The canyon sections were short, but the abseils were attractiveTim Vollmer

Julie had been trying for a while to get some interest in a local version of what has become an institution in the US, but for some reason people kept coming back with silly comments like “canyoning is a summer sport” and “you’ll all freeze to death”. Valid points, I suppose, but the story of human evolution has always been about pushing the boundaries; what doesn’t kill you only makes you stronger and all that jazz.

FreezeFest has become huge in the states, where the “bad idea that caught on” has grown in a decade from four people in its first year to 78 participants this time round. And sure, the Yanks might get snow and ice in their canyons, but we had a trick or two up our sleeves to up the ante and claim some national pride. And so the date was set — the weekend in the very middle of winter.

Despite the invitation being put out far and wide, in the end there was only a small group keen (or stupid) enough to take part, with a total of seven hardy canyoners entering the icy slots over the two days: Julie Burton, Tim Vollmer, Joshua Hill, Drew Morcom, Melissa Freer, Peggy Huang, Todd Harford and Scott Moores.

Our plan was to ease ourselves into it, spending the Saturday doing a couple of canyons with deep but short wades to get acclimatised, before going for a fully wet canyon, involving multiple icy swims, on the Sunday.

As we drove up to Mount Wilson in the Blue Mountains on the Saturday morning we were met with clear blue skies and radiant sunshine. So much for FreezeFest, I thought to myself, more like Luke-warmFest.

When we got out of the car, and the first icy blast of wind hit us, I started to lose some of the cockiness.

We set off towards Wotta Canyon, a tributary of Birrabang Canyon, through attractive bush and open mountain heathland. Eventually we turned off into the valley — a little past the proper point — bashing our way down to the creek. Shortly after this it began to drop, carving a waterfall between two rock pagodas.

We scrambled around this first obstacle, making our way down into the narrowing creek. Soon we were at the first drop that had to be abseiled. It was only short - a few metres - but it went straight into a deep pool.

Harnessing up, no one was particularly keen to go first. One by one we dropped in, wading neck deep a few metres before clambering up onto a rock shelf. Holy crap was that water cold! The second half of the abseil was dryer, for which we were all very thankful.

Wotta Canyon starts to drop between two sandstone pagodasTim Vollmer

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Standing at the bottom of the drop one member of the group was already feeling the cold, so some warm clothes were pulled out of dry bags and the first of countless changes was made. In the end two people insisted on moving between wet and dry clothes for each deep pool.

Wotta isn’t much of a canyon, so before long we were out of the constriction and warming ourselves up by picking our way through a forest of fallen trees. I can only imagine they were all brought down by that huge storm a year ago, because I don’t think I’ve even seen a canyon or creek anywhere with so much timber blocking the way ahead.

Finally, we reached Birrabang Canyon at a very attractive creek section, following it a short way to a point where we would exit on the other side. We only came to one deep pool, and it could easily be avoided on ledges to the left.

We warmed up on the exit, pushing up to the ridge top where there was finally some sun coming down. Unfortunately, there was also plenty of wind.

Along the ridge we walked to our turnoff into Better Offer Canyon — a distinctive rock pagoda. We decided to pause here for lunch, finding a small area behind it that had sunshine streaming onto it and was nearly completely in the wind shadow. When we moved to admire the views we were almost blown away.

Into our next canyon we went, scrambling down a small waterfall and along the creek before an impressive narrow slot cut away below us. This abseil was stunning, but best of all we were able to finish just above the water and walk around some ledges.

As we continued there were some short but attractive constrictions, and a few more wades to deal with. Then we came to a point where the creek plunged down into an impressive gorge just before it joined the Grose Valley.

We paused to explore a shale ledge in the sandstone cliffs that took us out along the side of the massive gorge, with views over the chasm and the two remaining abseils far

Attractive waterfall and ferns in the upper section of Wotta Canyon Joshua Hill

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Grose gorgeJoshua Hill

below. Unfortunately, the ledge ran out just before the corner where we would have been able to look out into the magnificent Grose Valley.

The next drop was stunning — and best of all dry — with the winter light illuminating the rock on each side with different colours. One final abseil, where Drew demonstrated a very unconventional technique, and we were done.

Down the boulder chute we went, then around under the towering sandstone cliffs on the left, enjoying glimpses through the trees of the amazing Grose gorge.

Our original plan was to finish by heading up Birrabang Canyon — which can be reversed — but with the short winter days we decided it was best not to. Instead we followed the creek a very short way, then went up a stunning pass onto the pagoda-tipped ridge where we were greeted with incredible views over the surrounding area.

The wind was still howling, so we didn’t dawdle for long (there was no temptation to do any naked star-jumps). An easy ridge-walk took us to Bells Line of Road. We still had a couple kilometres back to the cars and quickly discovered just how narrow the

shoulders are on this section of road and just how fast the traffic goes. We were most relieved when we were finished.

Arriving at Mount Wilson just on dark, we were greeted by the sight of a raging camp fire in the Cathedral Campground. Julie was standing with a couple of people, so we thought some others must have taken up the challenge. It turned out they were a group from the University of Technology Sydney Outdoor Adventure Club doing a bush survival course, but they still provided some great company through the night.

There was a plethora of food and drink, and we kicked on well into the wee hours before stumbling into tents (despite the now even colder and stronger wind) so when a few new FreezeFesters turned up at 8.30 am they were greeted by snoring.

A few people from the first day had to head off, and Julie was unfortunately not feeling up to the climb out of a canyon just after finishing her latest round of cancer treatment, so there were only five people ready to take the challenge.

After some discussion we decided on Why Don’t We Do It In The Road (Serendipity) Canyon. We wanted something wet, obviously, and it provides several very chilly swims. But we also wanted to be sensible and do something shorter, with the ability to bail early if we had to.

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We weren’t all going to do it easy. While two members of the group filled their packs with thermals, wetsuits, beanies and other warming attire, the remaining three made a pact to really up the ante by doing it nude.

Now let me paint the picture of just how brave (or stupid) we were. I checked the data from the nearest weather station when I got home. It recorded that it was under 4 °C when we set off — the overnight low had been 2.3 °C — and the top temperature of the day was 6.4 °C.

But the wind chill — which was substantial — is what made things really interesting. With the wind speed sitting just over 30 km/h, and gusts of double that, the apparent temperature never got above zero, spending the day between -9 °C and -0.6 °C. Given how cold the air temperature was, you might think the water would feel warm by comparison, but I can assure you it didn’t!

We set off along the fire trail — still fully clad because of how cold and windy it was — only stripping off when we hit the track that started to take us downhill out of the coldest of the air.

The first couple of abseils were great — nice and dry drops beside attractive waterfalls — so we didn’t feel the cold at all. It meant there was plenty of time to pause for photos and to enjoy this attractive upper canyon section.

Down the creek we went, wading at points, but mainly staying dry. The ferns provided a pleasantly tactile feel on our naked skin. This section went on for some time, and all the scrambling meant we were nice and warm.

Then we hit the main constriction. Pausing on some boulders, we looked down into the dark chasm below us. It wasn’t deep, but the abseil meant enduring the spray of the waterfall, squeezing between a wet log-jam, then jumping into a deep, dark swim.

It was at this point — while we still felt warm — that Joshua decided to throw down his expletive-laden challenge to the yanks to take on the nude FreezeFest idea. Lucky he did it now, because a few swims later we were feeling far less cocky!

An attractive waterfall abseil in the upper section of Better Offer CanyonTim Vollmer

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There were a couple more abseils, some more swims, a narrow canyon section which we bridged (and would have swam had we not been completely frozen). Before long we were near the end.

By the final abseil, which drops into a deep pool with a long swim, I was shivering uncontrollably. Even the two guys in the warm gear were really feeling the cold. We didn’t muck about, just wanting to get through, so much so that Drew forgot to pull the rope down and had to swim back upstream to retrieve it.

As the canyon ended, at the junction of the Wollangambe River, we were ecstatic. It had been an absolute blast! But we couldn’t really enjoy it until we were warm again, so we raced along the narrow ledge until we found some sunshine on the climb out.

As we reached a flat, sunny slab of rock the wind hit us, so we backtracked a couple of metres and huddled in the sunshine to warm up. Off came the wet clothes (for those that had wet clothes) and on went some welcome warm, dry clothing for the walk out.

By the time we were back at camp the memories of the icy water were so faded we were discussing trying to squeeze in a second nude canyon to really maximise our fun, but the call of the fireplace at the

Imperial Hotel along with the deteriorating weather convinced us otherwise.

Our first FreezeFest, while small, had been wonderful fun. Hopefully we will see more people willing to give the idea of mid-winter wet canyoning a go next year.

As for the nude winter canyoning part, FreezeFest has always been about bad ideas that catch on, so perhaps we’ll see a lot more goose-bump-covered-purple-coloured-frozen-canyoner-flesh next year!

Our first FreezeFest, while small, had been wonderful fun. Hopefully we will see more people willing to give the idea of mid-winter wet canyoning a go next year.

As for the nude winter canyoning part, FreezeFest has always been about bad ideas that catch on, so perhaps we’ll see a lot more goose-bump-covered-purple-coloured-frozen-canyoner-flesh next year!

The lush green room in the upper section of SerendipityTim Vollmer