Now that I’ve led Trapped Like a Rat and Pink Laurel on the same day, I’ve decided that not only is TLR the hardest seven at the Gunks; it’s the hardest nine<\/i> at the Gunks.<\/p>\n
TLR is slimy. It’s a dark corner that tends to stay wet after a rain but today it’s more slick than actually wet. The smears feel terrible, every hold is less bomber than it should be. I waver and waffle and go up and down a couple of times but utlimately get it cleanly. At least the roof never bothers me much anymore. Of course, I’m the only one who feels that way. Michelle following me has trouble at the roof, not at the start. I wonder if they’d all feel differently if they were leading it.<\/p>\n
Then Michelle does a fine job of leading Rhododendron and I promise to take her farther away from the Uberfall today and get as far as Pink Laurel before breaking that promise. Well, Pink Laurel is a fine route and I’m a leading machine. I do it to prove I don’t mind doing it. <\/p>\n
I warn her I’ll be going up to the cave before putting in gear, then teeter my way up the opening moves. I know I have to solo them, but I don’t have to like it. Then the cave and the solace of a finely placed cam.<\/p>\n
I swear it was the red cam, but it won’t go in today. Maybe it was his<\/i> red cam, the HB one. What would that be equivalent to in Camalots? It’s a great piece. Todd knows just how it goes. But Todd’s not here (and if he were, he’d probably be leading this, not me), so I’m going to have to figure it out on my own. It’s not like I’ve never placed gear before. <\/p>\n
I stop obsessing over what color cam he’s told me to place in the past and place the cam that fits. Then I obsess over whether to clip it short or long. Short because I might fall on it; long because it’s under a roof. I’ve fallen on this piece and I can’t remember how I clipped it. That shows you what happens when someone’s telling you what to place and how. <\/p>\n
I decide to clip it long. I think I’ve probably clipped it short before but you can’t really go wrong with long and I know I’m going to step up and put another piece in right away. I pull through the moves to escape from the cave and they feel more straightforward than they usually do. I find the hole for my left hand and go about the business of placing a nut.<\/p>\n
I don’t love the nut placement here. It’s one of those where “you can see the whole nut” as I sometimes say. I like the nut to be a little behind something, not having complete faith in those ones that are held in only by the taper. They’re so easily kicked out unless you set them hard and it’s always the worst stances where you want the best nut. So you tread that fine line between really setting the nut hard and risking toppling over backwards when it comes out in your hand.<\/p>\n
In the past there’s been a fixed nut here. On my first attempt, the unsucessful one, I clipped the fixed nut but wanted one of my own too. By the second time (the sucessful one), the fixed nut was gone and I placed two nuts of my own. Today I place one and call it good. I’m tempted to hang on it. Even with the hole for your hand, it’s a pumpy stance. <\/p>\n
I’m tired and nervous but I’ve got a piece in and the least I can do is step up, so I do. I look for the feet that are there on my good days, not rushing anything, make another move and find a stance good enough to place from and do. Another move and I’m done. I shout out “woo hoo” and something about being Superwoman and run through the rest of the route.<\/p>\n
The belay ledge is a madhouse. I build my own anchor away from the bolts and bring up Michelle. The good part about climbing with a beginner is they fall on your hard leads. The bad part is they don’t know when to say “nice lead.” But she says “nice route” and that’s good enough. <\/p>\n
Once the masses on the ledge go up or down as they desire, the way is clear for her to lead the second pitch of Jackie\/Classic, which she does in fine style. I tell her “nice lead” then notice that out of an entire forest (c.f. rec.climbing and blueberry bushes) she’s chosen to attach herself solely to a baby tree about two and a half inches in diameter. “Michelle,” I say, “have you anchored yourself to the smallest<\/i> tree on the cliff?” She blushes and says she was hoping I wouldn’t notice, so at least she figured it out herself.<\/p>\n
We get all the way to the hairpin before I bail on my stated purpose of going to the Mac Wall. I look up and think I see Shockley’s free. It turns out I’m wrong but Strictly is free so I take that one.<\/p>\n
I’m nervous about the gear at the crux because a couple of people have told me that the placement seems to have changed this year, like something must have shifted or expanded over the winter. I’m hoping I can find a good piece because there was an accident here a couple of years ago and I don’t want to be involved in the next one.<\/p>\n
That’s my excuse for not checking to see if Michelle was tied in or not. Luckily, as it will turn out, she was. I’m glad she was listening.<\/p>\n
I place very little gear on my way to the crux, too concerned that I won’t have exactly what I need when I get there. Once the crux is in sight, I start cramming in gear like mad. The result is possibly the most over-protected ascent of Strictly from Nowhere on record. At the crux, it turns out that Todd’s new gear beta works beautifully. I slide a nut in and love it. Nothing to worry about, I pull through to the bolts at top speed.<\/p>\n
I guess I have a short 60 meter rope. And I’m worried about Michelle a little, so I put a piece in above the bolts, so she won’t be looking at a bad swing if she comes off on one of those last moves. My line seems as straight as it can be, so I can’t blame that. But whatever it is, I don’t make it back down to the ground. When I’m fifteen or so feet shy, Michelle tells me she’s run out of the rope. This is the part where I realize how stupid I was not to check that she was tied in. I know<\/i> Strictly is a rope stretcher. This is also the part where I’m eminently grateful that she tied in without my checking on her. Or I’d be in a hospital about now.<\/p>\n
So I climb back up to the ledge and belay her from there. This causes a lot of confusion with the next party to arrive. They don’t seem able to understand that once the line is straightened out we’ll be able to hit the ground with one rope. Finally I tell them we’ll be doing a two rope rappel. Where the second rope will magically appear from, I don’t know, but it quiets them down. <\/p>\n
Finally we make it to the Mac wall where someone talks me into doing Something Interesting up to the Higher Stannard belay. This is supposedly legal, according to certain postings on gunks.com, but its legality is apparently not well known. Everyone who walks by has a nasty word about closures and bird attacks. I find myself explaining my position mid-move, more concerned with the people below me than the moves above me. The route feels easy enough today, even the crux, but I’m sorry I ever got on it by the time I get off. I don’t like feeling like a villian. <\/p>\n
The traverse to the Higher Stannard anchor is simple and TR’ing Higher Stannard is interesting. I try to imagine myself leading the route and it’s not that hard to do. I could lead this. Maybe.<\/p>\n
Trapped Like a Rat (Dawn)
Rhododendron (Michelle)
Pink Laurel (Dawn)
Jackie (P2: Michelle)
Strictly from Nowhere (Dawn)
Something Interesting (P1: Dawn)
Higher Stanndard (TR)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Now that I’ve led Trapped Like a Rat and Pink Laurel on the same day, I’ve decided that not only is TLR the hardest seven at the Gunks; it’s the hardest nine at the Gunks. TLR is slimy. It’s a dark corner that tends to stay wet after a rain but today it’s more slick… Read more »<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-153","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-gunks"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dawnalguard.com\/climbing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/153","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dawnalguard.com\/climbing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dawnalguard.com\/climbing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dawnalguard.com\/climbing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dawnalguard.com\/climbing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=153"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dawnalguard.com\/climbing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/153\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dawnalguard.com\/climbing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=153"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dawnalguard.com\/climbing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=153"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dawnalguard.com\/climbing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=153"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}