2007 April

Camping near the road on the Saturday night of a giant Vedauwoo kegger somewhere further in is a noisy, dusty affair. We make a note to hunt down more remote camping next time. Nevertheless, we awake to another gorgeous morning.

Today is my day to lead something wide. We park at The Nautilus and wander up to Handjacker 5.7+ and Lower Progressive 5.9+. I go for Handjacker. Never can I recall working so hard for essentially six feet of climbing. I rest on torso jams, arms and legs dangling. I fight for every inch, and leave bloody crystals in my wake. My feet are too big to heel-toe, too small to cam. I settle for thrutching until I reach the top gasping for air.

My reward is Lower Progressive on toprope, which taxes me but feels like clean strenuous climbing. I’ll admit to face climbing around the offwidth finish. I love Vedauwoo, but need a little time between spankings.

Ann and Kate make Handjacker look more civilized. The real performance, though, comes from Mark. He determines to climb it perfectly, and goes for it.

We wake up in Vedauwoo, the reward for punching through Friday night fatigue, packing the car, and meeting Kate and Mark in Wyoming. It’s well worth it. The tent never felt better, and the day greets us like a herald of summer sun and warmth. Eagerness for the day’s potential creeps in as water is boiled for morning coffee.

We head for Poland Hill, inspired by the perfect weather to climb hard. Mark and Kate start with Sugar Crack 5.7 and Little Old Crack 5.5 while Ann starts up Kim 5.6. Kim is touted as good beginner trad lead, and it does offer good protection, but the sideways lean makes it feel insecure. A difficult climb to relax on. Ann takes one rest hang to get through it, then builds an anchor for the first time on her own at the top. Everything she does is solid.

Fantasia 5.9 is the main event. Mark is psyched up to lead it. This is a sustained, vertical offwidth that was once considered the hardest crack in Vedauwoo. Combining our big gear, Mark starts up laden with giant cams and big bros. It’s a terrific gruntfest. Mark does admirably, keeps moving, passing gear from the outside of the crack to the inside with his body wedged in the mouth. At one point he asks me to take rope so he can relax for a minute - I’m not even sure if he weighted it. It’s the kind of climbing where a long fall is unlikely, but a two-inch fall can be painful and discouraging. Tension builds up. He grovels up the remainder without resting, to our cheers.

For my attempt I get on a bolted route, Piece of Dirt 5.11a. Remembering the last time we were here and did it on TR, I think I have a chance for a redpoint. I stem the moves to the first bolt, then begin to lieback the flake. The second bolt is a tough decision: clip low on dicey feet but a reasonable fall, or get into a full-tension lieback at the bolt and risk launching into the boulders below. I go for the low clip, stick it, but pop unexpectedly on the next move. Ann wasn’t expecting it either, and slams her elbow hard into a boulder while catching me. As soon as she’s convinced her elbow is okay I get back on, make the next clip, launch into the crux moves from the flake to tiny crystals, and pop off. Suddenly I remember the sequence, get back on, and do it. The rest of the thin crystal climbing goes well, if a tad shaky. I still feel undeniably high when I reach the anchors.

We spend the rest of the day toproping these two routes. My fight on Fantasia leaves me scraped up and full of respect for it. The view from Poland while kicking back in the sunshine hasn’t gotten any worse, either. Vedauwoo is here for us.

Kate got lots of great pictures.

I don’t know if these guys have heard the weather forecast of snowstorms on the way, but they seem unusually willing to let me watch them at their business of catching lots of fish. The whole pond is full of fishers, 3 herons, the pelican, ducks, and geese. I stop and watch for quite a while before heading home for my own dinner.

It’s highly questionable whether we should be rock climbing today after we drive halfway to the crag with the hatch of our Subaru open, but these things happen to everyone, right? We also forget to drop our garbage off, so it will cook in the car all day. Hmm.

The hike in to Greyrock goes better, if slowly. Lots of plants are flowering, the air is sweet, and the bugs aren’t out yet.

We decide to climb Barfy’s Favorite 5.7, to the top. The first move - one good handjam to pull off a boulder and step onto little crystals on the face - is probably the hardest on the climb. The rest of pitch 1 and 2 are easy touring up the flanks Greyrock. Pitch 3 delivers some more fun climbing and a little less protection for spice (the way I went, anyway). Pitch 4 is basically a scramble to the top. We take our time and relish the day.

At the top Mark, Kate, and Kate’s mom Chris meet us with chocolate! It doesn’t get much better than that. We hike down with them and have a celebratory meal at Coop’s to polish off the weekend.

We make it up to The Palace about the same time the rain clouds do. The river is 2 or 3 inches higher than our last crossing, and we hope a sudden downpour doesn’t raise the water level much more.

We start on Churhill Rejects 5.9+, which is now my favorite starter route here, reminiscent of an Owen’s River Gorge favorite called Nirvana. Jestor 5.10b bucks me a few times at the crux and makes me work hard for the anchor 80 feet off the ground. Ann is happy to make it up on TR, as am I on round two. I finish with a toprope on the shorter Ghost of Cedar Creek 5.11a, which I throw myself at with everything I’ve got, and manage not to fall. Great edges, edges to dream about.

The river lets us back across, before the clouds return and start to sprinkle again.

The cold, overcast morning does not encourage us to pursue our plans to do a local multipitch climb of Lover’s Leap. We go out for a leisurely breakfast, check out the now-closed crags at North Turkey Creek, realize we’ve lost our phones, and return to Dad’s where we don’t find them. We still don’t feel eager to climb, but find the pullout on 285 by Lover’s Leap. It’s still overcast, but warming up, so we decide to lug the gear up and take a look at least. (more…)

The introductory piece tonight is Tibetan Swing by Chinese composer Bright Sheng, a piece inspired by a rhythmic, whirling mountain folk dance. It’s a good mix of foreign and familiar sounds, and a nice tribute to a culture whose survival is threatened.

Next Christopher O’Riley takes the stage to play Ravel’s Piano Concerto for the Left Hand, a piece commissioned by Paul Wittgenstein, a concert pianist who lost his right arm in World War I. (He’s also the brother of the philosopher / logician Ludwig Wittgenstein, who I happen to be reading about.) O’Riley shakes hands with the conductor and first chair violinist with his left hand, already setting the mood. Watching a pianist use only one arm is unsettling. It brings thoughts of war, loss, and wounds, which the music seems to play upon. It begins low, in a murky world of despair, and makes its way steadily through the stages of grief to a final defiant, triumphant overcoming. Wittgenstein himself didn’t care for the piece at first, yet came to change his mind, and I wonder how much of this process is reflected in the piece itself.

I have more energy than usual left over for the symphony, Rachmaninoff’s Symphony No. 2 in E minor, Opus 27. To my surprise I still have trouble holding my attention on it, despite Rachmaninoff’s talent for whipping up a musical whirlwind to blow your hair back. It occurs to me that perhaps I just don’t like symphonies. Maybe I need the focus that the soloist provides in a concerto or sonata, or the conversational focus of a duet. When faced with dozens of musicians all playing well at once I just seem to float away. So I let myself float, the music drawing images out of my mind and swirling me around in them. Maybe this is the gift of a symphony, a subtle massage of the psyche that reveals the music of our own lives to us in the guise of a daydream.

We join my dad to do some car shuttling on this sunny afternoon to help us explore some more of the many trails near Dad’s house in Indian Hills. To make sure we get some uphill hiking, we park one car at the Pence Park Trailhead, and take the other down Bear Creek to the Corwina Park lot. From there we cross a bridge and search downstream Bear Creek for the trailhead, but give up and climb up the hill to the trail. (We should have walked down the road a ways to the next bridge). Bear Creek Trail is a lovely winding hike through forested hills. It’s still a little wet from recent snows, and now the strong sunshine fills the air with a glorious spring pine aroma. We pass many signed trail intersections that beg for future explorations, with names like Meadow View Loop and West Ridge Loop. We cut off the final ridge traverse to do a short, steep climb at the end, leaving us ready to recover with an afternoon coffee in Evergreen.

A few more bugs have been squished in the WordPress Geo Mashup Plugin. And I let one little feature in too:

• Feature: add geoRSS tags to feeds
• Fixed ‘geo_locations - invalid argument to foreach’ error.
• Fixed category map links when map page is front page.
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Our plan is to climb in Penitente Canyon on our way to Pagosa Springs on Ann’s birthday. We get there late, though, with just enough time to tour around a bit on foot. The canyon is has an intimate feel, with piñons and Douglas fir scattered amongst a treasure trove of interesting walls of volcanic tuff. It’s quiet. Taken with the place, we decide to return in the morning to climb.

It’s snowing hard on Wolf Creek Pass, but only lightly when we reach Penitente Canyon again. It’s not encouraging weather. I scope out conditions and get some pictures of the canyon, and we decide to give the rock a try.

Ann is excited by a good lead of The Serpent 5.8, a varied climb with slab, face, and even a bit of finger crack climbing at the top. Encouraged, she gets on the lower rated but more sustained Mr. Wind 5.7. On this one she has to fight hard not to give up and fall, or grab a quickdraw. When she finally reaches a rest she expresses the sort of relief that is unique to a challenging lead. It’s great fun to see. Charged up, we head up a side canyon to How the West Was Won 5.9, a steep route up a hueco-covered arete. The first bolt is high, but the holds are good. I have a blast on it.

Unfortunately, the light snow turns to rain at this point. It’s too wet to keep climbing. We’re disappointed, but figure we’ll come back tomorrow (which we try, but find it raining again). As a consolation, I get this sweet little video of Ann descending some wet rock. (Rated PG for strong language.)

Both us would like to return to Penitente. Most of the routes (it’s predominantly single pitch sport climbing) are harder than we’re climbing now, but it seems like there is enough protection to push the grades safely.

Another change on this trip is that Ann did all the navigating and route finding. She enjoys this, but I’ve taken it over. I hope this summer to give it back. She clearly enjoys it, despite the moments of frustration it entails.