planning my plans, and the red report November 20, 2011

Because when it comes to your climbing trip plans, you’ll encounter your share of naysayers. Have you ever noticed this? Wherever you’re headed, you’re going at the wrong time, the weather/crowds/star alignments are not optimum. I field a lot of ish from folks when I describe whatever my latest plan is, and if there’s nothing to naysay about my actual locations and timing, it’s the pure fact of having a plan that’s wrongheaded. Maybe it’s just annoying to hear someone else’s plans, and it’s like spray to share them. Maybe I’ll start answering the question “where to next?” with “Houston”. Because there’s nothing like “Houston” to throw a wrench in a rock climbing conversation’s flow. Except maybe “Jacksonville.”

I’m thinking about this because I’m in the Red during prime time, and I still got naysayage over a potential freeze out. Turns out it’s the rain that’s been hard to cope with. It seems to keep to a 4-on, 3-off schedule, and with my (less than) trusty tent proving no match for the mud pit that is rural Kentucky, I may take off a few days ahead of shcdule and hit Horseshoe Canyon Ranch over the Thanksgiving holiday. On the way to Houston.

warming up at HRC a couple years ago. I wore that same warm top yesterday, but those awesome pants bit the dust this summer :-(

But my sport climbing session in the Red has been a blast, despite the rain. I did another of my hardest sport climbs, this time shaving a full day off the time, sending after 2 days and about 8 goes. This one is called Stunning the Hog at Left Flank, and is a perfect route for me. Steeper than a lot of lines at the Red, a bit shorter, with big moves and lots of heel-toe cams. Cletus told me that the line doesn’t see very many female ascents, and that gave the accomplishment an added bit of sweetness/rationalization for the excessive eating of ice cream. The second day on it I was out with Eric from Ohio, Elodie from France and Andy, who works at Miguel’s. We put some serious time into determining our climbing spirit animals. Turns out I’m a bat.

milking the rest

I haven’t fallen as hard (so to speak) for another line here yet. I tried one called American Dream about three times, and was psyched to send as the light was fading, but then Cedar accidentally pulled my rope down. The route starts up on a death slab and it was a total debacle to get the rope hung through the first, and just couldn’t muster the time/will to reset it. No big deal though. I can’t imagine a better reason to not be able to get on a route one last time.

Yesterday I took two goes to do this amazing, perfect slabby crimp line called There Goes the Neighborhood. It felt just like the terrorist face climbing of Ceuse, but with twice as many bolts. I’m super proud to have done it, and I think my limit for face climbing is still pretty moderate. I was eager(ish) to try its bigger, longer, harder brother, Orange Juice, but the weekend crowds at the Red are insane and I didn’t get a turn.

Which reminds me of how I bailed on the whole project last weekend and went to the OBed with Dan Dan and his friend Spiral. I’ll make that a separate post.

In conclusion, my sport climbing trip the Red has been a climbing success. I did another hardest sport line, and climbed fearlessly on faces and slabs, and took big falls. My body feels great, and most of my bouldering tweaks (left forearm weakness, elbow fire, hamstring death) have begun to heal. I’ve also made a few amazing new friends, and had a long and awesome catch-up with John Garcia, Bentley and GMFB when I randomly put my stuff down next to them. What a nice shock that was! I got to spend some quality time with the Pigeons, further streamline my car camping setup, and met my major Red River Gorge goal of not getting a Miguel’s shirt, even though there are these awesome thermal ones that taunt me daily.

Look at them all, just hanging there....

Today I’m gonna take a 2-token shower, and do a few more of these captivating blog posts, a little internet moneywork, and tarot cards with Thomo. That is my plan!

high-ness September 8, 2011

My whole quick stop at Horne Lake then spend ten days in Washington plan changed, and I stayed 6 days in Horne Lake. It was just too good! I got the project I’d been hoping for, Subdivisions. It was my first true power endurance route, and I think I took….I don’t know, like 6 tries total over 3 days. The day I did it I gave it one burn in the morning and fell at the anchor, which is the same anchor as a route I have already done, Moonraker. It’s a few moves on jugs into a slopey hole, a few underclings to clip from, and a very awkward body position. I had forgotten how specific the moves were up there, and didn’t rehearse that section ahead of time because I am lazy. After the fall I almost started to cry, because the sun was killer hot and I was kind of nauseous from climbing in it. But I collected myself and figured out the moves, brushed everything, made some ticks and top roped the end 5 times, then twice more just in case. Then I came down and hid in the shade for 4 hours til the sun went behind the wall.

this is the first rest right before a cruxy part of Subdivision. The pic is from that German guy Axel's blog, which you'll get to if you click on it. I have no idea who the climber is or who took it, just wanted to show you kinda what the route looks like.

In the meantime I tried a few burns on Plastic Jesus, the first “pitch” of a badass endurance route called Jesus Saves the Pusher. I didn’t do more than a few moves of it, because again, I’m lazy but also because I was saving myself for proj. But next time I’m here I’m going to work hard on that line and see what’s possible. I finally got through Subdivision by climbing fast and letting this awkward, sharp holds on a weird face section be a rest. So yay! Basked in that one for a day or so.

I also managed to do this short, pumpy line called Code of Honor, which had been very painful and annoying on my last trip, with close-together bolts at the start and some tufas that were easy to bang the shit out of your knees on. I don’t know why people get so excited about tufas, they’re almost always just bad sloper pinches. I mean I like sloper pinches too, I guess, especially these because they’re covered with limestone warts and are super sticky, but still. I think what I like would be more accurately called “roofas.” But anyway, I used a long draw and the downgrader and got through Code, long moves between huge holds and some pump.

But then it was Tuesday, and I’d been thinking to be back and gone to Washington by Sunday so…yeah, here I am, still in Squamish where there’s a hot spell and it’s in the high 80s until the sun dunks down. I may go back to the boulders this evening, but eh, I’m enjoying the chill time, organizing my car and hammering out my fall plans, working and reprogramming my body with pilates and yoga.  Here are some shots with/by Lotti and Martin, gettin yogic in the park. Lotti’s been introducing me to her specialty, therapeutic acro-yoga. It feels as good as it looks, but I don’t like doing it with strangers.

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things i did, quit, or that hurt me, squamish edition September 1, 2011

Shoot, I hate to post twice because I know I then won’t post at all for a while. But this video by starring scottish major Tom pretty much captures the Squamish experience. He (in the green) falls off a lot of the same stuff I did, and it’s beautiful. And I love posing productions, of course. Ummmm, what else?

Had my last day in the forest yesterday, but I haven’t been projecting much the last couple weeks so there was no urgency. I didn’t even feel like making any beta videos, since I either sent, never tried, or gave up on pretty much everything I’d encountered. So hey I suppose this is where I can talk about climbing!

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I’m super happy with my bouldering trip. I did a ton of problems, a few projects, and yesterday I managed to do one more hardish lip traverse in just a few tries. I took that as a sign that I’ve learned something aboot sloping lip traverses.

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There were a few things I thought would be projects that I had to give up on, and that was strange since I rarely honestly forfeit a climbing project. I’ll move on for a while and plan to return at a much much later day, but I never outright say “I’m over this forever.” But I did that a couple of times.

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I thought, after my first good day missing just the last move, that I’d get Baba Haridas, a classic lip traverse. But jeebus, my hamstring never recovered from the first session, and has lead to a pretty horrendous right-kneebar disease. I kept giving it goes now and then, getting close and falling. Finally it was just painful to pull with my heel, and I let it and all the other right-heel hooking lines go. I had a similar but worse experience with Sesame Street. My first day felt good through the strong lower moves on greasy crimps, but I didn’t know how to do the end, a big move over a bulge with a greasy sloper (there is a theme developing). I was super stoked to try it more, and the next time I nailed the last move a couple times pretty easily. But that day the beginning felt super hard and I couldn’t get to my previous high point. The next time I lost another move from the start. The other day, after a full rest day and with decent conditions, I couldn’t even stick the start.

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It was the flowers for algernon project experience, and I got very bummed. Nate got annoyed with my grim attitude and decided to give me a talking to about how lame it is to have low climbing self esteem, which was super awesome of him. So I gave up on Sesame Street. I think that’s all the projects I quitted.

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I sent some good ones too! Including Gibbs Cave, which was super fun and went down fast, early in the summer when it was still a bit cool and rainy. Ah…what else? Minor Threat took a few days, I kept trying to do it at the end of the day, thinking I was some kind of hoss, but no. Had to go first thing then it went fast. Those were kinda the highlights. There were some things I wanted to try but never got to. There’s this awesome talus line that some folks find dabby that I’m excited to get on someday. It has a glorious name too, “Native American Giver.” I also got on The Fuzz last night, but it wanted everything I don’t have, like left wrist hanging abilities, and hamstring power. Autobody/Fixing the Car also looked awesome, but I wound up not spending anytime there. It’s About Time, Child Abuse, that long one with the sharp crimp and the impossible to remember name uphill of the black dyke, Old and Serious, and Twisted, are others I’d like to get on but I never made it.

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Sport climbing was rougher. I didn’t go much, and although I managed to do a good new line every time I went it’s been a constant battle. I feel pretty scared up on the rope and I’m still trippin out over anything less than a 35 degree angle. Heading to Horne Lake tomorrow, so there will be no shortage of steepness! I want to project this thing called Subdivision, which will take a couple days I think/hope, and give a few runs to Velvet Elvis, which seems relatively easy, but is very strange and I didn’t do all the moves of the weird, face down the middle of the cave ending. After that I’m going to spend another night or two in Squamish getting organized, then head to Leavenworth for ten days before I race back south. Yay hoo!

glamping at horne lake August 1, 2011

Took a 3 day camping trip to Horne Lake on Vancouver Island for some limestone sports action. A delicious break from granite sloper training and brushing off holds all day. Climbed 3 days and no elbow fire! I think the relatively relaxed climbing was a good break, and I also think I’m trying harder than I think I am at bouldering around here. The rules at Horne Lake seem to be something like, ‘no chipping, sandbag everything’. But it was pure pleasure to move on that kind of rock again, workin knee bars, grabbin’ jugs, gettin’ pumped, taking looooong falls in a roof. I did some twelves (omg!) and took some pictures:

berries galore

that's a camping milk steamer there on the right. i know. no, i know.

looks.....good

the titular lake

aggressive canadians graffitied my car at the trailhead

Back to the Squamish forest boulders today! I have a few projects in the talus, tons of classics to try and mellow circuiting to experience. Why is the sherpa taking so long with the coffee?

smoke out July 28, 2011

scary slab arete at the smoke bluffs. terrifying, but a lovely pic by lotto dotto

party time April 29, 2011

Might have spoken too soon about climbing = over. We got a very quick low-80s snap, and Merrick and I grabbed one, maybe 2, last moments on our late-spring project at Reimers, Bloc Party. Today I felt amazing on it. it’s a weird, chossy at the bottom, glorious traverse of jugs, tweaker headwall situation. But the last 3 days we got out to it, Merrick and I have both been pumping out at a low crux, not making it to the end of the traverse. The classic screw up is to get to the headwall and fall a move or two into it for the pump.

Today, I finally got to there! Twice! It was so simple! Whorray for traditional flailure!

Here’s Zoolander John Garcia doing Bloc Party years ago, falling just about where I did. He rests and is precise and blah blah blah. I don’t look like this on it, but whatever. I FELL AT THE REAL CRUX!

We’re going back tomorrow morning to catch the end of this bliss, and THEN climbing in Austin in pretty much done for me I promise.

you can totally stop my shine, actually March 3, 2011

I’m going through kind of a klutzy phase, and it came to some kind of apex on Tuesday when I took my first ever horrible ground fall. Typical headstrong stupid rock climber behavior, I was circuiting at McKinney by myself listening to Jason Derulo.

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My current “alone at Mk” circuit is this: Traverse high, traverse low, traverse wherever with no feet, then do the lunge, the two worth doing, and the monopop from as low down as I can pull on, do all of those twice. Then the prow with sloppy big shoes on, then power slide minus the last move. Then I move down and go into a ‘single moves and systems’ thing on harder problems I don’t want to do without a spot. I figure it’s a good use to my time to dial the insecure low moves so I don’t waste time when I do have a cohort. I practice starting and hardest moves on el camino left, qg, seige tactics from low, trap freak and geek. I try each move like 5-10 times each, hopefully hitting it 40%, then I go home.

But I guess Jason Derulo gave me some false swaggar or something, because when I was doing the first little part of seige tactics, which is not super hard but kind of painful and inconsistent, I thought ‘why don’t I just stick my foot up here by my hand and see if I can balance — NOPE.’ I fell on my right hip onto a rock, missing the stupid pad. It hurt so bad, and it took forever to get my headphones off which made it worse. Once I realized I wasn’t paralyzed or broken, I started ranting out loud about how lucky I am, and dragged myself out of there.

I think I’m fine, psychologically. It was just such pure idiocy and ego, and I don’t feel hesitant to get back on. My butt hurts and I have a huge gnarly bruise, but it feels a little better every day, so hopefully I’ll be in gear again by Sunday. It’s only a little worse than the time I fell off of the boat onto the slab/water at Amistad, banging my knee and scraping my thigh to high hell.

 

behold the ugliness, inside and out on this one

It’s bad enough that I blew off climbing at Reimers with Mike Personick et al today. It’s so pricey to get into that place, I can’t fork over 10$ for the pleasure of hobbling around and not being able to flex my right leg. OH! I went out with Hannah on Monday and finally did Raindance, so that gave me a nice five-twelve feeling. Everything else is fine. I hate looking at this picture, actually. It was a low moment on a rough trip. But then again, remembering lousy times also makes me happy, because they’re over.  Told me get my ish together, well now I’ve got my ish together. I’m jumpin in my ride and wearing shades etc.

127 seconds February 27, 2011

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Last week coco hung draws on a random Reimers 12a for me. I know it’s so noob nerdy but I still feel like a total baller when I do a new 12. I have this fear that on any given day I’m gonna lose my ability to rock climb so there’s really never any time to waste, and I didn’t want to futz with draws. Hang the long ones, coco! And yay! I did it first go, then coco followed it up to clean (servicy!). So I’m lowering him, and we’re yammering on about nothing, and a huge hunk of my hair gets caught in the ATC. Everytime I moved it gets pulled in further, following the rope through the metal, then curling around  and up the other side oh my god oh my god oh my god coco my hair is stuck in the ATC shit it just went in further oh no.

He was still pretty high up,  dangling in empty space, no easy trees to reach or anything. I felt him swing the rope a bit but nothing. There was no one at Reimers. We’d seen a hiker down by the river earlier, but the place was dead (on a cloudy 67 degree afternoon because people in Austin have no idea). I looked at our stuff, out of immediate reach but, eh, maybe.

“Do you have a knife?” I asked.

“Uhh, I do, but it’s in my bag, way over by the other wall.”

We stood/hung there saying “Ummm” and kinda laughing. The day had started with Vinny’s dog….well nevermind that’s another epic. Ummm. I grabbed my hair and tugged it just to see how it might feel to, ya know, lose it by force. It was a lot of hair. I broke a few strands. It was a lot of hair.

I looked at the dogs, and pondered how they might help. Nothing came to me. The ATC was getting closer to my scalp.

I pinched the lock off at my head, then coco grabbed the rope and did a weird rope pull up, and I got it out. I lost some length, but no blood. So Aaron Ralston right now. OMG, he has my same initials!! It was MEANT TO BE.

 

America the Beautiful People September 21, 2010

Another climbing couple I’ve gotten to know on this trip is the Christenson’s of San Francisco, who are, apparently, a big deal in the trad world. We met in Ceuse, and have a similar itinerary, so we’ll be riding together to and in Mallorca tomorrow, and might be in Siurana at the same time in October as well. Viva the circuit!

They tell me about each other’s notable Yosemite sends, but I’ve never heard of any of them so I just say ‘wow’, because I sense that I am supposed to know what the Moonlight Butter is. Anyway, they are two lanky, gorgeous people who completely crush at crimpy face climbing. I went out with them and our friend Blanca from Pampalona yesterday.

The company was great. The climbing, ugh. I don’t even want to talk about it.

But Andrew took some nice pictures of us, including this one, which illustrates precisely how I feel while climbing on crimpy faces.

Here’s a few more. I’m wearing a polka dot tank top from Target, and these corduroy shorts I’m not sure I like yet. I got them at a clothing swap. Click the images to see them bigger.

It rained hard last night, so I’ll wait until the afternoon and probably go out with Lu and Pita. Hopefully we’ll go to this sector called Boulder de Jon, which has a few  15 meter 7a 45 degree routes, perfect to sooth my shattered face climbing ego. I know I only get psyched when I’m projecting, so I need to pick a facey project and work it, rather than just give up and freak out when I fall on the on-sight. We’ll see. This may not be the trip where I do that.

I’m heading to Mallorca tomorrow to meet up with Gustavo and company. Psyched to ditch the harness for a bathing suit and just beach for a week.

Full on Brazilian September 21, 2010

It’s my last day, for now, at Rodellar. This is probably the funnest hard climbing I’ve ever done. I am never happier than when I’m memorizing beta for a powerful, steep route. I think I tend to pick ambitious projects, and that might be part of why I rarely send anything, but I had a total victory here on a fat 28 meter tufa line called Nanuk (7c). It only took 5 tries total and two days, and on all but my very first run I went all the way to the top and fell at the end. I even managed to use 2 kneebar rests, which is huge for me because I hate to rest. On Nanuk the moves and the rests get progressively harder, ending with a few strong roof moves and an unlikely high step situation. It was a very perfect project for me in many ways, and having done it so soon after sending Jesus/Chuy is a total feat of concentration. Yes, I know that is pathetic by many standards.

Here's Nanuk, with this random Austrian underwear model standing under it. Peep those ClimbTech draws.

My Brazilian friend Luciana was working Nanuk and recommended it to me. We worked it together for a day, then both sent. Lu is from Rio, she speaks like 5 languages and is just freakishly beautiful. She’s traveling with her boyfriend Pita, and they are two hilarious people with a fun couple dynamic. Pita kind of reminds me of Capt Bastard, with his skilled climbing, enormous green backpack always full of jumars, somewhat checkered history and easygoing, self-effacing attitude. Another Brazilian climber here told me that Pita is a pretty big deal in Brazilian climbing, that he fa’d and bolted lots of stuff all over the country. He’s all about cracks, big walls, short walls, choss, he’ll climb anything and be perfectly psyched.

Pita and Luciana at Grand Boveda

He and Lu have these hilarious arguments in Portuguese while she’s climbing. “You know what we’re saying?” Lu will ask me, and I don’t. Then Pita explains, “she says ‘oh it is so much easier when I do it like this,’ and I say yes I told you do it like this three days before!” Then Lu yells, “but is better I learn myself!”  Then Pita wanders off laughing, and one-falls 8b’s for a while. Lu is the kind of girl who, once it’s too dark to get back on her project, will climb on Pita’s projects with a headlamp just to wear herself out before a rest day, then hike out in a rage wearing flip flops.

Lu has had enough

Lu's double brush action

Climbing with them has made for some of my best times so far on this trip. I’ve had good luck with other tufa climbs here, but I’m still flailing and failing when it comes to crimpy face climbs.