A weekend of onsights

After a tough week back in class I really wanted to get outside climbing so Laura and I decided to go out just the two of us to Bob's Area at Exit 38. This time the hour walk in didn't seem so brutal, maybe we're getting fitter or maybe we were just better prepared for it this time. Once we got up we started out on the Peannacle, a short outcropping with lots of easier fun climbs. We did a few, my favorites being Peanut Brittle (5.8) and Gallivant (10a). Then we headed up the hill a bit to Alpina, I had never climbed on this crag either, its a really good little crag with 4 routes on it, a 10b,11a,11b, and 11d. Laura onsighted the 10b (nice job!) which I think makes that her 5th 10b onsight in a little over a month, not bad. I onsighted the rest of the routes at Alpina, they were all great, deceptively technical and harder than they look from the ground. I finished off the day with another 11a at Slumbersome Ridge, I think I led 10 new routes in total, and there's plenty more at Bob's Area to go back to. It was really great to get out just the two of us, sometimes 2 people is just perfect for getting a lot of routes done and enjoying the peacefulness at the crag.
The view from Bob's Area

Saturday we took a rest day, and I finished off some homework, we planned an early start the next day to go climbing. But that didn't stop us from going out Saturday night (see photo below).
Laura showing off her karaoke skills

Sunday, we didn't get out quite as early as planned, but the days are long so there was no rush. Micah drove me Laura, Jimmy and Chaz, south down 1-5 to check out a new crag, Ozone. Ozone is in the Columbia River Gorge near Portland on the Washington side, it has just been developed in the last few years, and is a really fun crag. Its a very different style to what we're used to climbing, the rock is basalt similar to the rock at Vantage, but with more friction, and its less columnar. It was our first time there for all of us, so we started out on some easy stuff, the climbing is very ledgy with short cruxes. A lot of the routes are mixed trad and sport, which I was surprised I enjoyed, it did limit the routes available to other people in our group who didn't feel confident placing gear.
Laura warming up at Ozone

After a few warm ups, I got on a 12a The Humbling, it started out quite easy then has an obvious crux boulder problem at the top which puts you in a really cool horizontal position going over a roof. I was psyched to onsight it, it didn't even feel that hard. I also flashed a couple other 12a's as well, it would have been nice to onsight them, and I think I would have managed them no problem, but I was happy to share the onsights with Micah and Jimmy. My 12a onsight was my 3rd onsight of that grade this month all 3 at different crags with different rock types, it feels good to be confident onsighting at this grade, I don't think this is my limit either, I look forward to trying harder onsights. There was some cool looking steeper climbs to the right as well that I'd like to go back to. I don't think I'll have too much of a problem convincing people to go back there though, I think everyone gave the place the thumbs up.

Jimmy on the horizontal crux of The Hurting (12a)

Downpour

I guessed I jinxed myself with my last post, because on Friday the skies opened and I experienced some of the worst rain I've been in. The forecast wasn't looking great for Friday, and then when it started raining, our big group heading out to Little Si whittled down to just the hardcore (or crazy), Me, Nick, Jimmy, and Micah. We knew that even in a downpour the steep routes at Little Si would still stay dry.

I wanted to get on hard stuff straight away so as my warm up I dogged my way up the 5.13 bolted crack route. It starts out really easy, and really only has a couple of bolts of hard climbing, but it was a lot more cracky that I thought, I guess I thought there would be some face holds. But if your confident on finger cracks then I would think this climb would feel pretty easy. I decided it wasn't really worth the effort, so I downclimbed and swung over on to its neighbour PC7, to see if the crimp was still as bad as I remembered, it was. I played around on it for a while, trying different sequences and eventually figured out something that might just work. It involved using the crimp below the broken crimp for the left hand, getting the right foot up really high and rocking over into a bad sidepull, then bumping to a better sidepull. It was harder than the original sequence but it was doable. I lowered off, rested for a bit then got back on for the redpoint, I made it through the first crux, a V4 dynamic move off opposing sidepulls, then made it through the second crux using the new sequence, probably worth V4 as well, I took a good shakeout before the last crux a V3 big reach off an undercling to the victory jug, I eyed down the jug reached up and fumbled it. I don't know what happened exactly, I had my hand on the jug but I just didn't grab it, instead I took a 20ft whipper. I had conflicting emotions, I was glad to have linked it through the middle crux using the new sequence, but gutted having fallenon the last hard move and not knowing if I could get there again. Jimmy who had been working it as well got on for his go, he was looking really good on it, got through the hard part, then did exactly the same thing as me, falling off the last move! I guess I didn't give that move enough credit for how hard it would be on the redpoint. I rested for a while then got back on it. This attempt was more of a fight, the moves didn't flow quite as well, and I was close to coming off a couple of times, but I made it to the last move again, and this time I stuck it! Yes! The very last moves to the chains were soaking wet from the rain, but they were on jugs, so I stuck with it and clipped them for my first hard redpoint of the summer! Inspired, Jimmy got back on it and fired it off right after me, good effort Jimmy!

Micah giving PC7 (12d) a shot.

Meanwhile Micah and Nick had warmed up on Rainy Day Woman, gotten a burn each on Californicator, and watched us send PC7. They decided to get on PC7 as well since we made it look so easy, the top was really wet by this point though so they just hung around on it figuring out the sequence, but it seems like they are both ready to give it some good redpoint attempts next time they're there. Jimmy and I got on Propaganda next, Jimmy has been working it so knew the beta really well which was good for me cause I had never really tried it, and its really beta intensive. It only gets 12c, but it felt quite a bit harder than that to me, I think it'll be a really good project to work on cause the moves are so good, but it might take a bit of work. We each gave it one good go each, then the rain really started coming down heavily, I started back up on it on toprope, but the rain was seeping down on it faster than I was climbing up it, so I hastily retreated, where we met Nick and Micah under Chronic, the only climb there that was completely dry.


I hopped on it and got to the forth bolt before hanging, which doesn't sound like much but it starts out pretty hard. I eventually dogged my way Californicator the 12d that branches out left after the first 7 bolts of Chronic. I think this is going to be the next big project of summer, Nick, Micah, Jimmy and I are all really psyched for it so hopefully it will go sooner rather than later. It is really hard for the grade, but I'm sure it will feel a lot more doable once we have the sequence more refined. Once we send Californicator the logical next steps are Californication (hard 13a) and Chronic 13b, so there is plenty to keep us busy on this summer.


We left the shelter of World Wall I at dusk and made our way down the path in a torrential downpour, we arrived at the parking lot completely drenched only to find the gates locked. Noo! After a short-lived panic we realized one of the gates was just closed and not locked, Phew! We made it safely out of there, and stopped off at McDonalds for some well deserved ice-cream cones, before heading back to Olympia. I was absolutely exausted when I got back, but it had been worth it, it was a great day out with the guys.

28 days dry

Nick warming up on Iguanarama 10a at Amazonia (Exit 38)

I think I heard on the radio that today was the 28th day straight without rain in Olympia. With this kind of weather its hard to not get out climbing, plus Nick is back in town and more psyched than ever to get out climbing. So on Friday the three of us Nick, Laura and I made our way out to Exit 38, we were planning on climbing up at Bob's Area but we got sidetracked at Amazonia and The Actual Cave, so decided to save Bob's Area for another day. Amazonia looked as chossy as I remembered but the routes climb well. We warmed up on Iguanarama a really good 10a, and an 11a then headed up to The Actual Cave. I had never climbed there before, I had always just walked past it on my way to Bob's Area, but now having climbed there I can report back that The Actual Cave is actually AWESOME! The crag classic Giant is one of the best sport routes I've ever done. If you can climb 5.11 and can do 10 pulls-ups you have to get on Giant. It goes at 11c but it essentially climbs one big jug the whole way to the chains. It starts on the right hand side of the cave, you climb up easily to the roof of the cave then you start traversing along a jug rail on the lip of the cave through 5 clips of horizontal jug shuffling, its so much fun. I made it to the chains no problem, so decided to go for the extension Mr. Big 12a, its only one more bolt then the chains, but since there were hanging draws on all the bolts I didn't bring up any more draws and I needed something to clip the chains of Mr Big. So Nick and Laura threw some up to me while I was hanging on to a jug, after a few missed throws I eventually caught a couple and made it to the chains, Mr. Big was really good, not too hard just a little pumpy, but that may be due to the hanging off the jug trying to catch draws. Nick sent Mr. Big right after me as well, he was pleased because he had tried this route a couple of years ago and couldn't do it then.
A couple of photos of Me and Nick on the awesome roof climb Cyanide (12b), so much fun!

After that I decided to give Cyanide a shot since it had hanging draws on it as well. Cyanide is an unlikely looking climb. It climbs straight through the roof with 5 clips of 180 degree climbing, and it gets the fairly amenable grade of 12b, you don't get many climbs like this. On the onsight I found that the holds in the roof were better than I had imagined, I made a few hard moves to get to the third clip, where there was a good looking V-notch, I tried jamming my hand in pinkie first, but it didn't quite sit right, I pulled on it and was off, damn! I reached back up to same hold this time with my hand the other way so I was holding it as a ring lock and it was a jug! I pulled back on and managed the rest of the moves through the roof no problem, Oh man, I was so close to the onsight. I managed to fire it off second go using the right beta, its such a good climb, but it was hard to enjoy it knowing that I should have onsighted it. Nick also managed to send it second go, which he was really proud of since he struggled a lot more with the sequence than I did, probably due to his height. With those two big sends done we were feeling pretty pumped so finished off the day with an easy route at Club Paradiso (not recommended) before heading back down to the car.

Scott on a really nice thin 5.9 slab and crack at the Repo I (Little Si)

The next day I headed out climbing with Scott and Nick. It was good to climb with Scott again, I hadn't seen him since the Smith trip back in March. We headed back to North Bend, with the plan to do both the exits in a day. First stop was the Repo crags at 32 where Nick wanted to lead Mambo Jambo (the route I sketched out on last week) in the same style as I did, skipping the top bolts. I climbed up on top of the crag across it to get some cool photos and a video (which nick will hopefully put online soon) while Nick cruised it. He made it look like a 10b climb which it is instead of how I climbed it, making it look like a 12b.

Nick negotiating the jamming crux of Mambo Jambo (10b trad).

Nick on the top crux of Mambo Jambo, skipping the bolts in favor of gear placements.

Me on the steep wall of PC7 my broken project on WWI at Little Si

We then headed up the hill to WWI where I wanted to get back on PC7 the climb I had come really close on a few days earlier. I had been thinking about it a lot in those few days. I got through the first crux feeling super strong, it didn't feel hard at all, I got to the hard part above the third clip on the headwall, crimp, undercling, crimp with the right then reached up to the crimp that Micah had broken off, wait where is it? There was barely anything there, it was way worse than I thought it was going to be, it was barely possible to hang off it let alone pull way past it, NOOO! I hung there and tried to figure out some other sequence, but switching hands and moving right from the crimp below wasn't an option. I tried the broken crimp again, thinking there must be some other way to hold it, but there wasn't. I was pretty gutted, I was so close to getting this route done, but now its way out of my range. Its probably a 5.13 now, so I'll just have to move onto other projects and come back to this when I'm stronger. I can't really blame Micah, maybe he saved me from pulling off the crimp myself. I was kinda bummed out, and I apologise Nick and Scott if I ruined the vibe of the day. Nick managed to lighten the mood, with his impressive send of Bust the Rhythm 12c. This is a climb that Micah and I had done a couple of years ago, Nick had tried this quite a bit in the past but couldn't link the hard crux, on Saturday though he got it first go, and made it look easy. With Nick's project sent we headed back down the hill and to the Far Side at Exit 38, where Scott really wanted to try Endless Bliss, a monster 18-clip 10a slab. Scott and Nick had looked for this climb before but with no success, but I knew where it was so I took them there, where we all led it. Scott cruised it on lead, he has no problem on slabs like these. I also scoped out potential for a couple new routes on a hard technical section of rock to the right of Endless Bliss. They would be really hard and technical, but I think they would go, I would totally bolt them if I had a drill. We ended the day with the 5.9? to the left of endless Bliss, where Scott took a fall and hurt his shin, which was a bit of a bummer on an otherwise great day. I'm looking forward to climbing more with Scott and Nick this summer.

Nick finishing a great day off with a great climb, Endless Bliss 120ft of amazing slab climbing.

A new project

I had promised myself a rest day yesterday after too many days in a row climbing. But then Micah offered a ride up to Little Si that was too good to refuse, so off we went. It took us three hours to get there because of a terrible accident on I-5 that we were stuck behind for a while, so once we got there we were in a rush to get things done. Once again we warmed up at Blackstone, then Laura and I moved onto the Woods while Micah and Greg headed up to World Wall I. I wanted to get on a route called Bioclamactic Quandry, its a mixed sport/trad route that gets 4 stars in the guide. I wanted to do it all trad, running out the bolts, I got past the first three bolts placing one wire, then there was a bomber finger crack for the middle section that took great gear. Then the crack ended and there was another 4 bolts of airy thin slab climbing with no other gear before the chains, I figured it just wasn't worth it to skip the bolts, it would be really scary, but it was still a great route I'd recommend it. Its listed in the best routes at exit 32 list at the end of the guide, which of the 28 routes listed below 13a I've done 24, which ain't bad. I did a couple more short routes on the far right hand side of the Woods, before we headed up to WWI.

I got on Son of Jesus, but was unsure what to get on after that, I'm not really motivated to repeat routes I've already done. I figured I'd check out a route called Judgement Day Direct or PC7 as the locals call it because its supposedly glued (although I didn't see any). I had tried the start briefly the other day, but wasn't really feeling motivated then. This time it felt a lot more doable, I got past the first crux then dogged my way up, checking out the holds. They were surprisingly good, small but very positive and crimpy. It goes up the steepest part of WWI probably 20 degrees overhanging, so you need good holds. I managed to figure out a good sequence and I clipped the chains, this might go I though to myself, it was a lot more doable than I was expecting for a 12d (7c).

I got lowered down and pulled the rope, I was going to give it a redpoint attempt, I said I'd be happy to get it down to one-hang, but secretly I though there was a chance I'd send it right then. I made it past the first crux, a big throw to a jug, then through the crimpy section and the big move going out right, I had to skip a bolt cause I couldn't take a hand off to clip, but the next one was close anyways. I got to a decent shakeout, only two more hard moves to go before the victory jug, I lunged up to the sidepull, got my fingers on it, but couldn't hold on, I was off. Man so close! I got back on and fired off the move next try and clipped the chains, at least I got it down to one hang, but I felt robbed, I could have finished it off there and then.

I got lowered off since it was getting dark and Micah wanted to give it a quick shot. He dogged his way up through the first bolts figuring out the sequence. He then tried the big move going out right off the small crimp, and disaster struck, he pulled off the crucial crimp! He took a bit of a whipper in the process, but was ok, but to be honest I was more concerned about the hold and whether the route will still be possible. He says there is now a smaller sharper crimp, so hopefully that will still be enough. I'm really excited to have this project now, and can't stop thinking about it I think I was starting to feel a bit jaded about World Wall I, but now I'm psyched to get back there and finish off a new project!

This afternoon I'm heading down to the quarry it'll be my 8th day climbing out of 9, 6 of those outside, tomorrow is definitely a rest day!

The other side of Little Si

Yesterday Laura and I headed out to Little Si with Jimmy and Lisa. But unlike the other fifty or so times I've been there over the last few years, this time I took my trad rack. Yes there is trad at Little Si, don't tell anyone though cause its pretty sweet. Instead of being crowded on the Ledge at World Wall I, we had pretty much the whole of Repo I to ourselves down below, it was awesome. We started out warming up at Blackstone, where Laura and Lisa onsighted a 10b and 10c respectively. Before Jimmy and Lisa headed up the path to hang on their projects at WWI, and Laura and I took in some easy trad at Repo I. I did a 5.5, 5.6, 5.6, and 5.9, which were all excellent except for the 5.5, don't do it, its a chosspile. Laura cleaned all the routes, getting a feel for trad placement again. Laura has led a handful of trad routes in her past, but like me its been a while. In Scotland she led a VDiff and a Severe (5.6 and 5.7) at Reiff, although it was more a case of placing gear down low then run it out to the top. And in Squamish a couple of years ago, she led a couple of 5.5 and 5.6's, although she had an epic on the last route she led and has been scared to return to trad ever since. She felt up to trying a route today, so she led First Things First, a really fun 5.6 with great gear placements, all her gear was bomber, and I think this gave her a lot of confidence for getting back on more trad routes.

The easy routes were just a warm up for my main objective of the day, to onsight Mambo Jambo a classic 10b trad route. The route starts out easily in a finger crack going up a short dihedral to a ledge, you place your first pieces here and go up the slightly overhanging crack that starts out with ring locks then gets wider to hand and fist jamming. I was feeling good on lead up to this point, I placed my biggest cam above my head and it looked good, but there was another 20 ft or so of wide crack that I knew I couldn't really protect, but I figured I'd just go for it. I climbed up past my cam, to really insecure hand jams, in fact I was pretty much just holding onto slick slopers in the crack. I was really sketching out, both legs were shaking uncontrollably, then I realized I had a big hex I could throw into the crack, I jiggled it around in there but it didn't really settle, I was getting pumped fast, and I knew if I didn't keep moving up I'd be coming off, so I clipped the rattling hex, jammed my feet in and sketched my way up, to what looked like a ledge, it was just more slopers, so i kept on going until eventually a jug! Phew, that was scary, I threw a sling over the jug spike, and looked down, that would've been a big fall, there was no way the hex was holding, but the cam below would have prevented a ground fall. I climbed up on to a ledge above the spike, the route wasn't over yet, I still had another 20ft of tricky slab climbing before the chains. The slab was protected by two bolts, but I knew I couldn't clip the bolts after getting this far on trad gear. I managed to fiddle in a sideways nut in a small undercling flake, it didn't look amazing but when I gave it a tug it held. Ok just trust it I thought to myself and you'll be on top before you know it, a few precarious high steps and rockovers later and I was on top. Yes! It was a sketchy lead, but I had done it, this is what onsighting trad is all about.

Although it only gets the lowly grade of 10b, (6a+) I felt this is one of my hardest trad onsights to date. I have onsighted routes that get harder grades, but this was definitely not my style, because of the wide cracks, and the mental aspect running it out during the crux and at the top on the slab. If this were in the UK, I would think it would probably get E3 5c, since it is both physically quite hard, and you could take a big fall especially on the top section if the nut on the slab didn't hold. I came down feeling great, but both physically and mentally drained, Laura was sure glad to have me back on the ground, I know she wasn't looking forward to having to catch my fall.

We headed up to WW1 to join the masses of sport climbers and see how Jimmy and Lisa got on, sounds like they had a pretty good day, Jimmy managed a repeat of Psychosomatic 12d, and Lisa made progress on some 12s. I gave Girls in the Gym a quick repeat, and watched Jimmy onsight End of the World 12a, then we headed back to the car, and I slept the whole ride back to Olympia, looking forward to being back safe and sound and ready to climb an other day.

Lisa going for the flash of End of the World

Trad is Rad!

Yesterday I brushed off the cobwebs on my trad gear and placed some pro for the first time in a long time. The last time I climbed trad routes was up in Squamish in the summer of 07. But even then I only led a handful of routes, in fact since I came to US 3 years ago, I can probably count all the trad routes I've done on both my hands. Which is weird because I used to be a big tradder. When I started out climbing in 2001 I bought a very minimal rack (just a few nuts and slings, which I still use today) and got out climbing on the sea cliffs and crags around where I lived in Scotland, I was climbing easy trad and I loved it. The next year I worked in a climbing shop, so built up a respectable rack and was able to push my grades a little. For the first 5 years of my climbing I nearly only did trad routes, since there was very little sport routes to climb in Scotland. Since I moved to the states I got hooked on sport climbing and seemed to forget about my trad roots. But yesterday I got out to Index with Doug and Zach, for my first time, and it all came back to me.

I forgot how much a rack weighs me down

I love trad climbing, I'd forgotten how much fun it is to plug a bomber nut in a crack and run it out til the next good stance. The first route we got on was Aries a popular 4 pitch (5.8, 5.8, 5.6?, 5.8) route at the Great Northern Slab area. I got a bit nervous at the start since there was a mandatory 15ft or so of hand jamming which I'm terrible at, I stuck my hands and feet in the crack, and they seemed to stick so I made a few moves and I was on a ledge before I knew it. The next pitch was a great friendly finger crack up a corner. It felt great to place pro and feel confident climbing past it. I was really pleased at how smooth I seemed to be climbing and I was really happy with my gear placements. It was really fun setting up a gear anchor, it had been a while, since all the stuff I did Squamish had bolted anchors, but it came back to me really easily. For some reason I got a lot pride setting up a bomber equalised anchor. Doug and Zach let me to lead all the pitches, with them following and cleaning. The last pitch was an awesome exposed pitch climbing around a roof, I was really grateful for being able to use Doug's big cams, otherwise it would have been a very scary and run out pitch. We made pretty good time for climbing in a threesome and rappelled down to see what was next.

Me climbing up the tricky moves at the start of Japanese Gardens P1 (10a)

We checked out more of the Lower Wall, which is very impressive and intimidating. I spotted a cool looking pitch that had a bit of everything, slab, finger crack, and wide laybacking flake. I got on it and did pretty well, the top part laybacking the wide flake was a little nervy since it was insecure and was pretty much placing the cams blindly. There was one bolt mid way up the route, but I opted to skip it since there was good gear placements not too far away. I clipped the anchors and got lowered off for Doug and Zach to toprope it. It turns out that the climb I did was the first pitch of Japanese Gardens which goes at 10a, which felt about right. I was a little scared on it, especially on the wide crack section, but I feel like I could climb harder trad if I stuck to smaller cracks which I feel more secure on.

Zach toproping Japanese Gardens

With that in mind we headed back to the Northern Slab area, where I got on a cool finger crack up a dihedral that I had spotted earlier. Its listed in the guidebook as a 10c alternative start to the Great Northern Slab, but its really short, I only placed two pieces of gear in the crack. I finished the route by cruising up Great Northern Slab which get 5.7 here but it felt way easier than the other routes we had done. After we had all done this route, we rapped down and headed back since it was getting late and we were getting hungry. We stopped en route in Seattle for a great dinner (thanks Doug!) before getting back to Olympia pretty late. I would definitely go back to Index, I just wish it didn't take so long to get there from Olympia. Theres a ton of routes to do there, we barely scratched the surface. Most of the stuff there is a lot harder though, so I'll have to step up my game for next time. It has definitely re-ignited my enthusiasm for trad climbing though, so hopefully this summer I'll have more opportunity to get my gear out more often.

Fossil Rock

Yesterday Laura and I got out climbing with Doug. We went to Fossil Rock for our first time. Although Fossil is relatively close we had never visited it because of reports it's a big choss pile. I can see now why people would write it off as that because of its appearance, but there are actually some great solid routes which are really fun to climb. Doug had been there several times so was able to show us around. After the half hour bike in we started out at Boyal Bobbins Wall where we did a few 5.8's and 5.9's. The rock here looked very suspect, but Doug assured me it was totally solid and had never seen a hold pop. Only a few moves into my first route though I popped off a golfball sized foothold, thankfully this was the only hold popping incident of the day.

Laura starting up a route on the Boyal Bobbins Wall

It seemed to me the harder the route the more solid the holds were and the better the climbing was. We did a fun 10a then moved on to the classic of the crag 'Battle of the Bulge' an 11a. I got the onsight, despite messing up the crux sequence and getting pumped. Laura and Doug both managed it clean on toprope, so Laura figured why not go for the lead since she knew she could do the moves and the clips were ok. It was a real battle for her going through the fingery and powerful bulge, but she managed to stick the moves and pulled through to complete one of her hardest routes yet. It was her first 11a in almost a year, since last summer in Europe, and almost certainly her hardest lead in N. America. I could see it coming from the way she has been climbing in the gym. I'm sure this will be the first of many hard climbs for her this summer.

Me on Battle of the Bulge a great 11a

After that we headed around the corner where we all did a 5.9. Then I tried Sketchmaster 5.12a as the last route of the day. It didn't look too bad from the ground, but once on the route it was very thin, balancy and surprisingly pumpy. I came close to coming off a few times, but held it together and clipped the chains for the onsight. It was a great route to finish off a great day on. I certainly changed my perception of Fossil Rock and will for sure be back there again soon.