Wow I haven’t been this excited about bouldering in a long time!
Let me explain. So recently a lot of the Olympia bouldering crew (Jimmy, Jeremy, Derik, Miles, David, Kevin, Chase and others) have been scouring the forests around Olympia and clicking through Google Earth in search of rock to climb on. Until recently their search had returned very little worthwhile. Then last week while turkey hunting in Capitol Forest, Chase stumbled upon a moss covered monster boulder. Pretty soon the boulder crew had waged war on the moss and an excellent boulder emerged, they dubbed it the ‘The She-Bear Boulder’. All week rumors have been circulating of a boulder so good it puts the blocs in Leavenworth and Squamish to shame. So today I thought I’d take a break from schoolwork and see what all the fuss was about. Half an hour after leaving downtown Oly I was standing under one of the best boulders I’ve ever seen! The rumors are not exaggerated, this boulder is something special. The crew have done a great job of cleaning it, dragging up their sledgehammers, chainsaws, leaf blowers, crowbars, and machetes to clear away the vegetation and remove the ‘loose’ holds. There is still more work to do and a major tree to take out, but it is very climbable in its current state. Jimmy has snagged most of the FAs, although there are a couple of hard ones and eliminates still to go.
Today I climbed a few of the future classics. Most of the problems I did were graded anywhere between V4 and V7 depending on who you ask. The hardest I did was an amazing sloper problem called Gummy Bears that felt around V6 to me. And I got the first ascent of a fun link-up that weighs in at around V5. I’m sure we’ll get a grade consensus soon. There are about 10 independent straight up problems, most of which have been done at V0- to V7, with potential for another 20 or so link-ups and eliminates. Most of the boulder is slightly overhanging with lots of small crimps so it lends itself to problems in the V4-V7 range, with a smattering of easier warm ups and at least 2 classic HARD lines that will be in the double digits for sure. Its certainly going to keep me busy this summer. I can’t stop thinking about a couple of projects that I need to finish up before someone else does. I’ll be headed back up Monday or Tuesday for an evening session depending on weather if anyone wants to join, as long as you don’t steal my project. Oh and I’ll bring my camera this time.
