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jambalaya
Jun 21, 2014, 4:28 PM
Post #1 of 13
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Registered: Apr 24, 2011
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Check it out:
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/2062866359/a-climbers-guide-to-smoke-hole-canyon-west-virgini
Smoke Hole Canyon and its surrounding crags provide limitless potential for sport and trad routes in a peaceful, yet surprisingly accessible, setting. Currently, routes range from 5.5-5.13+, but you may never hear of any of these without the climbing community's support. Please consider a pledge of support! And don't forget to spread the word!
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satch
Jun 23, 2014, 9:02 PM
Post #2 of 13
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Registered: Mar 28, 2005
Posts: 94
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I supported it. Can you tell us more about Smoke Hole?
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roninthorne
Jun 24, 2014, 9:23 PM
Post #3 of 13
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Registered: Nov 27, 2002
Posts: 659
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Seneca Rocks and Germany Valley are an important cornerstone of West Virginia climbing history, prior to the discovery and development of New River Gorge.
Pioneers who would go on to define outdoor sports in America came to explore and discover Seneca, and in time spread out from there through the assortment of rock that surrounds those inspiring fins of stone.
To the East, North Fork Mountain rises in a green wall, lined with cliffs of varying height and quality, and signs of vertical passage can be found; the tattered sling, ring pins and pitons, broken flakes and leveled bases overgrown in green brier. The setting, perched high above Germany Valley, with the Allegheny Front rising before you, is among the most beautiful locations in the United States.
Ten miles east of these cliffs hides a garden gem of climbing and natural beauty, carved by the South Branch of the Potomac River from the bedrock and folds of the Alleghenies, framed by the steep ridges of Cave, Middle and North Fork Mountains. Pins and pitons, fading webbing and anecdotal evidence give proof that the early explorers came this way as well.
This is Smoke Hole Canyon.
The character and features of Smoke Hole are as varied as its inhabitants. For the wealth of history alone, natural and man-made, Smoke Hole is a treasure. Like Germany Valley, home of climbing landmarks Seneca Rocks, Smoke Hole Canyon also offers a surprising array of opportunities for recreation and adventure.
Breathtaking views and quiet solitude wait for the visitor who wanders down one of Smoke Hole’s many trails and old roads, through soaring hardwood forests and gardens of ferns, past groves of cedar and pine and open mountain meadows and along fossil-strewn rivers and creeks.
From Smoke Hole, the scenic and historic North Fork Mountain Trail can be accessed via four different trailheads. Single track enthusiasts can enjoy the trail from its juncture with FS 79 north to the final steep downhill at the northern terminus of the trail, just a half mile from Route 28/55.
From the canyon‘s mouth just north of the town of Upper Tract, Petersburg is a rewarding weekend’s journey away for the paddling enthusiast. Heavier rains and deeper waters convert this quiet river into an adventure worth remembering for even expert boaters.
Smoke Hole may be one of the best-kept open secrets in West Virginia. In an age of massive social media, instant internet rumor and on-demand beta, the canyon has always been something of an enigma; minutes from the main road, less than an hour from the tourist magnet of Seneca Rocks, marked by the blazing banner-in-the-sky of Cave Mountain’s limestone cliff band, with 40-80 foot cliffs lining the entrance and 300-foot Eagle Rock sitting five minute’s hike from the car, above the cool waters and numerous campsites and swimming holes of the South Branch of the Potomac River… and somehow, the canyon remained a place where few paddlers or peddlers explored and almost no one climbed.
The dramatic nature of the canyon’s cliffs and steep ridges, the incredible and visible variety of wildlife, and the wilderness feeling of a place just off the beaten path seems to invite a lot of superlatives from visiting climbers; some have counted these scattered crags and routes among the best climbs in their lives… others have cursed the approaches, moisture and sandy holds, venomous snakes, voracious insects and loose hillsides, vowing never to return… only to return.
One climber’s hell is another’s heaven, and pain can become a sweet addiction in search of something different.
Smoke Hole offers escape from the crush of better-known crags, a satisfying variety of styles and formations, with a number of moderate routes for the beginning to moderate leader and more than enough challenges for serious technical climbers.
This guidebook is intended solely as a personal record of rock climbing and route development in the tiny corner of Heaven known as Smoke Hole Canyon, and elsewhere in Pendleton County, West Virginia. It cannot and was never meant to be considered a comprehensive or exhaustive work…
After all, we’re still out there, finding and climbing new things.
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roninthorne
Jun 28, 2014, 12:02 PM
Post #5 of 13
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Registered: Nov 27, 2002
Posts: 659
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Hey, Kids, check it out: we reached 50% of our goal of $8,000 dollars to publish the new Smoke Hole Guide Book, but there are names that I have not yet seen on the pledge list, and I know every one of you who lives in the southeast is as excited about a Smoke Hole Guidebook as I am.
So please, I know life is busy, but take a minute right now to pledge your support and help us finish the funding. Tell a friend, text the gym, whatever it takes, but let's keep the incredible energy of raising over $4,000 in a week rolling, and get this thing to press.
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/2062866359/a-climbers-guide-to-smoke-hole-canyon-west-virgini
Remember that the guide not only helps new climbers find more than just few routes of Franklin, it will also pay for new anchors and bolts, and help to fund future Trail Daze at all the crags inside the book: Franklin, Reed's Creek, and Smoke Hole.
We've come so far... let's finish this thing and get back to the crags!
Mike
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johnjhuber
Jul 2, 2014, 1:59 AM
Post #6 of 13
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Registered: Jun 6, 2010
Posts: 1
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Would like to support if it is a place I might go to. Could someone put up a map with where it is.
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roninthorne
Jul 7, 2014, 9:46 AM
Post #9 of 13
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Registered: Nov 27, 2002
Posts: 659
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Well, we're down to it.... crunch time.
Twelve days to go, and we still need 32% of our funding to make this bird fly.
But we can do this.
I'm willing to bet that each and every one of us knows one person who would or could support this project, someone who has been on vacation, on the road, or out of town.
Now is the time to reach out to those last few numbers. I've been in touch with a number of the gyms and climbing clubs in the area, and I encourage all of you to post this address on your gym's white board or online message board. Spread this link to every single email and news source you can think of, and rest assured that I am doing the same.
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/2062866359/a-climbers-guide-to-smoke-hole-canyon-west-virgini
Thanks again to all the backers I ran into and heard from this holiday weekend... your energy and excitement is contagious, and it was great meeting and chatting with you all.
Climb on
Mike
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roninthorne
Jul 8, 2014, 11:57 PM
Post #10 of 13
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Registered: Nov 27, 2002
Posts: 659
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So very grateful, and EXCITED!
Comment
For all our new backers, for the folks who have increased their pledges and brought others onboard, for the friends who have stepped up to truly support an idea they nurtured, to my incredible family; mother, father, and my amazing wife, who has done her best to keep me sane through the process (well, she did try...).
We stand at 82% of our $8,000 goal: $6,615!
Now I am offering the same challenge to all of our new pledges. You heard about the project from someone... now who do you know that would love to pre-order a new guidebook to over 250 lines, trad, sport, and mixed, from 5.5 to 5.13+, save $10 on the shipping and handling, and in the process help replace worn anchors and support future trail work and community events?
Right now I will up the ante as well- anyone who increases their pledge to $100 between now and the end of the project will be invited to join us for a catered weekend of climbing, camping, community and discovery this fall, again during the holidays when the guidebooks are delivered from the printer, and again next spring. You will receive an additional signed guidebook, a Smoke Hole Canyon T-shirt, and you will be listed on the Smoke Hole webpage and on my blog, Ronin's Road.
This reward is extended to all of you who have already pledged over $100, btw... just another way to say "Thanks".
We are soooooooo close.... let's keep the momentum going!
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roninthorne
Jul 13, 2014, 4:23 PM
Post #11 of 13
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Registered: Nov 27, 2002
Posts: 659
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Made the goal with a week to spare.
Thanks to all the pledges.
Guidebook due from the printer Nov-Dec 2014
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roninthorne
Aug 25, 2014, 1:50 AM
Post #12 of 13
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Registered: Nov 27, 2002
Posts: 659
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Publisher's proof inbound, T-shirt designs on the way to production, mixed bag of 50 bolts, hangers and anchors supplied to local activists courtesy of PHAR/UP.
Next trail work weekend- Hallowe'en.
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roninthorne
Nov 23, 2014, 12:56 PM
Post #13 of 13
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Registered: Nov 27, 2002
Posts: 659
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The new Smoke Hole Canyon guide books are being mailed out this week, again, as they were last week, along with PHAR/UP Smoke Hole ROCKS t-shirts.
If you missed the Kickstarter campaign, you may be out of luck, getting either one. This author decided that West Virginia already had one guidebook published and nationally distributed that included a troubled access crag. The author and climbing shop made money and the climbing community was left to pay for and clean up the mess.
I'll leave that kind of thing to the folks in Meadow River.
So, for now, the only people getting their hands on the guide will be the people who pre-ordered by backing the Kickstarter campaign.
Want that to change?
Tell your Access advocates and affiliates that it is time to stop sitting on the fence about Franklin Gorge.
Tell them "don't ask, don't tell" doesn't work... they apparently haven't worked that out, yet.
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