15 March 23, Autumn is moving slowly moving into town and we are still working to get the Mount Chalet into shape and amidst building a home gym in the garage and frequent spells of drizzle we managed to squeeze in a quick session down at Sharon Stone and Dark Gully. The weather was a little fierce, with occasional rain and gusts of wind, so there was no one around on the path down Porters Pass, which was a welcome reprieve from the bustling weekend traffic of weekend-warriors. Ryna and I were late in the afternoon – deciding between a gym session and a rock session but luckily the rock won, and went straight down to get to business. A quick lap on Sensory Overload 23*** to put the draws on for Ryan to see if he would like the moves. I had some faint memories of the battle inherent in this climb, slow building pump, but easily relieved with occasional kneebars. Last section boulder problem with high left hand undercling to gain some good crimps. Keep it together to climb the chains. Mostly nice moves on big jugs with some rests and I managed to retro-flash it with some screaming and shouting. The wind was picking up after Ryan’s session on the route to work out all the moves and we were a little wind-swept on the exposed ledge. A quick mental note for the exposed 21 around the corner toward Heathcliff and we decided to head back into the relative protection of Dark Alley for one more quick climb. I had tried Find the Positive 23** before but could not remember much about it. I was going for the retro-flash again while putting the draws on for Ryan. First move is almost the crux with a long reach from a match over the starting lip, quite tricky, then easy moves on jugs getting steeper. Up higher, move right to a little cave with good underclings and a kneebar if required, final section traverses left with a sloper in the middle and then jugs to the anchor. Felt harder than I remembered, but I am not used to warming up on 23s so it was a nice change to get right down to business and see what can be done. Overall a short and quick section with a nice walk thrown in for good measure and then a pup meal as rewards. This is just the beginning…. |
