Family Day

Practice Wall at Crowders Mountain State Park, North Carolina

 I am currently into my sixth week at the South Carolina Fire Academy with the Columbia Fire Department. January 9th was the start of my training with the fire department and since then I've only been climbing once a week on Sundays. I would frequent Stronghold Gym about twice a week and go climbing at least once on the weekend on an average before starting with the fire department.

Now that I only climb once a week, I truly cherish the time I spend on the rock and have had to change my tactics with how I go about choosing what to climb. I have had to identify my goals before hand and feel them out at the crag.

As most of you know, I frequent Crowders Mountain State Park in Gastonia, North Carolina quite a bit. It is the nearest climbing to Columbia, South Carolina and has been a large portion of my schooling in traditional and sport climbing since I moved to Columbia in 2005.

This past Sunday I was fortunate to have my family (Nicole and Ava) and an old friend (Ashley Navarro) with me at my stomping ground. We started the day at Practice Wall where I lead Playground (5.9 trad) and then lead a route that I had top-roped the previous Sunday. This route in particular was neat to me because it isn't in any guidebooks so I took the liberty of dubbing it something until I find some or any information on it.

Davids Castle Backside at Crowders Mountain State Park, North Carolina

The word 'arete' is french for edge or ridge and heady implies head games, thus Heady Areteddy (5.9 trad) was the name I chose for the route on the arete left of Gastonia Crack (5.4 trad) on Practice Wall. I don't know why this route has been overlooked or why it has nevery been mentioned, I thought it was really fun and placing the gear was not too challenging. It was one of the climbing highlights to my day.

 Another highlight would be leading Nuclear Cottage Cheese (5.9+ trad). I (like many) thought that I had led it before but I was actually on Overhang Direct (5.8 trad).  Nuclear Cottage Cheese has cottage cheese like features starting about half way up the crack system that leads to a roof. I had the pleasure of cutting away briers from this route which is ironically in a high traffic top rope area.

I had a wonderful time with my family and friends on the mountain that yielded mostly pleasurable conditions.  I'm not sure of where I am going next Sunday, all I know is that there is a Sunday and that I look forward to being on the rock.

Until next climb...

Super Sunday

 

Today was my birthday and it couldn't have asked for anything better. I spent the day at Crowders Mountain State Park with my love, Nicole.  Ava got to go to a Super Bowl party while we had the mountain to ourselves.   The drive to Gastonia, North Carolina is about two hours and the closer we got to Crowders the more fog and wet conditions we encountered. Never the less, we pushed forward to do some wet top roping if need be.  

We reached the top of Practice Wall where we rappelled from Gastonia Crack(5.4) and Nicole climbed Playground(5.9+)  on top rope.  I top roped the arete left of Gastonia Crack(5.4) I don't know what it is called because it is not printed on any of the old or recent guidebooks.  I would say it is (5.10a), I plan on leading it next time I am at Practice Wall. I proudly led The Wall (5.10a) and I was pleased to get the redpoint that had slipped away the previous trip. This route has a bit of a runout but nothing a top rope run won't remedy. 

Lastly, I climbed something that I had been working on sending for quite some time now. Golden Shower(5.9) is a line that is mentioned in the Thomas Kelley guidebook.  I did an alternate start that isn't in the guidebooks. When I first top roped this alternate start it didn't feel very hard but having to place gear on this overhang drained my energy and I ended up falling a good distance from my last piece of protection. I was thankful that it held and that I had such an awesome belayer (thanks Nicole).  Anyway, I ended up climbing the route all the way to the top of Davids Castle Wall. We tried to take pictures of the line but it was foggy all day.  We called it a day fairly early due to the weather not being optimal for climbing, and I wore myself out on Golden Shower Overhang (5.10). 

Nicole and I decided to treat ourselves to a birthday celebration dinner at The Cheesecake Factory. Let me just say that we are addicted to the Avocado Eggrolls.  We were pleased with our waiter Joe whom also provided a cheesecake dessert for the special occasion, thanks Joe!  

All in all I must say that I am a lucky birthday boy.  Hopefully next weekend will be a little sunnier. Maybe the Bald will be nice. Climb On!