TR: Calling Slow, Party of Three (long)
Mark Cato
May 25 - 26, 2002
Okay, so it's Memorial Day weekend. And the forecast is pretty iffy, with
a chance for scattered lightning showers. And we'll be a party of three,
with one relatively new leader and a newer climber with no multi-pitch
experience. We're heading to Seneca anyway!
I'm thankful when we revise our plans for a late-night departure on Friday
to a 7:00 a.m. start on Saturday. I like my bed. I'm only about 10
minutes early when I get to Dave's house the next morning. We throw his
stuff in the already crowded Jeep and head to pick up Chris. Thankfully,
Chris has contained himself to one large backpack. We manage to find room
for it. Dave asks Chris if he was able to borrow a helmet for the weekend.
"With it being Memorial Day weekend, it's a good idea to have some
coverage." I've got to buy one of those some day.
We make the drive down from Pittsburgh to Seneca, stopping briefly at the
Arrowhead Market at Deep Creek to get supplies and sandwiches for later.
Chris asks "just out of curiosity" how high we're going to be. Dave and I
laugh a bit and reassure him. The next stop is Seneca Rocks. We stop at
the visitor's center to check the weather. The place is pretty full, and I
spend a bit of time playing "Guess the Climbers" with the crowd. We go
back to the Jeep and gear up. I make sure to pack the rain gear and my new
headlamp. I love new gear.
Chris had heard about the stairmaster, but I don't think he realized what
it would be like with the humidity. We kept thinking we'd find a climb
without a really long line lower down, but we were running into groups
three deep as we wound our way to the west face. We continued along, and
eyed up a few of the lines that will get us to Gunsight to South Peak. We
gear up, and Dave starts up a 5.6 line. It's a bit stiffer than what we
want to take Chris up, and Dave downclimbs after nearly finishing the first
short pitch. We move to the base of West Face to Gunsight that leads up
and left to a somewhat loose gully. Dave quickly scurries off, slinging
trees and placing a minimum of gear. Chris climbs next, taking his time. I
reach the belay, and we talk about what we want to do. Dave and I have
done the traverse to the start of Gunsight to South Peak unroped, but we
realize the exposure would be a bit much for Chris. I put Dave on belay,
and he stretches the rope a full 60 meters. Unfortunately, the 60 meters
wasn't quite enough to get Dave to our intended belay, which offers the
best view of the most difficult series of the route. That means a really
short climb, and taking up tons of rope. It's becoming obvious that we're
not setting any speed records, or probably climbing anything else today.
We're moving slowly, even for a group of three, but I'm trying to just
enjoy the day.
Chris is a little nervous on our airy perch, which provides a nice view of
the valleys on both the east and west sides. He's pretty okay while he's
climbing, but just sitting around freaks him out. I used be afraid of
heights, so I know how he feels. I reassure him that it gets better, and
apologize for the exposure we're subjecting him to on his first day of
multi-pitch. Dave takes off from the belay. The roughest part of this
pitch is the first step out on the traverse onto the west side of the
gunsight. There's a really reassuring hold on the other side of the flake,
but it's a stretch to find the good holds on the west face. Like a lot of
the climbs I've done at Seneca, the moves are more awkward than difficult,
more heady than technical. Fun climbing, indeed. From the traverse, it's
pretty easy climbing, with an opportunity to use either the main crack or
an abundance of face holds. The last pitch is a traverse along the
southern spine of Seneca to the summit. "Walk, crawl, or slither" the
guide says, and I do all of the above. We throw together an anchor for
Chris to settle his nerves, and enjoy a snack on the summit. With all the
folks here, I'm surprised we're by ourselves. We scramble down, giving
Chris a belay, and move over to the top of the rappel to the base of Old
Man's. Unfortunately, we've left our shoes at the base of West Side to
Gunsight, so we have a bit of a walk in our climbing shoes. The drive down
and slow pace has killed most of the day, so we head off to Princess
Snowbird to see if there's anywhere to camp.
Things are out of control at the campgrounds, but we manage to create a
site nestled in some trees. We eat dinner and sit around for a while
before heading to our tents. I crash with Chris, but with the drunken
campers setting off fireworks, his tent off-gassing, and my allergies
acting up, I don't get a very good night's rest.
The next morning we eat oatmeal and drink a bit of coffee. We drive to the
parking lot and hike up to the base of Candy Corner (5.5). After some
conversation with our fellow climbers, and a short debate amongst ourselves
about the start of the route, Dave launches off. He takes a bit of time,
but reaches the ledge linking up with Skyline Traverse (5.3) in good style.
Chris climbs next, a bit hesitantly in some places, but looking good. I
bring up the rear, and appreciate Dave's lead. This thing has some
interesting moves for a 5.5. I take a while to clean one of Dave's nuts,
which is a bit stuck. It's right above another nut that someone's beat to
hell. By the time I free Dave's piece, I decide I've wasted enough time.
No booty nut for me today! At the belay, Dave hands over the rack. I clip
the fixed pin off the belay and set off on Skyline Traverse. Dave tells me
I'm a hard-core trad climber with balls like grapefruits to encourage me. I
tell him they feel more like the nuts of a titmouse and press on. Despite
my protestations, I feel good. I climb well, and find plenty of nice
stances to fiddle in gear. I reach the slope at the top of the pitch,
sling the tree and set my anchor.
When I bring Chris and Dave up, they congratulate me on my hardest trad
lead to date, and I'm grinning as I set off on the third pitch. As I near
the top of the first 20' section, I grab a bowling ball sized rock hanging
a bit over the left edge with both hands. I start to pull up, and it
starts to rock forward. I ease it back into place, and shout a warning to
Dave and Chris. That's the first time that's happened to me! I'm thankful
I didn't blindly yard on it, sending a very large projectile and myself to
the belay and beyond. They warn the next party in turn, and I work my way
carefully around it. I wrap up the short pitch and angle to the right to
avoid any rope drag over the loose slope. Dave and Chris soon join me, and
we make our way along Broadway Ledge to A Christian Delight (5.3). Dave
makes his way up, winding his way along the vegetated route. As I
followed, I passed a couple bushes, with small flowers in bloom. At one
point I was butting one with my head by accident. Sorry, bush. It turns
out that Dave stopped a bit short of our intended belay due to rope drag,
so it was another short pitch, with tons of rope to take up. As Dave takes
the lead, Chris asks about the storm clouds approaching rapidly from the
south. "Oh, I don't think there'll be a problem," I say confidently. Chris
nods nervously. By the time we all reach the belay that meets up with the
traverse pitch of Old Ladies Route, the clouds are looking closer, and more
ominous. We see that someone's already rigged a temporary rap anchor at
the top of the first pitch. Should we bail or press on? I tell Dave that
Seneca's not going anywhere, and that we just finished Old Ladies earlier
in the week. Why risk getting caught in the storm? Dave agrees that
discretion is the better part of valor, and I make my way over to the
rappel. The rig isn't ideal, but it will suffice. I clip in and start
feeding our rope. Dave throws the other end down, and it catches in a
crack. I tell Dave I'll fix it on rappel as he gets Chris over to the
station. I'm quickly to the large ledge at the halfway point, roughly
eyeballing the middle of the rope and throwing it off to the base. Chris
raps next, and I caution him to make sure both ends are down as he goes. I
tell Dave I'm going to downclimb to save time, and he decides it's better
to pull the rope from the first big ledge and downclimb, as well. It's
easy ground, and we want to make sure we don't have any problems with the
rope.
As soon as Dave touches down, we're heading down the trail. The only
problem with our choice of bail points is we're still in our climbing
shoes, and our packs are at the base of Candy Corner. We make our way
through the talus to the stairmaster as drops start falling around us.
Nothing heavy yet, but we call every man for himself so Dave can run ahead
and keep his rack dry. I'm not far behind, but Chris is having trouble
keeping up in his newer shoes. It's still mostly threatening as we reach
the packs and quickly get out of our harnesses and shoes.
We make it to the Jeep and throw our packs in. Right on cue, the sky opens
and the rains pour down. By the time we get to the Front Porch I expect to
run into Noah and the Ark. We run into the restaurant with a minor
soaking, and Chris buys Dave and me pizza. Climbers start to flood in, and
we chat with some of the folks we've met in the last couple days. Dave,
Chris and I discuss how we want to proceed. We all agree that we've had a
good couple of days, and we don't want to spend a wet night in the
campgrounds if we won't be able to climb tomorrow. We head back to
Princess Snowbird and break down in the rain. We head back to Pittsburgh a
day early, but content with the trip nonetheless.
_____________________
Mark Cato
mdc...@andrew.cmu.edu
stinkwagen
news:559985.3235461612@cfa-302-1.cfa.cmu.edu...
> TR: Calling Slow, Party of Three (long)
> May 25 - 26, 2002
>
> Okay, so it's Memorial Day weekend. And the forecast is pretty iffy, with
> a chance for scattered lightning showers. >
the
> parking lot and hike up to the base of Candy Corner (5.5).
This TR reminds me of The Oxbow Incident.