|
|
|
|
cxy101
Sep 15, 2006, 6:43 PM
Post #1 of 7
(2135 views)
Shortcut
Registered: Aug 4, 2006
Posts: 5
|
The attempt was for Epinephrine in Red Rocks NV’s Black Velvet Canyon. Weather that day was calling for 105 degrees in downtown Vegas with a 20% chance of scattered thunder showers.
Our rack consisted of the Supertopo recommended gear with the addition of our beloved HB Offsets :D . Despite the above forecast we decided we were going to skip the tag line and go with a single 60m rope. We had two packs; A small bladder pack for the leader that carried water (~60 oz.) and a couple gu, and another larger pack that carried a larger bladder (100 oz.) our approach shoes, rain jackets, headlamps, additional gu and a couple sports bars.
The start of our day started with the Bill’s progressively more aggressive attempts at waking my ass followed by the classic “Hey the alarm clock didn’t go off, it’s 6:30”. We had intended to be hiking so we arrive at the base of the climb at sunrise (or starting the hike at sunrise, if Bill were writing this), not getting out of bed at sunrise. I’m glad he woke up, ‘cause I would have slept ‘til noon. Although a backup alarm was not part of our preparations, we did manage to pack most of our stuff before we hit the sack, though the water bottles were still empty (who needs water in the desert anyway?). After filling our water bladders we headed down for a quick stop at CharBucks for some Joe and blueberry muffins (four parts oil, 1 part…wheat?). Then off we went. Shit, which way was it to the car again? Damn casinos. Anyway, we arrived at the parking area at a little before 8. Hmm…I think I’m done with my muffin, “time to test out the wag bag!” (i.e. wrap ass in plastic bag, pop a blood vessel, tie knot, put in zip lock baggy, toss under car for later disposal. Purchased from REI to keep with the hike in, hike out theory.) We actually started hiking at 8:00, approximately 1.5 hours behind schedule.
Due to my relative inexperience with chimney climbing we decided I would do pitches 1-3 & 7-8, and Bill would to pitches 4-6 & 9-10 (as shown in Supertopo). This allowed me to lead the most protectable of the chimney pitches, minimize gear changeovers and keep a good rhythm going.
I started pitch 1 from the gully, leading through the bolts to a large ledge, then continued up the slab to the belay. Progress on this pitch was slower than expected. The sun was full on HOT by this time and I encountered considerable drag on the upper slab section. This resulted in the pull slack, climb, bitch, wipe sweat from brow, pull slack, bitch, wipe sweat, climb method I’m sure we’ve all experienced at one time or another. Protection on the upper section was good with the two bolts being well placed in the blank section
The second pitch was easy going. This is the first pitch of “chimney” climbing. I face climbed the right side which consisted of zero protection from the big ledge/chimney base to almost the top of the arête you end up on; super easy climbing. When I emerged from this “chimney” I immediately saw a bolted anchor and headed towards it, stepping back over the chimney. As I set up the anchor I kept thinking “I thought I would be able to see the main chimney from here.” When Bill got to within eye sight I questioned whether I was at the correct anchor. A quick look around a corner confirmed another anchor directly under the main chimney confirming that I was indeed at the wrong anchor. Bill quickly lead over on the gear he recovered while cleaning and I down climbed then head over and up to the correct belay stance at about the same height as the one I originally went to.
The third pitch starts out easy with no real chimney climbing, but this abruptly changes after about 25 feet. After making the move around the vertical fin I dropped the small pack off my back and allowed it to hang off the double length runner clipped to my harness and away I went. The chimney climbing was much easier than I expected and a ton O’ fun. I traversed right to the anchor, brought Bill up, and swapped the rack. As far as big gear goes, I utilized 1 #4, 2 #3s, and I think 1 #2 as well as some smaller gear.
Bill stared up the 4th pitch, after passing the first bulging flake he scooted the #4 Camalot up as far as he could then took it with him in case of future need. He placed another piece below second bulge and cruised to the next anchor and put me on belay. I now had the large pack hanging between my legs which is much, much heavier than the other pack. Bill had mentioned it was heavy before handing it off but said it wasn’t too bad since it was dragging on the rock while he climbed. I had no such luck. The angle of the chimney changes and the pack swung freely in space making my progress difficult. I recovered from a foot slip, kicked the damn bag out from between the first bulging flake and wall that it managed to chock itself into, and spilled many colorful 4 letter words before reaching the belay station. Protection on this pitch was good, take up to a number #4 Camalot.
Pitch 5 is no where near as friendly looking as the first two from a protection point of view. It flares heavily from a comfortable chimney with face hold towards the outside to a nasty looking offwidth on the inside (though there is booty there if you wish to venture in that far). Bill opted for the comfortable chimney climbing on the outside with 2 widely spaced bolts and a nut under the right side of a hollow flake and a small cam under the left side of said flake. I’d say it was about 75 feet of climbing with 2 bolts and a crappy gear placement; the remainder of the pitch has adequate protection. He continued climbing out of the chimney until he reached the very top of the pillar (passing an intermediate anchor). Again, seconding with the heavy pack proved difficult with it still swinging freely. Climbing with the pack in this configuration for these two pitches took a considerable amount of energy. Other than hauling on another line (which we didn’t have and I don’t think would have worked for this pitch), I don’t really have another solution. We later discussed attaching the long sling to the rope with a prussic knot at chest height allowing the belayer to haul the pack and the climber to keep it from snagging. At the top of the pillar it is 2:00 and if you adjust for the extra sleep we took we are only a half hour behind where we wanted to be.
Pitch 6 was rather easy, head up to the ledge or the top of the elephant’s trunk if you have a 60m rope. Bill made quick work of it.
Pitch 7 is 80 feet from the ledge the elephant’s truck sits atop and pitch 8 is 120 feet. Since we were atop the Elephant’s trunk we decided to string pitches 7 & 8 together. I’m back on lead and it is fun easy climbing through pitch seven, clip one of the anchor bolts and continue with more fun easy climbing until…”Chris, did you hear that”. “No, er, at least I’m trying not to”, as I continue climbing. Another loud rumble, “Did you hear that?!” I stopped climbing and we held the “what are our options” conversation. Since we only have one rope we were at the last real opportunity to descend with a minimum amount of gear loss. Since there were at least a half dozen more rumblings from the heavens during this conversation and the clouds coming over top of the cliff were not looking particularly friendly, we reluctantly decided to descend. Neither of us was fancying climbing in the rain, but more importantly the thought of being human lighting rods on top of the cliff during a stormy hike down was not overly inviting either.
I down climbed to pitch 7s anchor and rapped to the ledge the Elephant’s trunk sits atop. By this time the frequent thunder is accompanied by rain, although it is light rain. Bill followed me to the ledge shortly after. The next rap is the only rap we think we will not make on a single rope. After the traditional paper, rocks, scissors I begin the exploratory rap to see how far the rope goes, and look for anchor options. Once I get over the lip I can see that the rope is about 20-30 feet short of the top of the pillar. Gear on this face is scarce. I make an anchor using the first bolt and a #6 Wild Country Rock (brown?) in the only placement I can find. “Off Rappel!” and down comes Bill. Pull the rope and watch it fall into the crack on to the ledge below, rethread, rap to the ledge.
“SHIT!” The rope did a nice job of getting stuck in said crack. It is raining harder now and still thundering frequently, so out come the rain jackets. After some mild tugs and some examination we can see that we easily have at least 15 feet of rope caught in the crack. To make things peachier the stuck portion happens to be the middle of the rope. After about 30 to 40 minutes of ginger fiddling and fishing with nut tool on a double length sling we decide it's time for finger crossin’ full on yankin’. PULL, nothing. Other end, PULL, "it moved an inch!" PULL other side again, "Yeah!" It’s pretty much stopped raining by this point but the thunder has not and the clouds have made significant progress toward downtown Vegas.
The remainder of the raps went smoothly. We utilized all the intermediate anchors we came across and a slung chock stone in the middle of pitch 2. By the time we made it to the bottom of the gulley the thunder had stopped, but the clouds were extending as far as we could see.
While hiking out we decided we probably could have continued climbing few problems. But without knowing what was going on over the mountain and the fairly continuous thunder that lasted about 2 hours, we didn’t regret backing off. It just gives us another excuse to go back.
We arrived back at the car around 6:00PM. The wag bag has baked in desert oven at 100 degrees for 10 hours now. Word of advice to those of you who go this route (and I think it is a good thing, IMHO), don’t go swinging that shit around; it ain’t gonna smell like roses despite the double bagging. :shock:
|
|
|
|
|
trevzilla
Sep 15, 2006, 7:32 PM
Post #2 of 7
(2135 views)
Shortcut
Registered: Sep 24, 2004
Posts: 164
|
Good report! It brings back memories of my party having to back off of that infernal climb. Can't wait to go back and try again.
There is a post floating around on RC.com wondering if a #4 cam would be needed. Aren't you happy you had yours? I would've S$*% a brick if I didn't have one. (Two could've even been nice, although probably overkill)
Glad you got down O.K!
|
|
|
|
|
krusher4
Sep 15, 2006, 8:42 PM
Post #3 of 7
(2135 views)
Shortcut
Registered: Nov 17, 2005
Posts: 997
|
Nice! Do you have any pics to post?
|
|
|
|
|
sticky_fingers
Sep 15, 2006, 9:05 PM
Post #4 of 7
(2135 views)
Shortcut
Registered: Jun 17, 2003
Posts: 420
|
Yerkey! Good to see you made it to rc.com. Sounds like you guys had a little adventure. Maybe next time I'll join ya
|
|
|
|
|
climboard
Sep 16, 2006, 1:44 PM
Post #5 of 7
(2135 views)
Shortcut
Registered: Apr 10, 2001
Posts: 503
|
In reply to: Good report! It brings back memories of my party having to back off of that infernal climb. Can't wait to go back and try again. There is a post floating around on RC.com wondering if a #4 cam would be needed. Aren't you happy you had yours? I would've S$*% a brick if I didn't have one. (Two could've even been nice, although probably overkill) Glad you got down O.K!
We were glad we had the #4 (C4) Camalot, I believe we placed it twice. You could get by without it but we felt it was worth bringing. What we didn't need were doubles in every cam from .6-3 inches like the Supertopo recommended. With a little bit of back-cleaning we could have done it with a single set of cams. If you wanted to double up on anything I'd say bring an extra 3 inch piece.
Chris seemed less tentative about continuing but I've had a few bad experiences with thunderstorms so I was a bit more insistent about bailing. It turned out to be a fairly mild storm so we were disappointed but I think we made the right call.
I am looking forward to going back to complete this- what a wonderful route!
|
|
|
|
|
cxy101
Sep 21, 2006, 4:05 PM
Post #6 of 7
(2135 views)
Shortcut
Registered: Aug 4, 2006
Posts: 5
|
In reply to: Nice! Do you have any pics to post?
I wish we did, but the camera wasn't the first thing on our mind in the mornign. I though about it the night before, but didn't take any action on it.
As far as the #4 goes, I was happy to have it. You probably could have done with out it, but why. Just make a game of trying to dump on your partner from there on out :lol: Just try to keep away from the obvious illegal dumping :wink:
I agree with Bill in that we probably didn't need to double up on all the gear. I personally would like to have doubles in #2 also.
|
|
|
|
|
krusher4
Sep 21, 2006, 4:33 PM
Post #7 of 7
(2135 views)
Shortcut
Registered: Nov 17, 2005
Posts: 997
|
Yeah I know how that is, I love reading these things thanks for posting :D
|
|
|
|
|
|
