Saturday 27^th

By 9.30am first James, and then Wolfgang and Josephine, had walked through my door, shared breakfast and tea, and helped me drag my rack and ropes down to the car. It was, despite predictions of snapping cold, a gorgeously bright day. John Peterson was off somewhere playing around in the Gunks. I had been invited, and it sure would have been fun, but I had already made plans. Today I would take my friends to Ragged Mtn in Berlin county, CT. With a cough and a splutter (from both myself and the car) we zoomed north and headed towards what would prove to be a great day’s rock-hopping above the golden leaves of Fall.

The plan involved finding some easy climbing and doing a little self-rescue practise. With our big Arizona trip coming up I wanted James to go through a few extra details and get a stronger grip on gear-placing and anchor-building. John had emailed a couple of good ideas and with the Traprock guide in hand we marched confidently under the Main Cliff.

The place was deserted. Weird. Absolutely gorgeous day too. (JP would report a similar state of affairs at the Gunks). I found Vector (which John led last weekend) and used it to orient myself with regard to the topo-maps in the guide. Nearby was a climb called …

Wiessner Slab 5.3 ***
     FA – Fritz Wiessner, William Burling, 1933
Start near the left side of the Slab and step up right to a crack and some large steps leading to a horizontal traverse line. Then move right and ascend the small inside corner to the top. Since the exit routes from the top are more difficult, be prepared to continue on or rappel. Also, be particularly careful not to dislodge any loose rock from the top, since the area below is often crowded with climbers.
     a. Crack Variation 5.3 Instead of traversing right to the inside corner, continue straight up the crack. [p226, Traprock, Ken Nichols]

Mr Nichols’ guide is, frequently, a delight to behold. The topo-drawings of the cliff are consistent, clear and uncluttered. The route descriptions are usually excellent. This particular description was of unparalleled clarity. If only I had read it carefully.

I looked up the slab and my eye lazily followed the crack line (i.e. the crack variation) and I completely missed the traverse and the following inside corner. Fortunately the variation was no harder than the principal line. Unfortunately my gaze followed the line up to a big ledge and then on to a much larger corner crack to the top. This last corner crack I initially believed to be part of the Wiessner route. How wrong I was.

We discussed our plan of attack. Everyone assumed that I had competently researched the line and mildly accepted my strategy of “going for the top”. It didn’t look more than twice the length of my 60 metre rope, so Josephine would go in the middle and Wolfgang at the other end. He would then trail the 50 metre rope for James, who would be responsible for cleaning up the gear. I handed over to James one of two brand new Motorola T6220’s … my latest toys … I’m sick to death of shouting hoarsely from atop windblown crags. Following this I stepped up and followed the Weissner Slab (crack variation).

It was an easy ascent, very easy on the first half counterpointing a couple of interesting moves on the second, but overall a pleasant stroll up to a big rock-strewn ledge which lay beneath the big corner crack that I had my eye on. Hey that looks pretty serious. I thought. I decided to try out my shiny new walkin’ talkin’ thang.

Boop Beep Boopily Beep.
     Pppffft crackle crackle … ”Yeah mate?”
“Ah, it looks a bit tricky up here.”
     Ccchhsss … “Really?”
“Yeah I think I’m going to set an anchor and start bringing you guys up now, I’ll let you know when I’m done.”
     Bzzt crackle … “Ok.”
Cool. These things work pretty well.

After about a thousand years I found a slim vertical crack I could place two totally bomb-proof nuts and one merely fantastic nut, enough for the obligatory three-point belay anchor. I called back down and asked James to set Josephine up for the ascent and then get back to me. He tied her into the middle of the red rope I had trailed, made sure that she was ok and then told me she was ready. I replied that she was on belay and could start anytime. All communication was done quietly and efficiently over the radios, no vein-bulging, eye-popping, unintelligible shouting at each other like incohate madmen. God bless the age of microelectronics.

Josephine climbed up with very little difficulty. It was her first time on real rock, ever. She had been to the climbing gym only twice before. As her head popped over the edge I asked her to hold still so I could take a photograph of her smiling face, a carpet of golden forests and sparkling ponds in the background. She then clambered up, talking exitedly about how the climb went, and happily sat down against the back wall. Wolfgang came up next, also enjoying it, he noted the difference between this climb and the big friction route we had done up in New Hampshire in August. Wolfgang was by now feeling very cold, he was already shivering as he sat down next to Josephine. James followed up last and I had the usual trouble of keeping the belay up to his speed, this despite the fact that he had to slow down two or three times to whip out the pro I had placed on my lead.

“Mate.” He said, looking up. “There is no way that’s a 5.3 climb.”

We were all staring up at the final corner crack. I had to agree, that didn’t look easy at all. We decided that we had probably done the Weissner climb and people would normally descend from here. I hadn’t seen the rap-rings yet, so I was convinced that I still had to at least get myself up this difficult looking line. What was this anyway? If I had bothered to look in the book (which was currently in the backpack on James’ back) I would have read the following …

Tower Crack 5.7 **
     FA – Fritz Wiessner, William Burling, Percy Olton, 1933
The strenuous inside corner that forms the left side of the recess has been known at various times as Mummery Crack and Weissner Crack. The present name was inspired by a climb on Devils Tower in Wyoming. [p227, ibid]

I said that I would have a shot at this, I thought it didn’t look too hard and that I could get up there. The others agreed and James put me on belay and I started up. Gosh, this is tricky. Right from the start it isn’t clear where, for example, your feet are supposed to go. Or rather it is, except that these seemed (like the handholds) hugely spaced. The crack is periodically off-width too. How the hell did old Fritzy do this anyhow? I got up to about half-way (the whole route is very short, no more than about 8 metres) and spent a long time going no-where. A brilliant hand-hold was out of reach, the crack was very wide, I was on my very tippy toes on the right and smearing on the left. The features inside the main crack were very smooth and not easily grasped. Ack. There were small, short and shallow fissures in the left wall. I had placed a rather dodgy nut in one of these and used it as insurance pro to back up the huge #3.5 camalot I had wedged in the back of the main crack. I jammed my whole left leg into the big crack and pulled on the nut. This lifted me up to the good (but small) handhold on the right, which I grabbed, and left me with no place for my feet. My left leg was jammed into the crack, my right foot was dangling uselessly. I then proceded to use a technique I had previously witnessed only in my childhood. I had, you see, once lived in Papua New Guinea. There I saw children my own age climbing coconut trees, wrapping their whole bodies around the trunk and sort of inch-worming their way rapidly up to great clumps of delicious coconuts suspended at perilously high elevations. So I wrapped myself around the very smooth, rounded right edge of the crack and wriggled upwards as best I could, jamming my back or left-leg against an opposing wall as needed. Eventually I could stand on something and the rest was relatively easy. I got into a notch and then walked up to the top of the cliff. There were zero opportunities to place a belay anchor at the top. I noticed that a little ways off to the right of our route, someone had set up long lengths of webbing to anchor a line somewhere in the vicinity of the Wet Wall. If I had similar lengths of webbing I could set up an identical anchor for my group, but I didn’t. Damn.

The skies were rapidly clouding over, and at the top a strong breeze was blowing enough to make me feel the chill. Winter is returning folks, let us make no mistake about it.

At length we decided on the following. I crept back down to the finishing notch and set up a strong anchor so that James could lower me back to where they were waiting. That done we decided to let Josephine and Wolfgang try Tower Crack on top-rope, after they had a go (each of them managing, alas, only halfway) I lowered them both to the base of the Weissner Slab. I top-roped Tower Crack, cleanly this time, and then set up to belay for James’ attempt to join me at the top.

There was some commotion below at the bottom. Wolfgang shouted up that someone was throwing stones from atop the cliff, quite nearby. I went, of course, insane. Scrambling madly to the very top I saw to my right a troop of elementary school-aged children under the less than effective stewardship of two old dudes. I hurled enraged imprecations at the group, my language descending almost to that of an angered primate. With all the cams and krabs and nuts and hexes jangling madly in response to my wild gesticulations I probably looked of dangerously unstable mind. The group hurried away from my foul-mouthed curses as fast as they could.

That done I snuck back down to the belay point and calmed down. Time to belay for James. We both privately wondered if James could do this climb. He is gaining technique and strength by leaps and bounds in the gym, but he is a little shy of attempting the harder stuff outside. That said, James did the climb with no falls and no pulling on the rope. He used his height to some small advantage and he also employed those piffling fissures on the left wall with marked success. It was an excellent solution. We were both immensely gratified. Shaking hands we collected all the remaining gear and walked off to find the descent gully.

Rejoining Wolfgang and Josephine, where we found the former teaching the latter how to belay, we decided to indulge in a little anchor-building and self-rescue. After some preamble demonstration at the base I got James to lead up about 4 metres or so up Weissner Slab and set a good three-point belay anchor. I had sidled up there unroped to oversee things, while Wolfgang kept him on belay. James was shown how to set up a redirected belay in preparation for bringing up a partner. We discussed the many merits and (slight) failings of his set-up and then had Wolfgang lower him to the ground. I downclimbed and we then did some prussiking up the rope (which I had fixed). Everyone had a go at this, slightly bruising but definitely exhausting, procedure and all displayed a measure of competence. I then demonstrated how to escape the belay in an emergency situation. Time was getting on and so we decided to go and do one more route before heading home.

We went and did Ancient Way (5.4). Something I had done with John last week. It is a more vertical climb than Weissner, but it is still easy enough for Wolfgang and Josephine. I went up it, feeling far less secure than I had climbing for John, but managed to finish it without incident and a respectable run-out at the end. Josephine came next and struggled for a while at about half-way. With James relaying to me via the radio some instruction for slack and such (the wind was blowing too strongly for me to hear Josephine’s calls) she eventually made her way to the top. She said that this climb was a bit scary but she was glad to have done it. Wolfgang followed, with slightly less trouble, he got to the top and hugged Josephine fiercely … so proud of her climbing today we were all. James followed, cleaning, reaching, practically leaping from hold to hold. We were done, the afternoon grew old, the wind blew harder and we were all getting chilled to the bone. Time to go home. Magnificent day.