6/25/05 - Leavenworth Cragging

6/9/05 - Mount Si Wakeup Hike

Michael, Carlos, and I planned on hiking up Mount Si to help us get in shape for the climbing season.  I don't think the other two really needed it; they'd been hiking.  But, this year was the latest I'd ever started to get out.  So, I expected to be tired.  Also, I felt a little ill from the day before but I was determined to go anyway.  It's JUNE!  The boyz showed up at 5:30AM but Michael announced that he had work duties and couldn't attend.  Carlos and I headed out.

For the most part, I felt pretty strong.  Although, on the Old Si trail, which is considerably steeper, I felt a good bit slower.  Still, we made great time, arriving on the top in 1.5 hours.  Another 12 minutes saw us on the Haystack.  It was my first time up there without snow. 

I had a meeting to attend at 10AM and it was already late.  So, we ended up running all the way down.  We took periodic walking rests, but we must have run 90% of the trail.  Each time we'd stop and walk, we could feel the heat radiating from our heads.  I also had my mp3 player with me and listened to the latest tracks from FT's new CD, Relic.

I ended up being 10 minutes late to my meeting.  Pshaw!  No matter.  What was really important was that I put myself on the fast track to getting in shape.  Also, I think I was purified by sweat - I felt great afterwards!  No more illness!

4/23/2005 - Scarington "Total Soul" III+, 5.10b

Coming soon...

4/20/2005 - Index before Work

Michael suggested a Index dawn patrol on Wednesday.  I replied with a resounding "Yes"!  I was at Michael's at 5:30 and we pulled in to the town walls parking lot at 6:30.  Our objective was "Aires", a 4-pitch 5.8 climb on "Great Northern Slab".  I was keen on leading the second finger crack pitch.  The first pitch was a rude awakening, awkward and strenuous as always.  OK, maybe my crack technique isn't that great after all.  Michael concocted a weird belay that would have afforded me a massive pendulum so I re-placed a cam and hung on it while he moved the belay.  Up on the finger crack, I noticed my shoes weren't sticking very well.  We had seen water seeping down the chimney pitch above, but we knew we could avoid it.  However, I realized that this entire pitch was coated in a slick morning mist.  Wisely, I backed down.

We then zipped over to Pisces.  I led this climb again, this time opting for the 5.7 start (at Michael's suggesting).  Some fiddling with a cam in a flaring crack forced me to give up and sling a chockstone.  Moving higher up, I placed a bomber Alien cam and then un-clipped the slung chockstone and pulled it out with my feet.  That was cool, I thought; I'll have to remember that.  Pulling up onto the ledge before the fabulous Pisces crack, I resolved not to fiddle with any more gear like when I first led this climb back in February.  This time felt like a cruise.  Three pieces later, I was on top.  Michael requested that I lower him down so he could attempt Libra crack.  It wasn't meant to be today and I felt him fall a few times before he re-climbed the 5.7 section and then up to meet me.

We then lowered down to Taurus and I checked out the possibilities of linking Taurus with Aires (works perfectly!).  After climbing back up, Michael lowered down, climbed up, then lowered down again.  I followed with a rappel and swung over to meet him at the base of the last pitch of Aires, the roof pitch.  The rope wouldn't pull.  There's a big bush at the top of Taurus crack that was obviously causing a lot of friction.  So, I went back on rappel, swung over to the rappel anchors of some crazy looking face climb, anchored in, and then pulled the rope.  Finally, it came.  I then tossed the rope to Michael, put him on belay, and he headed out on the last pitch of Aires.  I followed and found the pitch much easier than a year ago.  The undercling that gets you out onto the face looks scary, but it takes a remarkably small amount of energy to move through it and it's quite solid.  Some fun crack climbing got us back up to the belay anchors of Pisces where we rapped down and headed in to work.

Aires, Pisces, Taurus, Aires

4/17/2005 -  Vantage "Crack Seminar"

Check out the "Crack Seminar" Movie (10 megs)

Michael and I brought Carlos along for a day of crack climbing at Vantage.  We started the day early, arriving around 8am.  By the time it was 8:30, we were climbing on the Sunshine Wall.  Apparently no one was out climbing yet, so we picked one of the popular ones:  Twin Cracks (aka "Party in your Pants"), 5.8.  It was time for me to lead it so, feeling eager and confident, I jumped on it.  The climb is dead vertical, but overall quite easy.  The jams are solid and there are plenty of rests where it's easy to place gear.  I doggedly pulled over each bulge after placing a piece directly below and using the excellent jams to pull through.  This is one of the longer climbs at Vantage; the double ropes worked nicely - clipping one on the left and the other on the right.

The next climb was "George and Martha", 5.10a, one of the classic cracks at Vantage.  Michael led the climb and I followed second.  Previously on "Twin Cracks", Michael and Carlos followed in tandem, but for this climb, we followed individually.  I found the moves all there - a great feeling given that I've been working diligently on cracks for a year now.  The climb was quite strenuous though.  The top (very much like "Air Guitar") was the crux, featuring an awkward offwidth which was eventually conquered (like "Air Guitar") by a tiny step up to where the jams became more solid.

"Tangled Up In Blue", 5.9, came next.  Both Carlos and Michael agreed this was the hardest climb, although I thought "George and Martha" was the hardest.  The lower portion of this climb was certainly the trickiest, featuring delicate pasting and a thin finger crack.  Up higher, the climbing remained challenging but more solid.

We borrowed a top rope from another party and setup our own rope on "Air Guitar", 5.10a.  I found this one very enjoyable.  The lower part wasn't much of a crack and felt more like a thin gym climb, but higher up, the crack became perfect.  It felt great cruising up it for twenty feet or so before the offwidth crux.  If only this climb were 5 times as long!  I felt perplexed at the crux, but again, a hidden feature for my right foot got me up just a couple more inches where the jamming was solid.  I should say here that Carlos did fabulously on these tough climbs.  He wasn't used to crack climbing and ended up making some very strenuous moves to get up but his perseverance saw him through.

Next, I led "Seven Virgins and a Mule", 5.7, which is a classic Vantage chimney climb.  It felt really solid and I ended up placing only 4 pieces.  "You should be on the cover of Rock and Ice", Michael sardonically quipped.

There was no place to rappel down, so we headed over to another rappel station where we set up a toprope belay for Michael to try "Steel Grill", 5.9.  I opted not to top rope it.  One, I was getting pretty tired and another I was getting cold.  Strong cold winds had moved in while we were on "Seven Virgins" and belaying on the top of these cliffs two (and soon three) times in a row left me chilled.  The wind had scared off all the other climbers.  We all rappelled down and headed for Chossmaster.

"Chossmaster", 5.7, is an old favorite of ours.  It's a sport route, but a fun way to end the day and it makes it easy to walk out on the top of cliffs instead of going back up through "Fat Man's Squeeze".  Because we were hiking out, we had to put on our packs and simulated a little alpine climbing.  I led out and found it noticeably harder than the last time without a pack and in warm sun.  The climb went pretty quickly though (we did it in one long pitch) although the belay up on the exposed ledge chilled me again.  Finally, we took refuge behind some rocks among the flowering phlox where we recounted the day.  I remarked that this was probably my favorite day at Vantage.  First to arrive, last to leave.  We enjoyed a beautiful sunset hike out.

4/10/2005 - Vantage

Michael and I planned on spending a day climbing cracks in Vantage.  Robert and his friend, Andrew, would be out there as well.  The day before, Carlos decided to come along with us.  Then literally at the last minute, Michael had to bail out.  Carlos zipped up to Michael's house to grab the rack (we ended up only using quickdraws) and showed up my house around 7am, an hour after our original planned departure.  Still, as we all are wont to do, we overestimated the time to arrive at the climbing site and arrived just before 9am.  Robert and Andrew were unpacking.

We immediately headed down to Sunshine wall; no more warming up on the Feathers.  Robert and Andrew jumped on Chossmaster (2 pitch 5.7) and Carlos and I opted for Peaceful Warrior (5.6).  I'm certainly not a "rope gun", but I ended up having to lead everything.  I'm not used to that and it was a nice change of pace, although I didn't lead anything harder than 5.8.  Anyway, Peaceful Warrior felt a little challenging, strangely enough.  Turns out that it was because it was the first climb; we followed up with Chossmaster, which felt like a breeze this time around.  Chossmaster is a great climb, a little neglected maybe.

I may be missing a climb here, but the next one I recall was a 5.8/5.9 whose name I don't recall.  It was another two pitch climb.  The opening 5.8 was pretty hard, continually steep.  I tentatively moved up to the rap chains and looked forward to the next pitch.  Bah!  I'm mad at myself now that I decided to rap down and skip the second pitch because it "looked hard".  Robert later reported that it was a much better pitch and not as strenuous.  Instead, we rapped down and hopped on a top-roped steep column.  This was another 5.9 that featured every single bolt on the right-hand side.  It was continually pumpy and quite long. 

In the mean time, Carlos and I still couldn't get clearance to climb "Seven Virgins and a Mule" thanks to what looked like a rock-climbing class.  The same thing happened with "Twin Cracks"; it was never free.  A bit of waiting on the group at "Seven Virgins" persuaded us to move on to another sport climb.  Another 5.9 called "Ride 'em Cowboy".  The only reason I remember the name was the distinct rest spot where you "ride" the column in a hands free rest.  Pretty nice.  This climb was a good bit easier than the other 5.9 and a little more creative.

We split up at the end of the day.  Robert and Andrew headed down to M&M wall for some hard stuff.  Carlos wanted to head up to the feathers for a lead.  We settled on "Mandatory Suicide" which is a 5.4 climb.  I led it first just to let Carlos know what I thought about it.  It was fun to try to lead it as fast as possible, including the rappel.  It didn't take too long; glad I'm getting the mechanics dialed in.  Well, Carlos led it splendidly and made it a little easier than I did by sticking to the dihedral and not going out onto the face (which felt like a 5.6 move).  Thus the day ended.

3/13/05 - Outer Space (III, 5.9)

Robert and I met up at 7AM in Issaquah for the drive out to Leavenworth and Snow Creek Wall.  We were set on either climbing Orbit or Outer Space.  The last time I was out here, I hiked all the way in, crossed Snow Creek, and climbed up to the start of Orbit only to realize that I'd forgotten my shoes.  Arr!  Well, it was a good thing probably since I didn't feel to hot that trip.  I had all my stuff this time.  We hiked up fairly fast and as I was crossing Snow Creek on a solid log, I stepped on a slick section and, having my legs completely tugged out from under me, came down really hard on my axe.  At least I didn't hit the water.  It was nice and warm this late winter morning.  The sun was beating down on the wall as we approached the base of the "Remorse" start of Outer Space.  I was so hot that I opted to leave my fleece.  I almost wanted to leave my shell too; thankfully, I didn't.  There was another party on Orbit and another on the traditional start of Outer Space.  Robert ended up leading the whole thing.

Pitch 1:

An easy 5.0 that turned into maybe a 5.4 by tackling a dihedral directly instead of the easy ramp off to the right.  Near the top was a fairly delicate little 5.7 move up to a hanging belay under a bush.  From here, we had the 5.8 traverse.  Having done the Improbable Traverse, I was a little worried about it.

Pitch 2:

The 5.8 traverse ended up being great fun!  The hardest move is right off the belay and moving about 10 feet leftward to a massive undercling.  From here, the route looks harder than 5.8 but it actually is a little easier, always solid.  A climb up a dirty ramp led to the belay station near a large tree.

Pitch 3:

From the tree, Robert headed up leftward and then eventually angled back to the right up a smooth ramp.  The crux move, 5.7, was at the top of the ramp around a large block to gain the upper section of the pitch, another leftward angling ramp/dihedral.  I followed up through a tight squeeze that was a little clumsy feeling thanks to the pack I was hauling.  At the top of this pitch we were on the main route with the crux pitch in front of us.

Pitch 4:

We opted to climb the harder 5.8 direct route up to the 5.9 traverse.  I found this section pretty challenging.  It's certainly "old school" 5.8.  One thing I noticed is that the scale of difficulty between the grade 5.7 and 5.8 on this climb is really wide!  This was a tough 5.8 that led up to a squeezing rightward chimney that deposited you just above the 5.9 traverse.  Robert did a fantastic job leading.  However, I think I got in to the traverse much higher than I should have and I ended up trying to lower myself delicately down to a small flake.  Well, I couldn't quite hang on end ended up falling - arrr.  Once I was at the flake (where I should have been), I was able to complete the traverse, which was strenuous 5.9, more old school!  The whole traverse was quite demanding (harder than Princely Ambitions at Index) and I was quite hot and tired by the time I got up to the belay.  The sun had gone behind a ridge and the wind had picked up.  The temperature had dropped dramatically.  I was wearing my shell and I was really roasting from the exertion.  However, Robert was shivering when I topped out.  Of course, I was carrying the pack.  We quickly opened it up and got out some extra fleece and his shell.  Then he headed out for the 5th pitch.  It was my turn to sit and shiver (a recurring pattern for the rest of the climb).

Pitch 5:

This was a fun little pitch.  There wasn't much to it at the beginning - mostly 5.7 slab climbing.  Again, the 5.7 seemed super easy...then the very end featured a short burly 5.8 move.  And again, a distinct noticeable increase in difficulty as I powered my way over the mini tower in a half-lieback sort of pose.  Dropping down the other side deposited me at a nice belay stance for the best pitch of the climb.

Pitch 6:

Now that I've finally got decent crack technique, this pitch was a complete joy.  It's dead vertical, something that I wasn't expecting for a 5.8 climb.  Well, I suppose the 5.8 comes from the fact that there are chicken-heads-a-plenty on this pitch.  However, they weren't ubiquitous and I found that jamming the crack afforded me much faster climbing than if I were trying to place either hands or feet on the chicken heads.  So, I found myself moving quickly and jamming and then whenever I needed a rest, or the chicken head was just to bomber to resist, I would reach out and grab a head.  Robert really ran the pitch out.  He later remarked that it wasn't his choice, but rather he needed about 12 #2 cams to protect it regularly.  True true.  The top of this pitch ended at the famous "Library Ledge", which was just wide enough to sit on and dangle your feet over the 400 foot drop.

Pitch 7:

Another stellar crack pitch, although the opening 5.9 old-school finger crack was damn hard.  It seemed like it took me a while to get moving on the finger crack - I suddenly didn't feel to sure of myself.  "Finger Locks or Pine Box", I repeated to myself, having recently learned that pithy (search for that word) saying from Robert.  So I fingerlocked my way tenuously up the crack, very little for feet.  I thought perhaps I could conquer the whole thing instead of moving right to chicken heads as Robert did.  Not this time..."let's get moving," I said to myself and I hopped onto easier terrain and powered up to more hand crack!  The hand crack was easier than below, not quite vertical anymore so it was a total cruise up to Robert where I continued going up past difficult to protect slabs and a couple of easy roof.  Finally I was at the top where I did my usual "throw the rope around a boulder" routine and brought Robert up.

Descent:

We had just enough time to do the descent and cross the creek before it started to get dark.  The descent was actually very easy, though I could see how easy it would be to get lost in darkness.  We had no problems, however, and made it down fairly quickly.  A quick survey of the base of the wall revealed no gear, unfortunately.  We safely made our way down and across Snow Creek and onto the trail.  Only near the very end did it get completely dark on us.  We enjoyed a sandwich at the Subway and then beat it outta there for home.  Kick axe climb!

My Tick Count:  5

2/20/05 - Baking hot sun at Index

Because I was coming off a recent (and rare...first time since '98) flu, I opted for climbing at Index instead of an arduous snowy mountain climbing trip.  Robert and I headed out to Index around 8:30 in the morning in cold Seattle fog.  Just as we were arriving near the Mount Index viewpoint, the fog finally parted and we were greeted with brilliant sun not unlike the day two years ago at Mount Eerie, when we enjoyed similar warm conditions.

We decided to warm up on Princely Ambitions (5.10a) with the idea of climbing Tatoosh (III, 5.9+) next.  Princely Ambitions was my introduction into the harder climbs at Index two years ago and I thought it was pretty scary then.  Well, this time it still felt a little nervy but the moves were much easier (progress!).  Still, I don't feel I'm quite up for the lead of it yet.  The first crux was quite easy this time around, accomplished by a gentle weight shift to the right followed by two mantles up to the first flake.  I remember fiddling for many minutes the last time I was here.  There was another crux right below the hand traverse, again another trusting weight shift to the right. 

I had to pause a bit before the hand traverse just to get my confidence up.  Once I committed, it was quite easy.  The handholds are super bomber.  The trick with the feet is to paste them hard onto the wall by pushing your hips off of the wall.  However, I had to be careful not to try to escape the traverse prematurely.  The best trick is to wait until the hands start working up the crack and then exit.  The rest was pretty straightforward.  Looking back, I don't think it's a 10.a, more like an Index 5.9.  The moves aren't too bad but I think it's a climb where your mental power is better than your technical abilities.

I hadn't climbed the upper pitch before.  It's by no means as good as the lower pitch but it was fun to do some real crack climbing right off the bat.  Robert conquered it by stemming but I found it easier to jam the whole thing.

At Tatoosh, Robert quickly found that the climb was trickier than it appeared.  There's a supposedly 5.7 section that's way harder than that.  Robert fiddled around a while thinking of techniques on how to move through the second section then ultimately gave up and rapped down.

We then found that Aires was occupied by some Mountaineers so we moved over to Pisces (5.6).  I was eager to lead it for the first time.  Robert handed me the massive rack and I headed up.  At the crack, I placed a cam and stepped into the crack.  I moved up a few more jam moves and stopped to put another piece here.  While I was fiddling with the rack trying to find another comparable piece, my feet started hurting (jammed in the rack), I started shaking, and started to get nervous.  But, I regained my composure and decided to blast through it.  That turned out to be the right thing.  I moved above the first piece and got to a more suitable resting spot then got a great nut in on a small crack on the left.  Again, I moved quickly past it until I got to another reasonable spot to stop and place gear.  From there, the crack becomes much easier and I continued up to the anchors.  I brought Robert up and he continued on up Great Northern Slab and set a directional and lowered down to Taurus Crack (5.7)

Taurus Crack was a lot of fun.  I found it easier than Pisces mainly because you can get away without jamming it.  The crack is actually like a sawtooth and you can use the teeth as solid hand and footholds.  After Taurus, we rapped down and headed home.  This was a great day out:  it was warm and sunny and reminded me of the super fun days in the sun in spring and late winter in anticipation of the summer climbing season.