chossmonkey.com Blog

The Horse and Pony Show (III 5.12a, 400 feet) was my big climbing project this fall, an effort that took several days. My friend and climbing partner Chris Van Leuven wrote a nice little story about our time on the wall for climbing.com. I haven’t gotten around to writing my own story yet, but I’ll get to it eventually. In the meantime, check out CVL’s article, it’s a humorous and only slightly serious story about our adventure.

Climbing the incredible 140+ foot second pitch (5.11b) of the Horse and Pony Show.

Drilling away at our project.
After a busy fall, life is starting to feel more mellow now and I find myself spending more time reading books by the fire and surfing the net. It wasn’t that long ago that we finally finished our project, The Horse and Pony Show, a 400-foot 5-pitch 5.12a in Glenwood Canyon. It took several days of effort; cleaning loose rock, brushing holds, drilling bolts and redpointing the pitches. I had a great time establishing this route and I’m hungry to do more of long route development.

I’ll write a full story when I get a chance and the way this winter is going, it should be soon.

I’ve been busy on the choss lately. Yesterday we spent the day pioneering a new 500-foot route on a big face in Glenwood Canyon. I think it will turn out to be a great route with good, solid rock that is well-protected. It won’t even qualify as a “choss route” except for the fact that it’s on the same face as a few other local choss classics. The classic quote from the day came from the approach, which was pretty adventurous in itself, “I just want to get away from this f#%*ing death.” More on that later.

A couple weekends ago I climbed a big, mega-choss, mega-classic route in Glenwood Canyon, The International. The FA was done by Michael Kennedy and Harvey Carter and the FFA was by Kennedy and Jeff Lowe. We felt like we were walking in the footsteps of giants, so to speak, although trembling and crawling was also invovled. Anyway, it is possible we did the second continuous, free ascent of the route and we wrote a little article about our adventure for climbing.com. Check it out.

Oh, my wife, my sweet beloved wife. She’s a climber and rock solid but she doesn’t like climbing new routes. She likes the nice, friendly, clean routes. And, I don’t blame her one bit. So, it was with great excitement that I persuaded her to meet me at one of my latest “project” crags for a first ascent party. I had prepped, cleaned, bolted and sussed four routes and started on a few others. On Friday afternoon, she scooted out after work to the latest crag, affectionately known as the Quartzite Wasteland for some belay duty and climbing on my new routes.

Charcoal Burger Daydream

We started out on a fun, juggy 5.7 arete. I didn’t spend a lot of time climbing it so she wasn’t super impressed. Okay, I thought, hopefully the next one will make up for it. Unfortunately, the next one also wasn’t super clean and it was a lot harder, about mid-5.11, maybe harder. I blew my first attempt at the send but quickly lowered and went back up for a second go. When it was her time I was nervous because for me (6′2″) the crux move is a desperately long reach from a large pinch. I wasn’t sure how she (5′5″) would do and if she would just scold me for putting up a “tall man’s climb.” Instead, she had a great time and spent time working out her own sequence.

El Lagarto Borracho

Next up, were two long routes, both 100 feet with a good mix of gear and bolts. I’m always nervous about what other people will think of my “projects.” I mean, what if they suck and they end up being a waste of time, bolts, and cleaning? And, considering that my wife handles our checkbook you could see about 100 dollars of bolts in that cliff, I was a little nervous about my “spending habits.” Thankfully, I sent each and both got the big stamp of approval from my wife, and “three stars” at that! Of course, I didn’t ask her if it was 3 out of 10 or 3 out of 4, but I’ll assume it was the latter. And, she helped me name the routes, which is always the hardest part: Interstate Love Song, Twig and Berries, Charcoal Burger Daydream, and El Lagarto Borracho (”The Drunken Lizard). With those routes completed, it brought my FA total for the year to 14. Can’t wait to share this area with others and will try to do so soon! (Need to work on a better approach.)
Afterwards, we gobbled up burgers, fries, and shakes from the Charcoal Burger (hence, the name) with dirty hands, completing one of my favorite date nights ever!

Chris models the latest in climbing fashion, the climbing scarf. This is such a new trend you won’t even find it in a Patagonia catalog.

Glenwood Canyon, 13 miles of glorious, towering walls of choss. With a free Saturday, what’s a couple of guys to do?

Chris and I unexpectedly found ourselves at the Grizzly Creek trailhead, shouldering packs for the march in to The Mudwall, a 700-foot quartzite wall with a long, but brief history. We started up Bear Paw, an old Layton Kor/Larry Dalke line. The first 100+ feet were less than inspiring and the next section looked equally unappealing. We had nothing to go by but an old black and white photo with a big, fat line drawn in. Hence, it didn’t take much convincing to explore some other possibilities.

Chris starts up Bear Paw.

A beautiful quartzite face swept across the wall to the right of Bear Paw. I led out from the belay, placing cams in Fishers Towers-esque rock, traversing up and right gently. Chris and I laughed at my placement of “dirt cams” – take a cam, shove it in a dirty horizontal seam and move the cam back and forth, removing the dirt, and then grab the next size or two bigger to leave as protection. I start to curse myself at one point for cleaning out too much dirt because my biggest cam was no longer big enough, then stop when common sense reminds me that dirt doesn’t hold cams. Once situated on a good ledge I drilled an anchor and we lowered, to begin the process of cleaning.

With a toprope lap each we were able to clean the route, figure out the gear and place five bolts in the upper face. I had a hard time freeing the upper moves on toprope and my stomach sank at the thought of leading it. Chris dispatched the first ascent coolly, methodically working his way through the various cruxes and heady runouts, only giving a couple of sharp, loud grunts as a demonstration of his effort at the crux. I knew I had to try it now, even though I was still unsure of the upper crux.

Chris leads the first ascent of Orangina 5.11c PG-13, 115 feet.

After tying in, I climb the start of the route which is moderate climbing protected by medium-sized cams placed in deep horizontals. At 30 or 40 feet the route steepens and the gear gets tricky. Here, Chris and I placed “nests” of small cams in horizontals that were sometimes quite shallow. This second part of the climb involves small runouts above these nests of small gear, taxing the mind more than the body. I breath heavy and concentrate on the moves in front of me. Hopefully the gear will hold a fall and hopefully a fall wouldn’t be too bad, but I don’t want to find out about either. Halfway up the pitch, a yellow Metolius cam in a shall horizontal protects some committing moves that probably check in at 5.9 or 5.10. It’s one of those cases where it’s hard to say how hard the moves are because you know you don’t want to fall on that stupid little cam. With my feet a good 5 to 10 feet above that yellow Metolius I reach a small roof where two bomber cams are placed in a horizontal. There, I can finally breathe a sigh of relief because as Chris says, “now you know you’re not going to die!”

After pulling the roof, I find myself at the base of the steep face protected by 5 bolts. Calcite has coated this section of face and has formed weird but positive edges to grasp. At every bolt there is a crux and even though this section is bolted, it is clear that you’re not at an ordinary sport crag. Thought provoking and committing moves are encountered at and above each bolt and with each clip of the rope through the draw I breathe heavy and feel a step closer to success. The crux of the climb comes at the fourth bolt, where the holds get small and a deceptive and technical move to the left is required. This is where I had a hard time on toprope but I try to block out those memories. Chris yells encouragement and some helpful beta. I delicately shift my feet, setting up for the move. No matter how I change the position of my fingers the holds won’t get any bigger. Finally I commit to the small crimpers and smear my feet on the rough calcite. With every muscle in my body tensioned I make the move to a good edge which feels surprisingly good, probably a result of my intense focus. Once I clip the fifth bolt I know I’ve got it in the bag and I try to slow myself down so I don’t botch the finish. After clipping the anchors, cleaning the gear, and lowering to the ground my heart is still racing and I can feel the adrenaline coursing through my veins. Ah, what a feeling! I wish I could live in this moment forever!

The start of Bear Paw, an old Layton Kor and Larry Dalke line from 1961.

The Mudwall, an endless sea of choss real estate.

Correction: I originally reported that Bear Paw was freed by Jeff Achey in 2007. Instead, it turns out he freed a new route to the far left of Bear Paw in 2007 with Tony Angeles. The route is 6 or 7 pitches and is rated 5.11b. Have at!