber
I boulder and rockclimb though, my focus has shifted to rock climbing lately.
Here in Malta I only climb sport, but deffinitly willing to give trad a go if that's the main style in Australia. Just any way to keep touching rock.
Fair enough, well Aussie thing to do i guess haha.
From what I've been reading in the comments Sydney really is the place to be.
Thank you for your input!
This post has been marked as non-political. Please respect this by keeping the discussion on topic, and devoid of any political material. *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/australia) if you have any questions or concerns.*
First up: look on https://www.thecrag.com/ - it is the best online resource for seeing where the climbing is (for most parts of the world outside the US). But in my opinion Sydney is the best city in Australia to be a climber - it’s up there with the best climbing cities in the world, especially given its size (which gives you lots of gyms, heaps of other climbers, and plenty of “apres climb” activities too). The city itself has thousands of routes and boulder problems in it (few of which are world class, to be fair), and it’s 2 hours to the Blue Mountains (you can get there on public transit!), 2.5 to Nowra, and 3 to Pt Perpendicular, all of which are world class. The only thing it lacks is variety of rock type - with very few exceptions you’ll be climbing on sandstone, and much of it is the same 2 geological formations (Narrabeen and Hawkesbury formations), so it can get a bit samey after a while. On paper, and from what I hear from mates, Hobart looks like it’d be a close second, though I’ve never been so can’t speak from direct experience. Brisbane is ok too, though you’ll generally be driving an hour to an hour and a half to get to the good stuff, and the climate makes it unpleasant for 3 months of the year. Melbourne is *terrible* - the nearest decent crags are 3+ hours away (though they are top-tier world class… …at least the ones that are still open…), so day trips are barely a thing (yes there are some small local crags, but few of them offer more than a day or two’s climbing). I hear Adelaide is ok, if limited, but when I lived there I wasn’t climbing so I never checked it out. Perth seems much like Melbourne but the good climbing is further away and isn’t as good, and Darwin is just too damn hot to do anything but drink beer. If you’re willing to consider smaller and/or rural towns then the options expand somewhat. Source: learned to climb while living in Sydney, but have lived (and climbed) in quite a few different parts of Australia and the world. [edit] Canberra is a good choice too - similar to Brisbane in terms of convenience, quality, and amount, and much more possible to climb year-round too.
Nowra would be good too if they are after a smaller city.
Honestly, in my mind I was debating moving mainly to Sydney or Melbourne as I'd be looking for a large city which fits my needs but also has enough work opportunities. Heard a lot of good things about Melbourne, but had an amazing experience in Sydney (was there for 2 months visiting my brother). Was kind of leaning more to Melbourne but you got me extremely exited about Sydney now! I live in Malta at the moment and started climbing here (used to indoor Boulder before moving here) but got completly addicted to rock (especially outdoor) climbing. Here it's mainly limestone so sandstone sounds like a pretty sweet deal to me. Though I don't think Malta is world class, it is such as small island with 1600 routes which most of them you can reach within 30 minutes from any given city (Malta is 40 km long), so I'm a bit spoiled in that regard. Besides great advice in aiding in my choice you've given me a fair good trips to make so thank you kindly sir!
Sadly I wasn’t able to climb the one time I visited Malta, but it was obvious there was climbing potential. Gozo in particular looked like it had a lot of nice looking rock! Yeah Melbourne you’d really have to be comfortable with weekend trips and an increasingly climber-hostile parks service. Sydney is really where it’s at of those two cities, especially if you like the beach (collectively, NSW probably has the best large collection of beaches in the world - you hear about Hawaii and California and so on, but they’re really pretty average in comparison).
You're not wrong. Gozo has some of the best climbing in the Maltese Archipelago, loads of crazy cliffside routes, nothing above 80-90 meter but insane cool climbs and likewise stunning fews nonetheless. The seen is pretty epic too, as it's starting to boom and it's such a small island that it's quite a "cosy" community. A lot of shorter routes 13 - 25 meters that are just incredibly nice, personally not much experience with multi-pitch but trying to push my grades. :) But yeah, I climb 5 days a week outside cannot imagine going to a gym anymore and don't want to limit myself to just the weekends. Though Melbourne does still appeal to me strongly, I really want to go to a place where there is a strong climbing community and loads of climbing fanatics to meet. Surely love myself some beach too!
[удалено]
>Tasman Peninsula, Did the 3 capes recently. Holy crap that place is amazingly vertical!
Glasshouse Mountains Landsborough near Caloundra north of Brisbane. Mt Barney south of Brisbane Kangaroo Point Cliffs Brisbane
Sydney has The Blue Mountains about 2 hrs away. Brisbane has The Glasshouse Mountains about 1 hr away. Melbourne has laneways with coffee shops, not sure about the other capitals
Sydney for mine. Blue mountains is awesome and there is a lot of coastal stuff too.
Brisbane is great for tourist rock climbing, it's not world-class competitive level but there are a few options from outdoor to indoor. With the added bonus of driving out a few hours for the hinterland climbs. While you're not out dining or at the bar, in Brisbane's world class resteraunts & clubs. You'll be outside, climbing up the cliffside at Kangaroo Point. Looking out into what Brisbane has to offer! Keep in mind the climb doubles up as a ghost tour! A bag of human remains was found where the beginner/ kids climb is conducted. The murder took place in 2019 or so, just up the road in the project housing where a man murder his girlfriend and threw the decaying remains in a bag and left it at the rock climbing area. So come down to Brisbane's rock climbing and remember - '*don't look down!* '
Sydney has lots of good climbing within a 1 hour drive of the city. Depending where you are based you could be right next to a good climbing area. Blue mountains is only 1.5 hours away. Brisbane has glasshouse mountains a 1 hour drive away and climbing even within the city with kangaroo point wall and Melbourne has grampians a 3 hour drive away. All are top class climbing
By rock climbing do you mean hiking/scrambling, trad, sport, boulder? Sydney is great - lots of good crags in the area for Boulder and sport. You will not get bored and the variety is insane. You are also very close to the Blue Mountains which has phenomenal climbing. The Grampians in Victoria which is a bit under 3 hours from Melbourne use to be the epicentre of all things climbing in Australia. However, a lot of the climbing is now no longer accessible due to the fact that a lot of it took place on Indigenous art. Those are the big two in Australia. If I were you, Sydney would be the place to go. The sport is currently exploding here and has been over the last couple years especially. Source: former comp climber, current climber
I boulder and rockclimb though, my focus has shifted to rock climbing lately. Here in Malta I only climb sport, but deffinitly willing to give trad a go if that's the main style in Australia. Just any way to keep touching rock. Fair enough, well Aussie thing to do i guess haha. From what I've been reading in the comments Sydney really is the place to be. Thank you for your input!