Little Cottonwood Canyon: Hem Line

A wonderful trip back to Maine for the Christmas holiday resulted in some excellent times with family and friends, albeit little climbing. Upon returning to Utah I was rewarded with a very fun hiking trip in Canyonlands National Park with my girlfriend, but once again no climbing.

Back in Salt Lake and unemployed, I devoted much of my free time to exploring some of the surrounding canyons, often merely top-rope soloing routes just to get some mileage in.

Since I often enjoy aid-soloing when I can’t find a partner, I scoured the guidebook for lines to try. Most routes appeared to be either easy, clean aid, or moderate aid over ledges. Then I stumbled across an obscure route, deep in the Green Adjective Gully that caught my eye. Hem Line, listed as A3+, appeared to be easily top-ropeable; in fact the guidebook recommended top-roping due to potential groundfall. I decided this route would be an excellent chance to experiment with tricky, hard aid placements from the security of a top-rope, and jumped at my first opportunity to try it out. A nice afternoon hike up the Green Adjective Gully deposited me at the base of Hem Line, a thin seam, appearing to open up every so often accepting gear. A quick check of my buzzing cellphone revealed that my job interview the week before had proved fruitful, and could I start tomorrow? I happily agreed, excited about the prospect of employment, and then got back to the task at hand: finding a way to the top of Hem Line to set my top-rope. A scramble around the side led to two sets of bolted anchors, and soon I was rappelling down the route, trying not to scope it out too much in advance.

The first section off the ground, as the guidebook insinuates, is very steep with very small gear. A knifeblade in a horizontal led to two good beak placements, avoiding several blown-out heads.

A quick hook move above the beaks and the terrain tipped back to dead vertical, allowing me to get higher in my aiders. A string of offset cams in pin scars lead to a text-book nut placement and finally I was home-free, up a two bolt section, and onto the final slab! Although it wasn’t quite over yet. A short, maybe ten foot, blank slab separated myself from the anchors. I stood in my aiders for a minute, contemplating how to deal with this blank section. Fortunately, closer observation revealed a bathook hole, and soon I was on my way back down, removing my gear and happily hiking back to the car, my climbing need sated for the day.

Zion: Spaceshot

After our adventure on Lunar Ecstasy, Rico and I took a rest day to get ready to try Spaceshot, a 9 pitch 5.7 C2 Grade IV. While we initially wanted to try to do Spaceshot in a day, we decided on utilizing the “fix-and-fire” method again due to the limited amount of daylight and warmth. The next day we slept in, had a leisurely morning and got racked up for our Spaceshot attempt. Hiking up to Spaceshot from the park road took all of five minutes, and soon I was leading the first pitch–a 5.6 move to fourth-class climbing. Rico came up and led the second pitch, a 5.7 wide crack. I got the third pitch, loose 5.5 climbing, and soon our ropes were fixed for the next day. We rapped off and spent the rest of the evening hanging out in Springdale with some locals, eating delicious food, drinking beers and swapping stories.

We decided to get up slightly later than on Lunar Ecstasy, given the less-complicated approach, but when the 7:00am alarm went off it still took some considerable motivation to get up into the cold, dark morning. Soon we were jugging the fixed lines with frozen fingers. Turns out Spaceshot gets sun later into the day than Lunar Ecstasy, but consequently the sun doesn’t hit until later in the morning. Upon arriving at the end of the fixed lines, I decided to start up the next pitch, a bolt ladder, in order to keep warm and save us some time. By the time I was at the top of the bolts and ready to head into the C2 section, Rico had arrived at the ledge and put me on belay. Perfect timing. I moved quickly through the aid, stopping for a few tricky placements and quickly arrived at the belay. Rico came up the rope, gave me the rest of the rack, and I was off on Pitch 5. Part way up Pitch 5, the sun finally hit us, a blessing to be sure. Pitch 5 stumped me for a few minutes, placing and ripping multiple pieces until I finally got a small brass offset nut to stick. With that it was quick work to the anchor, and Rico came up, taking over the lead for the C1 Pitch 6.

Rico also took Pitch 7, half free half aid, and soon we pulled up onto the Earth Orbit Ledge, an amazing outcropping of rock that makes you feel like being in a spaceship, high above the earth. What a cool spot. We  took a lunch break, two nutragrain bars a piece and drank some water, then set off.

Rico won the honors of the final pitch, a bolt ladder. The ladder traverses to the climber’s right off of the ledge, giving instant exposure to ~100ft of air below. Rico soon realized that the term “bolt ladder” is very relative; this one consisted of mostly not very confidence inspiring pitons placed in pods. Not quite the casual pitch he had been expecting, but Rico soldiered through it non-the-less. Soon the rope was fixed and it was my turn to come up. Going from a solid ledge to hanging from a 10.1mm rope was quite exhilarating, and given the condition of the pitons, I think I got the better end of the deal.

A short section of fourth class led us to the descent, an exposed hike across a slab to a series of rappels which brought us back to the road. After remarking on the irony of choosing the harder route to do as our “warm up” we declared our trip a success, returned to camp, had dinner and celebrated late into the evening. The next morning brought a thorough cleaning of Rico’s van which we had been using a homebase, organizing of the climbing gear, and a long drive back to Salt Lake.

Despite the freezing weather and being the only people climbing in December in Zion for part of our trip, we had an awesome time and it was great to be back up on the wall with one of my favorite climbing partners. Mission Accomplished.

Zion: Lunar Ecstasy

After my solo ascent of Moonlight Buttress, I was very excited to return to Zion National Park to climb a few more walls with my good friend Joel Enrico (who will probably be referred to from this point on as just “Rico”). After the four-and-a-half hour drive from Salt Lake City, I met up with Rico at a BLM campground outside of the park. Having not seen each other for a few months, we quickly caught up, then discussed climbing plans. We decided on first trying Lunar Ecstasy, a nine pitch, Grade V, clocking in at 5.10 C2. Given the cold temps when not in the sun, we decided on the “fix-and-fire” strategy, where we would climb the first three pitches of the route and leave our ropes fixed, then return the next morning, ascend our fixed ropes and fire the rest of the route. Figuring that fixing wouldn’t take us long, we slept in the next morning, had a nice breakfast, leisurely racked up, and headed into the park.

The first obstacle on “fixing day” was crossing the Virgin River. After identifying a shallow, slow-moving spot to cross, we headed over. Rico was far better prepared than myself, having his rubber boots from our trip to Newfoundland. He crossed in relative comfort, with me, barefoot, freezing my toes in the process. The short hike to the base warmed my frozen toes, and Rico made quick work of the initial 5.7 pitch. After this warm-up, Rico also dispatched the next pitch, 5.10, with a little bit of aid. I followed up, and took over the lead for the third and final pitch of the day, a flaring 5.7 chimney turning into C1 as the crack thinned near the top. We fixed our ropes at the top of Pitch 3, and headed down, once again back across the freezing cold Virgin River, to a pair of 24oz beers, some reading, a delicious dinner and early to bed for climbing the next day.

Our 6:00am wake-up came early, and it took Rico and I several minutes to motivate to leave our warm sleeping bags for the 19°, pitch-black morning. After a quick breakfast of frozen left-overs, cereal, and tea, we drove into the park, leaving a car at The Grotto for after our descent. After crossing the Virgin River, I declared that I was done with the river until the spring. The river had other plans for me, however, as we soon discovered that we had forgotten our water in the car. Since I was already geared up, I elected to cram my feet into Rico’s too-small rubber boots and venture back across the river to the van to retrieve our gallon of water. We made quick work of ascending our fixed lines, and soon Rico was leading Pitch 4.

Half-way up Pitch 4, Rico came across an intermediate belay. After a few moves, he decided to return to the intermediate, claiming that the piece of gear he needed to continue he had already used below. Loathe to leave my spacious, comfortable belay ledge for the hanging-intermediate, I grumbled that we had brought a triple-set of cams, and then jugged up to the belay. Now having the requisite gear, Rico finished Pitch 4. Pitch 5 started up a bolt ladder with a interesting looking drilled piton, and continued into a splitter C2 crack in the steep, slightly-overhanging headwall. Pitch 6 continued up the same crack, and at the top I took over to lead the last three pitches.

My first pitch, Pitch 7, also known as the Amoeba pitch, was the technical crux of the route. The Amoeba, a large, hollow chunk of rock, presents an interesting challenge to the aid climber. Placing gear behind it isn’t really an option, because a cam might lever off the whole piece. Supposedly, there’s a drilled hole somewhere near the flake, enabling hooking past the feature to the next drilled piton, however after much searching I was unable to find said hole. I gingerly placed a hook on a patina edge on the Amoeba itself, held my breath, and quickly moved past the hook to clip a drilled pin after the Amoeba. Phew. The crux of the pitch turned out to be after the Amoeba; a string of micronuts led to a small stance where I tried and subsequently ripped several pieces out of a thin, sandy crack.  After pausing to look around, I found a bat-hook hole which made the whole section much easier and less scary. After hooking through to better placements in the crack, I continued up to the anchor.

After some hilarious shenanigans at the belay, I started up Pitch 8–tricky 5.8 free climbing up to a C1 dihedral. We decided to take the original finish for the route, and I was able to free most of it, aiding as necessary. After lots of sandy cracks and fragile patina edges, I pulled over the top, fixed Rico’s rope to a tree and waited for him to jug up.

We split a celebratory pecan bar and the rest of the water, then started down the Angel’s Landing descent. Back to the cars, a quick dinner of macaroni & cheese, beans and hot sauce, and we began planning our next adventure, a trip up Spaceshot.

Zion: Moonlight Buttress

After an awesome forty-six hour road trip with my dad, we arrived in Utah, where I will be spending at least the next several months. My first stop in Utah was Zion National Park. The first day in Zion, dad and I hiked Angel’s Landing: a beautiful, exposed hiking trail. We had an awesome day enjoying the beauty of Zion.

After dad left, I met up with Pete and Eli, from the Atlantic Climbing School, who had just arrived after climbing for a while in Red Rocks, right outside of Las Vegas. Their goal was to attempt to free Moonlight Buttress, so I decided to start up the day before, solo aiding, intent on taking photos of them climbing the next day.

Day One consisted of obtaining a permit from the backcountry desk. It turned out that the ranger was also from Maine, so we chatted for a little bit, and then I set off to meet Pete and Eli at the parking lot. The approach was short but tough, the hardest part being crossing the freezing cold Virgin River. Yikes. After warming our cold toes, we continued hiking to the base. Pete and Eli stashed their gear for the next day, and I began climbing.

Pitch One was scary, consisting of mostly 5.7 free climbing. Pitch Two required a easy, third class traverse into a nice crack. Hauling on Pitch Two was fairly rugged, forcing me to do short hauls up a series of ledges before I could lower the bags out onto the main haul line. The Pitch Three bolt-ladder went quickly, and before long I was on top of the Rocker Block. Pitch Four, my last pitch of the day, was long–180 feet, almost a whole rope-length–and tired me out. It was getting dark, so after hauling, I decided to set up my portaledge. Setting up a double portaledge by yourself is no easy task, and after getting the beta (“You’re not swearing enough!”) from a nice Scottish gentleman who was coming up to fix ropes for an ascent the next day, I got the ledge together and crawled into my sleeping bag. After a nutritious and calorie-dense dinner of sardine sandwiches, a can of beans and a nutrigrain bar for desert, I set my watch for 6:00am and fell into a blissful sleep. 6:00am came way to early, and getting out of my nice, warm sleeping bag into the cold darkness took all of my willpower. Sore and tired, I wolfed down a quick breakfast of canned fruit and PB&J bagel sandwich and got to work. Pitch Five was hard, aiding up a flared chimney. After much grunting, squeezing and cursing, I made it through the chimney, into the easier crack above, and finally to the anchors. Dismantling the portaledge was considerably easier than setting it up, and I soon was hauling. At this point Pete and Eli had almost caught up to me, making short work of the first three pitches. I continued on, climbing Pitch 6. While hauling Pitch Six, Pete had caught up with me, and we decided it would be best to let them pass at the top of Pitch Six. Them passing allowed me to hang out on a little ledge at the bottom of Pitch Six, enjoying Eli’s company while Pete struggled with Pitch Seven, one of the crux free pitches. Pete took a wild, inverted fall when his foot got caught up in a cam, but he quickly recovered and finished up the hard part. Eli flew up the fixed rope, leaving me to get back to my tedious, solo aiding.

The rest of the climb was more a mental exercise than anything–the climbing was easy, all bomber gear, but the repetitive work of climb a pitch, rap clean, jug back up, haul the bags then wash, rinse and repeat had me worn out. Having the bags get stuck on an anchor bolt on Pitch Seven–requiring me to re-rap to free them, and jug back up–did not make me a happy hauler. Pitch Eight was fun, referred to as “the nutting pitch”, I switched from placing mostly cams to strings of bomber nuts. Pitch Nine went quickly, mostly due to Pete and Eli’s encouragement from the top. I tossed them the end of my lead-line, weighted by a #3 Camalot, in order to bypass the last twenty feet or so of unprotected 5.7 slab climbing. Pete and Eli also assisted me by hauling the last pitch while I cleaned, which I very much appreciated after two days of hauling large bags up the cliff. We spent a little time on the top, then hiked back to the car, an exhausting capstone to the whole experience. Upon arriving at the cars, we celebrated with a few “PBR Lights”(what I’ve been referring to Utah’s watered-down 3.2% beer as) and then had dinner at a local western-themed bar. Then it was back to camp where I slept like a baby.

All-in-all, my first big-wall solo went remarkably well. My rope systems and organization all went smoothly, and there was no point where I felt like I wasn’t going to be able to finish. There were definitely times where I wished there was someone else there to haul, or that I was doing something else completely, but when my mind wandered I would remind myself of the advice a random climber gave Nate, Rico and myself before our first trip up El Cap–”Most people bail, just keep focused and moving and you’ll be fine.”–at which point I would get back to the task at hand. While I thoroughly enjoyed the experience of climbing a big-wall by myself, I’m definitely ready to do some free climbing.

Newfoundland: The Movie

I’ve put together a short video from some of the video footage and pictures from our trip. Enjoy!

Newfoundland Part 3: Devil’s Bay

And we’re back, with the final chapter in Ian & Joel’s Newfoundland trilogy.

After George dropped us off in Devil’s Bay we were a flurry of activity. The goal of our trip was to do as much exploration as possible, and since the larger cliff in Devil’s Bay, Blow-Me-Down, is probably the most climbed piece of rock in Newfoundland, we decided to hike inland and check out an unexplored cliff that all of our friends who had been to the area before told us about seeing from the top of Blow-Me-Down. We quickly set up base-camp, packed three days worth of food and equipment into our haul bags, and set off hiking into the unknown.

Rencontre to Devil’s Bay

The Hike

After a couple hours of bushwhacking through blueberry bushes and waist high pine trees we stopped for a break. The cliff was still nowhere to be seen, but we were fairly certain we were headed in the right direction. The mood got somber for a minute as we discussed the fact that we had left the satellite phone at camp in our haste to go light and fast, and then the realization that even with the satellite phone, if the shit hit the fan it would be next to impossible to explain to someone where we were, given that we didn’t even really know where we were going. After a couple of minutes of introspective thought, we continued on. After another hour or so, after summiting a small ridge, we could finally see our objective off in the distance. It looked really far away.

The First Sight

Since we started hiking in the mid-afternoon, we were soon caught by nightfall. When it got too dark for route-finding, we plopped our haulbags down, made dinner and settled in for a beautiful open bivy under the stars. Awakening the next morning to a blue-bird day, we had a quick, not-so-filling breakfast of not-quite-cooked oatmeal, packed up and started hiking yet again. The rocky terrain gave way to navigating around lakes and streams, and finally squishing through marshes, depositing us right at the base of our cliff around noon.

Close[r] Up View

Traveling light-and-fast, all that was needed to set up camp was set down the haul-bags. After scoping the cliffs for obvious lines, we settled on one, hiked over and started climbing. Rico once again one the shoe flip for first lead, and set off. After 40ft or so Rico yelled down that he was going to start aiding. After a while Rico built a belay and yelled down that I was good to go. I was pretty pysched to get climbing after the aid-belay session, and took off. The climbing quickly steepened and I had to take a few times to remove gear, but was able to free all of the moves. I apologized to Rico at the belay for sending him bad vibes about the aiding, I was just anxious to start climbing. He accepted my apology and I set off on the second pitch. After traversing across a ledge to look at a different crack system, I traversed back and began climbing up above the belay. The climbing consisted of sharp, wide cracks with plenty of loose blocks to keep the head in the game. After about 35m I found a nice alcove to build a belay behind a refrigerator-sized block at the top of a chimney (You can actually see it in the route photo about halfway up the cliff). I belayed Rico up, and he took the next pitch, fairly chossy, loose, heads-up climbing. Pitch 3 ended up being short, as Rico had traversed out left to avoid some terrible looking rock, and the subsequent traverse back right made it so he couldn’t pull any more rope. I followed this one and offered him the next pitch since his was so short. He accepted, took the rack and headed off. After a while I got the off-belay call, and started up. Steep, moderate climbing turned into lower-angle easy climbing, and soon enough I was on a big, grassy ledge. We agreed that the rest looked pretty easy, un-roped and soloed the final 3rd/4th class to the summit! Another route in the bag! We took a couple of minutes to enjoy ourselves, and then hiked back to camp where we had a huge meal of pasta, sardines, peanut butter and fluffs, and other assorted goodies before retiring for bed. We decided to name the route “Where’s Waldo?” after its remote location.

Where’s Waldo? Topo

I awoke around 3:00am to the sound of rain pitter-pattering on my bivy-sack. I rolled over and tried to go back to sleep, hoping it was a passing shower. Within a half an hour, what started as a light misting had progressed to a steady torrent. I tried in vain to set up the tarp we brought, but being camped in a swamp, the only option was to use the haul bags, resulting in a piss-poor configuration. By morning Rico and I were both soaking wet, our bivies and sleeping bags soaked through. Around 6:30am, we pondered the options and decided as soon as the rain let up to pack camp and hike back to Blow-Me-Down. It was a tough decision, as we had just arrived, but we figured the day was already shot for climbing, and given even if the rain let up the rock would still likely be wet the next day as well. Since we had only packed three days of food, heading back to shelter made the best sense. Around 7:00am the rain had slackened, so Rico and I jumped up and started packing. As we packed the rain hastened, giving us a taste of what the day held in store for us. Five hours of bushwhacking, sopping wet, cold and tired, we finally stumbled back into basecamp and crawled into our nice, dry sleeping bags for cocktails and games. We were a bit bummed that we had hiked all that way to only do one route, but were excited that we did get a chance to climb at least something, and that all our hiking wasn’t for naught.

After a rest day, we decided to climb a route on Blow-Me-Down that Pete and Eli had recommended called The Central Pillar of Aestheticism. A great plan, however one minor issue was that we had forgotten the topos for Blow-Me-Down in the car before the second ferry. This meant that we were going in blind. We navigated the slab approach (fortunately we found the bolts that parties typically use to fix ropes) simul-climbing style.

Not really knowing where the route started, we climbed one pitch from a two-bolt anchor, then decided that we weren’t on the right route. A quick rappel by Rico got us to the very bottom of Blow-Me-Down, and after he assured me that we’d be able to climb back up the section he had rappeled, I followed suit. Rico led a traversing pitch over the ocean, and then it was my turn. After some initial confusion about where to go, I spotted the second bolted anchor. After 30-40ft of poorly protected climbing, I reached the base of a super-thin tips crack. After confirming with Rico that we had brought neither the RPs nor the knifeblades, I back-cleaned a blue alien from earlier in the pitch, gathered my composure and set off. The climbing turned out to be delicate, balancy slab climbing, with the crack opening up every once in a while wide enough to take gear. I pulled onto the belay ledge, let out a whoop of excitement, and let Rico know it was time to follow. He came up after and started up on Pitch 3. When talking to others about this route, everyone had told us it was buttery handcracks. Pitches 1&2 were spent looking for these handcracks, and on Pitch 3 we found them. Rico quickly dispatched almost a full rope-length of buttery #2 Camalots, and I followed. Pitch 4 was a short off-witdh to a bulge, then some easy ledgy scrambling to the belay. All in all a short pitch. For some reason one of the bolts at this anchor was missing a nut, so I cinched a nut off of the rack over the exposed bolt stem to hold the hanger on. Rico joined me and took over for Pitch 5. After about 15ft, Rico asked me if we had dropped a nut. I laughed and explained what I had done to the anchor. He proclaimed that particular nut was the only piece of pro available to him, so I sent it up on our second rope, leaving me with only half a belay anchor when I weighted it the wrong way. After a while Rico told me he was off, and I followed up the pitch. Steep, hard climbing gave way to hard, wandery, run-out lower-angle climbing. I reached the belay, and we rapped off, doing our best to back up the tat at each rap station as necessary. Back at camp we hit the hay, tired but content.

The next morning we called George to arrange for pickup the following week. His weather report didn’t sound good, and we decided to have him pick us up that day instead of sitting around in the tent until the next hurricane blew by. George was late getting us due to a relative getting two moose, but he was very excited. Upon arriving back in Francois, we set up our tent in the campground behind the church, and went over to George’s for showers and dinner. After dinner we met up with Larry and got a chance to say thank you once again, and then went to bed. After another night of rain, we awoke for our 7:30am ferry back to Burgeo, and then reversed our travels back to Maine.

We had an awesome trip, fully living up to our expectations–lots of rain, some climbing. This being our first real expedition, we both learned a lot, and can’t wait for the next one! We’d like to thank everyone that helped make our trip possible, especially the American Alpine Club, Sterling Rope, Cadillac Mountain Sports and the Atlantic Climbing School. Thank you all so much for helping make our trip a reality.

Newfoundland Part 2: Rencontre Bay West

Awakening in Rencontre Bay West to a beautiful, bluebird Newfoundland morning, Rico and I decided the best thing to do would be immediately start climbing. After a quick breakfast, we surveyed the cliff for possible lines, decided on a cool looking corner/crack system, and set off on the bushwhack to the base.

Rico won the honors of leading the first pitch after a quick game of shoe-flip, promptly took the rack and set off. Pitch One consisted of steep cracks in corners between ledge systems. Rico stopped on a good ledge, and I followed him up the pitch. I re-racked and started up Pitch Two, which began with short-but-steep off-width section with questionable gear stuffed next to blocks on the inside. After a little “coaching” from Rico (“Just stuff your knee in there, it’s not THAT hard”) I pulled onto another ledge and then set off into about 30 feet of fun hand-crack in a corner. Soon enough the hand-crack turned into loose, chossy flakes with kitty-litter quality rock. After 15-20 feet I reached another big ledge and built a belay. Rico came up and led the third pitch, more sharp cracks and flakes. This pitch ended on a huge tiered ledge, which we followed back to the last pitch, an awesome gently widening hand/fist crack which took us to the summit. Rico came up and we enjoyed the scenery, finished the last of our water, had a snack and headed down the gently-sloped backside of the cliff. More bushwhacking through blueberry fields and route-finding around ledges and down gullies brought us back to camp, where I promptly took a nap. We celebrated our success with a delicious dinner, a game of chess, and sleep.

Day Two brought more blue-bird weather, so we had breakfast and geared up once again. Rico had hurt his wrist on the first pitch of the route we climbed the day before, but it wasn’t until he informed me that he wouldn’t be climbing today that I realized the extent of his injuries. Rico’s injury was a huge bummer, because although every climber’s dream is to get to lead all the pitches, I would have much rather swapped leads, as onsight new-routing can be a taxing endeavour both mentally and physically. I was glad, however, that Rico was still psyched to climb, and so once again we set off on the bushwhack to the base. Approaching the climb turned out to be challenging as the approach slabs were steeper than anticipated, and dropped directly into the ocean! We built a belay, roped up, and I set out across the slabs. Pitch one consisted of crystally, sharp rock, very similar to that of my home crag, Clifton, Maine. In fact, the rock was so similar that I felt right at home–sharp cracks with questionable gear and insecure slab climbing! Pitch two was a splitter tight hands crack in a corner, which looked as if someone had cleaned half of, and then stopped, leading us to believe that we may not have been the first people to climb this particular route. I cruised the lower section, and then cursed and cleaned my way higher up the corner, showering Rico and the belay with dirt and grass tufts. After 10ft or so of cleaning, I escaped out on the slab on the right, opting for the crystal-pinching slab climbing that I grew up on back in Maine instead of ripping dirt and grass out of cracks with my nut-tool.  I quickly reached a horizontal flake that I had been eying from the corner, which proved to be hollow. Not interested in trying to down-climb the slab I had just come up, I plugged two cams in the hollow flake, took a deep breath, and set out on the last 15 feet of unprotected slab to a ledge. Pulling up on the ledge, I breathed a sigh of relief, built and anchor and fixed the rope for Rico.

My euphoria of finishing Pitch Two quickly diminished as I looked up at Pitch Three. From the ground, Pitch Three had looked like a steep, fairly wide crack in a corner, but up close and personal it was clear that we had been tricked by an optical illusion. Pitch Three was a steep, wet-looking section of crack up to an overhanging roof. Very intimidating. I suddenly found myself wishing that Rico hadn’t hurt his wrist so he could lead this one. Rico reached the belay and could sense my trepidation. He gave me a couple of words of encouragement, then handed me the rack. I set off, hoping that the pitch wouldn’t end up requiring any of the aid gear that we had left in the tent. The first section up to the roof went smoothly, and despite how it looked from below, wasn’t wet, just mossy. I moved slowly, placing more gear that probably necessary, and began working my way out the roof. Right at the lip of the roof, I found myself pretty pumped, and opted to place another piece and hang rather than keep going and risk whipping on a previous, marginal piece of gear. After a brief rest, I french-freed a move or two to a stance, and finished the rest of the pitch, built an anchor and fixed Rico’s rope. I took a moment to laugh at my nervousness, the pitch wasn’t that hard, and didn’t turn out to be all that run-out either. Pitch Four was the feature that had attracted us to the climb in the first place, a beautiful less-than-vertical finger crack splitting a headwall. I made short work of this section (slabby finger cracks being one of my specialties…) and pulled onto a ledge with a short finger/hands crack in front. I climbed through this section to another large ledge, where I built a belay and took a rest while Rico jugged and cleaned. The last pitch was a wide, chossy crack up to a party ledge, where I built a final anchor and soloed the final 3rd class to the summit proper to wait for Rico. He soon arrived and we imbibed in the standard summit libations before heading down the gullies back to camp. I decided that we would call the route Still Grimey (inspired by the Wu-Tang Clan song) as we weren’t quite sure whether or not it had been climbed before, and if it had, it was still grimy.

Waking up the next morning to overcast weather, we decided to take a rest day, partly for Rico’s wrist and also because I was fairly tired. We spent the day playing games and reading. The next day brought more blue-bird weather, but we decided to take another rest day because the bay was calm as glass, allowing us to fire up the 2HP motor take the 8ft Walker Bay dinghy that we brought out to check out other possible climbing in the bay. We had a photo from Pete and Eli of the Atlantic Climbing School of another large cliff in the bay, and decided to go check it out. Upon closer inspection, the bottom half of the cliff was much lower angle than appeared in our photo. We identified 2-3 routes that we would probably be able to climb, and filed them away in our memories for the future. On the return voyage we spotted another line on the ocean-side of the first cliff that we did the other two routes on which looked like a lot of fun, and we made that our next objective.

The next day was wet and drizzly, so we spent the day playing games and reading in the rain. Later in the afternoon we were visited by some locals from Francois who had a camp in the abandoned fishing village across the bay. Larry informed us that there was a hurricane coming through in the next couple days, and that if we didn’t want to spend it all in a wet tent, we were more than welcome to join him and his wife Debbie for the weekend over at their cabin. We spent the afternoon weighing the options, and decided the next morning to pack up most of our stuff, stash it in caves to protect it from the rain and wind, and head over to the fishing village. We weren’t exactly sure what to expect, but Larry and Debbie were super nice, very happy to meet us and have company for the weekend. We spent several days with them in their cabin, playing games, chatting, eating plenty of food, drinking plenty of tea, and even watching a little satellite television when Larry would fire up the generator. Sure beat sitting in the soaking wet tent in the rain! One windy, but not raining afternoon we even had a chance to help Larry tear apart an old house, a project he was very grateful we accomplished. All in all we were very appreciative of their hospitality, and they welcomed the company. Later on we decided to name our first route Upta Camp after our stay with Larry and Debbie. On the morning we were getting ready to head back to camp we saw George in the Royal Oak across the bay over by our campsite. We fired up the Walker Bay and headed over to say hi. It turned out George was worried how we had fared during the hurricane and decided to come check up on us. Since we had all of our equipment packed already, we made the executive decision to load up the Royal Oak and head over to Devil’s Bay for more exploration.

Newfoundland Part 1: The Journey

I felt that there was just too much information and stories to share about our trip in one post, so I decided to split things up into several. I’m not sure exactly how many segments will result, but this first one will be about our travel from Bar Harbor, Maine to our first climbing destination in Rencontre Bay West, Newfoundland.

Overview of the Route

The first segment of our travels took us from Bar Harbor, Maine to North Sydney, Nova Scotia.

Bar Harbor to North Sydney

This part of the trip was fairly uneventful, including the border crossing, and consisted of mostly driving along the Trans-Canada Highway. Upon arriving in North Sydney, we spent the night in the Marine Atlantic ferry terminal in the trusty Town-and-Country (T&C).

Room for Rent

After a not-very-comfortable nights sleep, as our ferry was delayed, yet again, we enjoyed the town of Sydney Mines, getting breakfast, using the library and exchanging US currency for Canadian. Later that afternoon we finally were able to board the ferry, and set sail on the seven-hour trip to Newfoundland!

North Sydney to Port-Aux-Basques

The brand-new mega-ferry, named the Blue Putee, operated by Marine Atlantic, was very nice, with five decks of cargo space for automobiles and four decks of passenger space and amenities. We passed the majority of our seven-hour voyage playing bannanagrams, chess, and various card games, as well as reading and watching satellite TV. All in all, the ferry travel was a comfortable, nice experience.

Arriving at Port-Aux-Basques around 10:30pm Newfoundland time forced us to spend another night in hotel T&C. The next morning we had breakfast at a local restaurant, then hit the grocery store to gather the requisite food supplies for our expedition. After stocking up on food and a couple bottles of liquor (beer in Canada is heavily taxed, costing about double Maine prices, so we opted not to purchase any), we hopped in the T&C and set off for Burgeo, where we were to catch our second ferry.

Port-Aux-Basques to Burgeo

The five-hour drive to Burgeo was very nice, beautiful mountainous landscapes dotted with many lakes and small ponds.

We pulled into Burgeo in the early afternoon, but since our ferry wasn’t due to leave until 1:45pm the next afternoon, we had plenty of time to kill. After tracking down the last of the gear on our shopping list–a small gas can for extra gas for the 2HP motor and a gallon of white gas for our stove–we spent some time down at the pier organizing our gear. At the suggestion of some of the locals we decided to check out Sand Dunes Provincial Park, which turned out to be a beautiful place to spend the evening.

The next morning, after another night in Hotel Town & Country, we awoke, had a bite to eat and hung out until the next ferry, the M/V Marine Voyager, arrived. After some hilarious mis-adventures loading our equipment onto pallets to be craned onto the ferry and general miscommunication with the ferrymen (who had probably the heaviest accents of all the people we interacted with, and refused to cut us any slack when we didn’t understand them) we set sail for Francois, the final stop in our travels to Rencontre.

The ferry journey lasted approximately five hours, after which we arrived in Francois, a secluded fishing village population ~150. George Fudge, a retired fisherman who was to take us on the last segment of our journey–up into Rencontre Bay, pulled his boat, the Royal Oak, alongside the ferry and we unloaded our gear directly from one boat to the other. After filling up our gas can with the most expensive gas encountered on the trip (~$170CA per litre, that’s about $6.43 per gallon for all of you concerned about gas prices in the US) we hopped on the Royal Oak and set off for Rencontre Bay!

It took the Royal Oak about an hour in the swells to make it into Rencontre, and several trips with the dingy to unload all of our equipment to shore. After everything was unloaded, George headed back to Francois, and we sat for a few minutes, enjoying the euphoria of reaching our final destination. This feeling didn’t last long, however, as we realized that night was falling and it would behoove us to set up the tent and have dinner. After accomplishing those tasks, we went to bed, praying for good weather and dreaming of climbing in the morning.

This concludes Part 1 of our Newfoundland Adventure. Be sure to stay tuned for the next segment, which I assure you will include some tales and pictures of actual climbing!

We’re Back!

Well, it’s been a long journey, but Joel and I are back in Maine. We had an awesome trip, and as I sort through pictures and videos I will post updates with stories and media! Keep posted, but as a little teaser…

Travel Woes

The boys have been experiencing some delays in travel, initially stemming from mechanical issues with our first ferry, and now inclement weather in the Atlantic. We are currently killing time in North Sydney, Nova Scotia, as we wait for our boat. Our 7:00pm-last-night ferry turned into a 11:00am-this-morning ferry, to a 5:00pm-this-evening ferry. This also means that we will miss the second ferry tomorrow and will have to wait until Friday afternoon to get to Francois. Unfortunate, but not much we can do. These delays will allow us plenty of time to supply with plenty of food and spend some time exploring other parts of Newfoundland. Thus far the trip has been fairly uneventful, an easy border crossing in Calais, and lots of driving. More to come, and we will update as internet is available.