Do not climb 5.6 in JTree

Michelle on Right Peyote Crack III
Originally uploaded by slampoud

This weekend's lesson is in bold in the title.

I'm just kidding, but really, this was an educational weekend. Michelle and I headed to JTree on Friday night. I got there around 6, and got us site 9 in Hidden Valley. Michelle arrived around 11:30. I'd already slept a couple hours by the time she got there, so then I couldn't sleep afterwards. The howling winds didn't help, but at least it was warm and we got to sleep outside and didn't have to deal with tents.

In any event, the next morning found me drowsy. I've been out of physical therapy for about two weeks now, and the shoulder was feeling good after the first week, but starting to hurt again after the second. I had decided that I wasn't going to lead on this trip, and that I wasn't even going to climb anything harder than a 9. This left the chore of being rope-gun entirely on Michelle, who had never climbed in JTree before, and was, rightly, intimidated by its reputation for sandbagged grades.

Thus, we were looking for 5.6 cracks for Michelle to lead, in the JTree West area, since that's all that's covered in my newer guide book. Complicating our stringent requirements was the fact that it was windy and a little chilly in the morning, but things turned really hot in the sun. So we wanted sun in the morning, but not in the afternoon...

We decided to start with Mike's Books. All went well for the first pitch, which revealed to me that my cardio reserves were completely shot and the least bit of exertion made me pant. Michelle led the left variation to the start, and I started straight up the crack. When we eyeballed the second pitch, however, we thought it was a pretty clear offwidth, and without a #4, it would be dreadfully run out. We hadn't brought up the #4, so we bailed. The Mountain Project page corroborates our assessment, so I'm glad we did.

Next we were looking for something a little more challenging and maybe shady. We eyeballed Overhang Bypass, also at Intersection Rock. The first pitch looked like no problem, but the traverse, which is to bypass the overhang, looked like a bear from below, and there were no bailing options if we got spooked. I was especially freaked by the idea of having to do essentially a hand traverse (the feet looked nonexistant) on a recuperating shoulder. We passed on it, though I think Michelle was more stoked about it than I was. In retrospect I'm sure Michelle would've styled it, but I'm not sure my shoulder would have loved me.

I then located another supposed 5.6 that didn't have "chimney" in the description in Steve Canyon, Deflowered. The name should have been more of a hint. Alas, hindsight is 20-20. Michelle, always the good sport, up and led it. It was slow, grunting going for her, and I was belaying in the sun and getting very very hungry. Then she topped out with a whoop! While Michelle was finishing the anchor, I grabbed two bites out of a Gnu bar, thinking this would give me some energy for the climb. The first section of the climb was fine, strenuous, but fine. I had to take a break at the end of it to make sure I didn't barf. Note to self: do not eat 30 seconds before climbing in the heat. The middle section was most definitely a damn chimney. Michelle had placed a big cam at the very depths of the thing, so I had to go in and get it. But then I wanted to be outside the chimney and on this horizontal seam that she had placed a smaller cam in. I had heel-toed my way up and now I was pinched between two pro placements I had to remove: one required me to go deeper, one further out. Crap! I took out the outside one, which I could reach, and then got deep into the chimney to remove the other one. And then I was totally stuck. I mean mechanically stuck, no way out but to reverse my moves, but I was on toprope. I weighted the rope and just sort of swung out a little bit and resumed. What a bummer, a fall. Anyway, the grunt-fest continued all the way to the top, and I topped out thinking, this is the hardest 5.6 ever. Mountain Project folk apparently agree with me, and the rating has been upgraded to 5.7 at least.

After that we rapped to the base and took a nap, then hiked back to the campsite and took another nap in the midday heat. Later in the afternoon we headed out to the Peyote Cracks. Michelle led Right Peyote Crack, a 5.8, with a little more apprehension and shaking than before, but again in good style. I followed, again a little better than before, but not totally happy. Getting off that formation spooked the hell out of me, not being a boulderer and hating top-outs and jumps. I got down a different way from Michelle, and suffered a bunch of scratches for my efforts.

On Sunday we were fried and it was even hotter. First we checked out Touch & Go, which is Michelle's goal. Then we looked at Double Dip and Stichter Quits, which I legitimately should be able to lead, but was too spooked to try. We then headed into Real Hidden Valley to maybe climb on the Thin Wall, but that was still in the sun. Finally we drove out to Split Rock, to play on Future Games wall. But Michelle was, understandably, not feeling into leading. I totally commiserated, as that was exactly how I'd felt on Sunday during the #jtreetweetup, just done! So we thought we'd drop a toprope onto Invisibility Lessons, but we weren't sure the rope would reach (and this area is not covered by my guidebook, so no way to check), and the anchor looked like a total pain to extend over the edge. Finally we gave up and called it a day, and filed all the routes we'd seen as future projects.

It was a great weekend, despite the fact that, technically, we only got in three climbs. Usually I'm up for sharing the leading load, so it was really miserable for me to not be able to. At the same time, though, the shoulder held. I iced it on Saturday night and by Sunday morning the twinges I'd been feeling were definitely gone. That was great. Also, the partnership with Michelle is very new, and her familiarity with the area non-existent. So arguably it was a good thing to end on an up note, having challenged but not broken either of us. I have a long way to go to get back to the strength and stamina of last fall, and I'm hoping that my lead head will follow once I see I can climb things in a style that is also consistent with leading. At the moment, I don't like the way I'm climbing, I don't like that I feel out of juice, and I hate my friggin' shoes! So, onward, lots of work to be done to get back.

Climbing in Greece in Summer 2009

Racking up in the Zode
Originally uploaded by slampoud

A belated post on what we climbed during last year's trip to Greece.

The trip basically had two parts. In the first part we went to Kalamitsi, a beach in Chalkidiki where my parents have a tiny cabin. I figured, since the rock there is granite, we should be able to climb, or at least boulder some. But what I discovered was that the quality of the rock wasn't nearly as good as I remembered, and the salt and sand surrounding it didn't make things too easy either.

While Ben and I spent a couple days in Kalamitsi, my parents visited their boat, which they moor in Porto Koufo. I really wanted to talk them into taking us to Kartalia, the promontory at the tip of Sithonia, where I had heard there was some steep limestone climbing. It's one of my favorite places in the world, and I wanted to show it to Ben, so that, even if we couldn't figure out how to approach the climbs, it wouldn't be a waste of time. But there was quite a bit of wind, and we never went.

Instead, we noticed that the west side of the entrance to Porto Koufo is itself a steep limestone wall. We took the zodiac out and did some deep water soloing there for a couple days. We found a couple bolted routes, but they were heading into a chimney that was absolutely covered in batshit. Finally we decided that we thought we could see a nice trad line up the wall. We loaded up the zode, I rowed our asses all the way out, we anchored the zode with a hex (really!) and Ben led off. When he got maybe 15 or 20 feet up he realized things were a lot more broken than they looked from below, so he bailed. I rowed our asses back in.

Stefani and the Kakkalos refuge
Originally uploaded by slampoud

After that it was time to hit the mountains. We humped the ropes and rack, but thankfully no camping gear, to the Kakalos refuge, which is the main climbers' refuge on the Oropedio Mouson. We went up Anathema, which is a slightly steeper route than the alternative, and it was a bitch! Of course, in my current condition I couldn't even do an hour of that hike, let alone with a pack, so I marvel, in retrospect, at the fact that I made it.

The people at the refuge were amazing, and a good reason to go back, by themselves. I had printed some beta from routes.gr, but these guys were real connoisseurs of the surrounding climbs, and had lots of additional beta to share, so that worked out really well.

The next day we climbed the Comici/Escher route, which was the first technical route ever to be climbed on Stefani. It was ridiculously easy, probably 5.3 at most, but worth doing, since we really had no feel for route finding or the quality of the rock on Olympus. We realized that the challenge in the easier routes is really not the moves, but rather rockfall. The moves on easy routes in this type of chossy limestone are, in fact, quite boring. There are tons of incut edges, and you're always facing the rock and moving up like a crab. It's nothing like climbing granite, where, aside from slab climbing, every single move is different, even at low difficulty grades.

Halfway up Stefani
Originally uploaded by slampoud

The next day we were looking for more of a challenge, so we asked around and the guys pointed us to Ahladi, another route on the front side of Stefani, to the left of C/E. We got to the base and decided to solo the first & last pitches, since using the rope just dislodged pebbles and pissed us off. I led the second and fourth pitches, and Ben led the third. Ben managed to place gear in such annoying places that I was cursing for the most part on the pitch that I followed, and I had to leave a hex behind. The most memorable part of the climb was definitely the fourth pitch, which involves a really neat traverse. Apparently people call it "the pilgrimage", because beginners often get scared and gripped, and find themselves groveling across the ledge instead of walking a little lower and keeping their hands high on the ledge. In any event, it was easy but more memorable than the rest of the choss. Ahladi was tons and tons of fun, but definitely not a challenge.

We had originally discussed also climbing Mati, a route on the other side of Stefani that day, but Ben was feeling very "accomplished", so we went back to the refuge and chilled while watching a couple of the guys open a new route on Stefani through binoculars. The next day we descended, this time via the Zonaria and the Zolotas refuge. My knees were killing me and the whole thing was abso-fucking-lutely miserable. And that was it for climbing in Greece.

Let's celebrate!

Today I went out to San Ysidro with Theresa and Jamilah. We threw a toprope on Oranguhang, the stuff to the right and the stuff to the left of it. For me this was primarily an opportunity to test my new shoulder. It seems to have held, but we'll know for sure tomorrow. It was so nice to get out!

Oh how the mighty have fallen

Being injured sucks so much. I am an endless fountain of complaints.

I went out to New Jack City this weekend, mostly to get out of Santa Barbara and see my sport climbing friends. I climbed two 5.8's that are usually my lead warmups, and onsighted an easy 9. The shoulder isn't that painful anymore so it was really hard to stay off the rock, but the experience of re-tearing the rotator cuff in March was enough to deter me.

I also got to meet Jack, the guy who set all the routes and after whom the place is named. He gave us the unofficial news that the BLM is planning on developing the site for R.V. camping, so they're putting in a proper road, campsites and toilets. And then, after a while, they're opening the canyon to windfarm development. Apparently, even though it's not optimally located for that, the fact that it's remote, hence the wind turbines won't ruin anybody's view, is a big draw to developers. So NJC will be temporarily closed to climbers during the campsite development, and then maybe again, possibly permanently, for the wind development, if they decide to do it right by the crags. The temporary closure nobody cares about anyway, since it's about to get hotter than hell in the middle of the Mojave, so climbing won't be possible again until September. The wind thing I just don't see. Who would put a turbine at the base of a chossy cliff?

By the way, Jack is a real character! I got into a conversation with him where I was defending NJC from the term "chosspile", which I've seen climbing mags using for it. But we ended up disagreeing, since he embraces that term wholeheartedly. He's all in favor of developing sport routes in chossy areas. His reasons are that good rock is usually not steep enough for his tastes, and I think he also finds it a little uninteresting if little bits aren't raining on him. I think of myself as primarily a trad climber, so the notion of chossiness goes hand in hand with the potential for gear pulling. From the sport route developer's perspective, though, that's not a consideration. NJC is supremely safely bolted. I watched Jack dance up a 12 and then heckle his girlfriend up the same climb, and I have to say, it was better than TV, better than the movies. A real character, I tell you!

Testing the TR-solo rig

Things have been quiet around here, since I re-injured my shoulder just over three weeks ago and haven't been climbing at all. I'm silently screaming in frustration.

On Saturday I ventured out, with a new climbing partner about whom I'm really excited, and checked out the Gibraltar area. We wanted to play on Lower Gibraltar, but there were people already climbing there. We checked out Gibraltar Rock, but the South face TR's were already occupied. We went up to Toxic Waste Wall, but the rock quality sketched us out -- it got badly fried in last year's fire. So we ended up at Crag Full o' BoomBoom, where Michelle led everything in style. It was chill. I TRed Tuco, and it didn't feel that great, which made me a little sad.

Yesterday I was going stir crazy dealing with work, so I decided to pop up to Lower Gibraltar and test my TR-solo system.

Before I get into my current system, here's a little about my first attempt about a month ago. I originally thought that I could TR-solo with my guide in autoblock mode + a prussik backup. I've used this setup before in low 5th class terrain (gullies) when a rope was stuck or there was some other reason why I needed to go back up to my anchor. But when I tried to use it at Lower Gibraltar, which is a reasonably steep dihedral and a steep face left of it, I realized a couple things. First of all, I shouldn't have used both strands of the rope. In fact I didn't need to, because the rope was fixed at the anchor, so I could've used just one. That was just operator error on my part. Second, since the rope obviously does not feed freely through the guide, the loop of rope that accumulates above the guide is a real problem. I kept stepping on the rope and getting tangled up. This is a problem with both a single and a double strand setup. I hadn't noticed it before on the low angle terrain, but in the steep terrain it was a definite issue. Third, the weight of the rope loop makes feeding it through the guide really hard, sometimes requiring both hands. The prussik was actually the most pleasant part of this system...

So my original plan wasn't going to work. I studied ascender devices and TR-solo resources, and decided the device I wanted to use was Petzl's microcender. I wanted a device that didn't have sharp teeth in the camming section, and that could, ideally, be used for other tasks as well, but would be primarily for TR-solo and should be bombproof for that. The microcender fit the bill, can also be used for hauling, and it weighs about half as much as the alternatives. That probably means it'll wear out twice as fast, but that remains to be seen. Note that it's not indicated for lead-solo or even TR falls with slack in the rope. I think it's meant to work best on fixed, static lines, but it seems like a lot of people use it on their regular dynamic ropes. It's a gorgeous little device, that's very simple to set up and break down.

At first my plan was to have the microcender set up on my belay loop, on one strand, and a prussik backup going to my belay loop, at eye level, either on the same strand or the other strand. When I set that up I realized that the prussik was now the annoyance in the system, because it was impacting how the rope was feeding into the microcender, and also the loop it made was flopping around, threatening to get tangled up with the microcender. I'm especially aware of the possibility of something snagging the microcender's handle and keeping it from doing its job, so having a sling flopping around in the vicinity was a definite no no.

After tying in short, setting up the system and taking a bunch of test falls on the microcender I was ready to trust it alone. I knew that the rope has to be weighted a little in order to feed through the microcender by itself, but I didn't know how much. The pitch I was climbing is only about 1/4 length of rope up, so I piled the loose rope at the bottom of the climb onto the end, hoping that the weight of half the 10mm rope would be sufficient. For the first half of the climb, it wasn't, so I had to occasionally help the rope through the device. I could do that single-handed so it wasn't a big hindrance on 5.8 terrain. For the second half of the climb the weight was enough and the rope fed through just fine. People have suggested using a quart sized water bottle as a weight, or fixing the line on the ground, both of which are great ideas if you're planning to return to the ground. I was climbing at a place where you rap down from your anchor to climb, so I wanted to be able to pull up the rope behind me with no snags.

I have come up with only one way to switch from microcender-belay to rappelling with my guide at the top of the climb (I wanted to do one more lap, so I was headed back down). That is to tie directly into the anchor, unweight and remove the microcender, then set up the guide for rap. It seems like there should be some way to go directly from the microcender to the guide, but I don't see what that is. If I set up the guide below the microcender, there is no way to remove the microcender because it's loaded (it's not like a grigri, where the lever unloads the cam). So I need a point of leverage above the microcender to load my weight onto. Setting up the guide above the microcender is obviously not an option, since my weight is on the rope. Thus it seems that the only way to switch to rapelling is to offload to a point (anchor or prussik) above the microcender, remove the microcender, then set up the rappel. Interesting...

In summary the system seems to work. I'm not entirely happy about using a single device. A possibly better setup would be to have one microcender at chest level and one at the belay loop, similar to Steph Davis' setup (except she uses mini-traxions, which have sharp teeth). On this test day I didn't really enjoy myself climbing, both because I was stressed out by all this rigging, but also because my shoulder is completely messed up. Time will tell if knowing how to set this up will enable some fun for me in the future, or whether it will prove too stressful to use regularly. They say that roped soloing is another level again in the mind game that is climbing, and I agree. My stomach was in knots both times I worked on this stuff. I don't even try something unless I've spent hours researching it and mentally working it out, and, despite that confidence that I have the principles fully in command, it's stressful to tie in for a TR-solo. We'll see how it feels next time...

Update: My friend Rick has written a blogpost, adding his observations to my thoughts on roped-soloing.

Riverside Quarry

I've been dying to go to the Riverside Quarry, since everyone I know raves about it. The opportunity presented itself this weekend, when a bunch of the San Diego folks were planning to drive up, so I ditched family (who knows what I owe for that?) and drove down. It's about a 2.5 hour drive, if you don't get lost getting off the 101 to the 60 ;-)

The location is a man-made abandoned granite quarry. There is shade in the morning and sun in the afternoon. The invitation said only those comfortable leading 5.10s need apply. That, technically, is a sticking point for me, as I can only reliably lead 10a without falls, but the other attendees were friends, so they overlooked my shortcomings.

One of the fun aspects of the day is that we got to watch the main developer of the area set a bunch of routes. Apparently there was a section of rock that already had routes on it, but that was a little loose, so they rapped from above, pried it loose with crowbars and dropped the loose section. There was a lot of debris! So while we were there climbing, this route setter was on rap from above cleaning the rock, chipping holds and bolting. Very interesting!

We warmed up on a 5.10b, followed by a 10d, another 10b, two rounds on one 11a and another 11a, all on toprope, for me. I flailed on everything but the 10d, which I cruised and everyone else fell on. Wtf? It was awkward and balancey, which I guess must be my style. Either way, it was a very very fun day of pushing my limits, and I can't wait to go back.

On the minus side, I'm starting to be not that fond of my women's mythos. They seem to have a thicker sole than my old men's pair had, and as a result they don't feel very sensitive.

Matilija Wall

This picture is taken from the junction of Hwy 33 and S Matilija Rd, i.e. the road to the Matilija Hot Springs/Sanctuary.



And here's the google maps satellite view. It's the thingy casting a really big shadow in the center of the map.


View Larger Map

Friends tell me that this is the Matilija Wall. Apparently the most famous route on it is the 5.9 Chouinard-Bossier about which there is some information here. There used to be access via a small road called Camino Cielo, but that's been blocked by a private land owner. The approach from the dam is apparently choked in poison oak. We'll have to figure out some way to get there...