Smith: Christmas in July

Pretty! Agro gully
One of Lisa'a P-town friends on the Quickening, one of the 6 climbing it that day
Agro...
Chas on an 11a
Dom on the same problem

Well, not exactly. It was only 70 in the shade and jackets were needed in the mornings and evenings. For this spur of the moment trip, I was accompanied by Dom, Lisa and Chas. Day 1 was sunny and we accidentally went to lower gorge. After going through my options I decided to give Badfinger a burn. It is a stellar 10b crack and I fell at the crux(3rd trad fall ever) and took once more but did all the moves. It was real fun and I would like to come back for the Red point. Next we headed over to the Pheonix Butress and I got destroyed on a techy 11c. I wasn't to psyched on the whole smith rock pebble smeary techy thing...
Day 2 was better and after warming up we headed to agro gully where armed with beta I managed a flash of the quickening, 12c. Then the day heated up and we finished it off watching Lisa hike Henious Cling 12a for the onsight! I might return in fall but we'll see...


In other news I'm almost done with the Olympia area bouldering guide. Turns out there will be aprox 100 problems spread throughout the county with even more rock outcroppings for those willing to hike. If all goes well I'll be attending UW this fall and that will be the guides release date, ideally. Fossil Rock bouldering isn't included due the horrendous approach, poison oak, ect. Here are some pics from the Skookumchuck crag.

Wet, but could clean up nicely, bout 20-25 feet, overhanging basalt, just need to remove grass from top, could also be a high ball wall.
But might just go to the gym...

Rat Cave: Knee Bars and Stick Clips

This past weekend Lisa and I ventured on south to spend a weekend on the steep basalt crag of Rat Cave. We started on Friday and after getting close to onsighting the 'warm up' I tried a couple of other lines. One line I like was Shitfire 5.13b/c. This line starts up a good 5.12a and veers straight up some steep bulges. After going clip to clip I managed all the moves but the route was gonna be a race against the clock. Lisa then sent the 5.12b second go and returned to her propaganda-esc 12c.
We came back on Sunday depumped and armed with beta from the locals. It was nice. The weather was just cool enough and after receiving the correct sequences managed a send of shitfire 3rd go of the day. The route comes down to big moves off of pinches, underclings, and the ocasional sloper and crimp. The blockiness lends itself to many, many drop knees and these were key to the send. Another thing we learned is it is the norm to stick clip the first two bolts here. I also sticked clip a pre placed draw for the first time, on the 7th try! Lisa made great progress on Shitfire and she'll be returning to the crag all fall. I'm planning on returning too later this ummer to finish up some of the other good lines. If you like steep and bouldery, this is the place for you. But there is loose rock, trains yards away, a highway in the background, rats...

Also, Dom, Lisa and I meandered up to Little Si yesterday. Oval was wet so I worked my way up Gerbil Rising 13c and was able to get my beta back and could everything except for the Flatliner crux. I'm psyched to send this by the end of Aug. Dom is also ready for a change so for the next couple weeks we'll be venturing out to some new crags and try some new stuff!