Sunday, September 5, 2010

Made to order













Kelsey Duncan and I headed up 
to the pass this early weekend to take care of some business. Kelsey is about to getballs deep in his art/work/homelife and I might be taking off to NY to build a house until mid Nov. We bolted a route on this undeveloped dome in the lower crystal theater a little over a year ago and hadn't been back. We drove up a nice logging road and found a new sweet place to camp, made a fire pit and set in on beers and making some burritos. Temps were perfect and we passed out late after meandering around some boulders in the dark. The morning greeted us with some semi rainy looking clouds, amazing breeze. coffee, burritos, cig, climb. I even found a crystal when I was poopin! cool-
Crystal castles 512c follows a barely there looking set of features for 80' and then climbs another 40' of run out slab to the top. It climbs a lot like limestone, very technical and footwork dependent.  We went to the top to rap over and clean/chalk and re-sus the line for redpoint goes. As we rapped off there was a huge swarm of honey bees living in a pocket adjacent to the route.  Sketch. There is also a really sweet Fir tree and a nice rock to chill at below the route. Especially since its south facing. The clouds started in and Kelsey tied in, fell, worked it out and lowered. By now the clouds had passed so I cracked a beer and rolled a cig up to wait for some shade. Well, it didn't come for me and I tied up any way and sent. A cross body clip off a half pad mono was a little worry some but it all worked out and I climbed to the top. The upper slab was a bit dicer, feeling like i was hauling a boat anchor. Sweet, I untied and dropped the rope back down and scrambled off. 
-another beer-n-cig, and the clouds came back, but dark very dark. So K-bone tied in and started up. Through the first crux, it started raining a little, shit dude send it, fuck off rain. And indeed the rain fuked off enough so K-bone could send by the skin of his teeth. And we were happy. But Then it did start raining hard so I rushed up amidst the thunder and lightening and rain, on top of the dome, reveling in my stupidity and the danger. Rapped super quick and then the storm had passed and we rejoiced with beers in hand and packed up and enjoyed the sun.

ThEn----We headed down the way just a bit and climbed the eagles Brood a nice 512 boulder crack boulder problem that is thin hands/overhanging and right slanting and sick. We tapped up and got worked until we sent. Totally the bachar cracker of lolo. A Justin Peterson testpiece!
And on we went, pack up the truck and down the road and onto the highway and back to fishcreek to granite creek- To Roll Rock for some more business. 

Brometheus 12c is a 4 bolt line next to Roller girl that I talked about last week. We didn't have the gumption for it last week but today was prime. Stick clip the first bolt, boulder problem to rest to boulder problem to rest.....boulder to rest, chains. I crushed it first go. Kelsey worked out his beta and sent as well. Work.

Then we headed to Tor rock to look for kelsey's lost glasses which became un-lost.
Today's redpoints bring the total to 5-5.12 FAs this season, two 12bs and 3 12cs.

This little trip was perhaps the best of the season. The culmination of all our hard work. All we had to do was climb. No bolting, no cleaning, no bullshit. It was totally the peak of Kelsey and My partnership for the season. It was a really good run of things. One would hope that days like this are attainable at a higher frequency, but days such as these come about with undue rarity.   I've had many a satisfying day out in the woods with peeps but today was one of the best. An aim for future experiences!!.

3 comments:

  1. These 12s sound sweet, Levi. Can't wait to try Crystal Castles and the others. First order of business beginning this month is Rock Lobster, but, definitely to your new stuff after that.

    -Ken

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