haydon_peter

Bigman is now an old man and turned 21 today. Happy Birthday and welcome to the old man club

That was one awesome weekend! I still feel bad about Rich's 3am awakening which led to Pierre nearly being thrown down Prawn's stairs, maybe the video will be uploaded one day... I'm liking the picture of my sprawled out on the floor holding my bollocks in pain after being attacked by drunk Prawn! *Prawn walks out of bushes and shakes my hand* Me - "What the f**k is that on your hand?" Prawn - "Prawn Vomit!" *Prawn then spreads Prawn vomit over my face* That ain't no Cherryade, its the students favourite of Cider and Blackcurrant

Went to the Calshot wall tonight and had an awesome time! Through the ukclimbing forums I have guy that lives real close to me and was in need of a partner too. He has been climbing outdoors and indoors for a few years now which is helpful for me learning and also meant that I did my first ever lead climb tonight! It was only a grade 5 but leading made it much more interesting! I think I will need a few falls from above the protection before I am happy about leading though. It looks like I will be climbing regularly now

Dont go to Australia if you think that spider is big I didnt see as many spiders as I was expecting to see out in Oz. I saw Red Backs in the zoo's but not in the wild, they are tiny, keep your eye out for Orb Spiders and Huntsmen Here is a picture of the Orb spider in the rafters of a loo in the outback, from memory I guess it was around 5" in size... Its a shame I didn't have my camera with me when a hairier tarantula like spider walked across the table while we were eating dinner at the cattle station EDIT: Here is pictures from a google search to give you a rough idea of how big it was:

Your the wrong side of Southampton for me to pick you up...

I used to use a Giro E2 and loved it, I still have the E2 but as it was a few years old went out and bought a Giro Xen as a replacement. Both are awesome lids but I prefer the fit of the Xen. At the end of the day go into a shop and try on different helmets, everyone's heads are different shapes and you need to have a lid that you are comfortable wearing

Nothing is wrong with building from scratch but its cheaper to buy a complete built on a tight budget, for example: My Marin cost me around £1000 and came with: £300 Fox Vanilla R forks £200 Hayes disc brakes Thats already £500 of parts without including the: Frame Mavic rims on Deore hubs Truvative crankset Shimano Deore shifters Shimano XT Mechs All the other finishing gear like headset, bars, stem, tyres, seat and post etc...

BUMP How is everyone getting on? I have not been to the wall for a few months now, mainly cos I haven't been in the country (Been in Australia for 2 months) but also due to not having reliable climbing partners for one reason or another. Anyone in the South wanting to start going to Calshot regularly, say once every week?

Ah crap, sorry, I have been kinda busy. I just went through my bank statements and credit card bill for you (Part of me wishes I had not checked although the money was worth it! haha). I'm not sure why I think this, but I would prefer not to go into how much it cost me on a public forum. If your really interested PM me for my MSN. $7000Aud will be fine! I reckon if you properly backpack it eating budget food and staying in cheap hostels you could survive on £1000 a month no problems! With free accommodation etc... you will be sorted. You will love Fraser Island! Its beautiful! While on Fraser go to Lake Mackenzie for a few hours relaxing and swimming. For Whale watching I recommend you go to the 'Indian Head' look out! There are amazing views of the island and I got to see Manta Rays, Sharks, Turtles and Whales. From Cairns make sure you go to the Daintree Rainforest and Cape Tribulation! I did a day trip up to both these places and wished I had stayed for 1-2 nights, there is a backpackers at Cape Tribulation called PK's where I had lunch and I reckon it would be fun in the evenings! You can also do night walks through the forest which a friend did and that sounded awesome. Most importantly, sail the Whitsundays! I spent 2 nights on a sail boat in a group of 30 people and it was fantastic! I'm so jealous you are going there in 3 weeks, your gonna love it! Can I hide in your suitcase please?

http://www.marin.co.uk/ I post this every time someone asks for help selecting a XC/Fun bike, but again I will say it: Look at the Hard Tail range from Marin. I have a 2005 Marin Rocky Ridge and its an awesome bike for the money, I made a few modifications when I could afford them and its all good (Thin Bars, crappy pedals and Shimano hubs all needed changing )

Have you considered going for a hard tail?

Got back yesterday. As planned, after Melbourne I headed to Sydney for a few days and also spent 3 nights at Katoomba in the Blue Mountains. The Blue Mountains are awesome, it rained the whole time we were there and also snowed on the last night but the weather didn't bother me. When I returned to Sydney from the Blue Mountains I changed my flights and booked my trip up the East Coast to Cairns. Did loads of stuff along the East Coast which I wont go into but the best bit was 2 nights sailing the Whitsundays! In the end I spent about 8 days in Cairns. While in Cairns I rafted the Tully River, visited Cape Tribulation, the Daintree forest and did a 14000 feet skydive landing on mission beach! My plans to do the diving course all went wrong due to problems with my ears meaning I had to quit so I did a great day trip snorkelling out on the Great Barrier Reef instead. Friday 13th July was my planning day for the rest of my trip and it was the most stressful day of the trip! I wanted to head up to Darwin to visit Kakadu and then make my way down to Alice Springs to visit Uluru, Kings Canyon and The Olga's but flights to Darwin ranged from $1000-$2000! In the end I decided to fly straight to Alice Springs and pick up a tour from Alice Springs to Adelaide which ended up being a great trip! A trip from Adelaide through the Grampian's and along The Great Ocean Road got me back to Melbourne for a few days before flying home I had an AMAZING time and wish I was still out there!

HAHA that was funny. The conversation went something like: Me - "What the f**k do you want?" Nick - "Is it really 5am there?" Me - "Yes it is f**king 5am and yes I was trying to sleep and you may have woken up the whole dorm, everyone thinks your a cock don't you everyone? Mark what do you think?" Mark (From Germany sleeping above me on the top bunk) - "Dickhead!" Me - "Did you here that Nick? Germany thinks your a complete wanker" Nick - "Well remind Germany we won the war"

Hi everyone! I arrived in Melbourne yesterday and am now at my friends house. Thanks for the replys so far, it means a lot! I was expecting mixed opinions due to the style and level of riding. A big thank you to Chris for taking the time to film me and edit this video! Keep the comments coming and make sure you all have an awesome time at the DJ ride!!! Pete / Tic

Ryan Leech Kranked 6 Section (You have to put up with a short 30 second advert first) I found this due to Nadine's other thread about a Ryan Leech 'Home Invasion' video which can be found here Ryan Leech Home Invasion Anyway, discuss the Kranked 6 section

Here is a direct link (You have to watch a short advert first)

Is that better or worse than BT?

Are you on BT broadband by any chance?

I haven't had any problems with my home hub loosing connection although I am on a wired network and haven't had any experience of the wireless. Every so often I have to re-boot the hub but I don't have a real problem with having to do that. I had issues when port forwarding the BT hub due to the shite menu/settings so if I had my way I would have changed back to a Net Gear router but we do actually make use of the hub phone so the BT home hub has to stay. The hub phone is stupidly cheap though! E.g. 2 phone calls to an Australian land line totalling 1 hour 50 minutes cost just £1.25!!! Non home hub related complaint: BT seem to be capping my connection when downloading torrents

They may have crotch wars but I guess you meant crutch wars :lol: :lol: How did you both become cripples?

A segment from Ryan's section from Kranked 6 can be found I cant find the whole section on the internet (You could always buy the DVD unless your feeling naughty and want to 'sample it' via a bittorrent download )

Off topic, but in Egypt get to Dahab and go to the Blue Reef! I only snorkelled there for a couple of hours and it was amazing!

Well said Before you read this, please don't get me wrong Simon, I understand where your coming from regarding the risks of travelling all that way when you haven't ever met the person in real life before. But I have a counter argument for you... Flying isn't as expensive as you think, in fact its more accessible and cheaper now that it ever used to be! Here is a comparison: Cars cost money, extreme amounts of money, not to mention all the other costs involved. I am flying return to Melbourne in about a week, I am paying £670 for a return flight. London to Melbourne is approximately a 20,000 mile round trip. Using the rough figure of 10p a mile for the car fuel that's £2000 just for the fuel (Not to mention all the other costs involved which I wont run through cos there is so many I could list). I had to use cars as a comparison because I know you have an interest in cars Anyway, good luck to JT! If he is anything like me he will have thought long and hard before making his decision so I'm sure it will all go well! If it doesn't work out at least he tried and can say he has visited The States!

Just a quick bump I leave in 9 days! No more real plans as of yet, my 'leaving do' with work is this Friday (Its also pay day on Friday so things are probably gonna get messy). After Melbourne it looks like one of my friends is taking some time off of work to visit Sydney with me! Thanks to Adam for recommending the Blue Mountains, a bit of research via Google and a trip there looks like a plan. My friend hasn't been to the Blue Mountains so hopefully she will be up for them. I have still got to buy a backpack, plug adapters, change some money, etc... I usually get things like this sorted out best if I leave it 'til the last minute

You have the same birthday as me *High 5*