bear valley epic

(me on the Bear Valley project)
(photo courtsey of : Daniel)

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well, brett, scott, taz and i headed up to bear valley for the http://www.adventuresportsfestival.com/ bouldering competition at hells kitchen.

we headed up saturday in the later morning, the comp didn't start till 4, so we figured we would take our time. but just as we got almost arnold, the road was blocked. there were apparently 4 roadside fires that blocked the road. we almost turned around because they said it would be 4-5 hours until they opened the road again. it still was about 3 hours. needless to say we did not get to the comp untill around 7.

right off the road was a boulder that seemed to house some potential. i checked it out and there was a cool sloper problem on the left, and a project up the middle of the face. the sloper problem was pretty cool 'g-ma', my tips got thrashed up on the coarse granite up there, its really fucking gritty.

there was a really cool project that started low, went up to a decent crescent, then went up to a pretty henius gaston, and then big reach out to a sidepull, where it is really hard to get your feet set up and hard to crank just on the gaston with your left arm. it didn't go down while we were there, but it will eventually.

we stayed the night and next morning walked around, but needless to say did not find a whole huge amount of potential there for really good bouldering. it was really slopey, gritty with minimal features. but i'm sure there is a few gems out there and probaly a decent little colony of sickness.

so fucking stoked

so fucking stoked to get out and climb again.. been doing well in the gym getting in shape..

going to be up in hetchy the memorial day weekend, I got the DL on the area from Tim Tuomey, he guided me to the best bouldering area he had found..

can't wait to get out and develop some problems out there in the awesome fjord

The season is coming upon us..

been training a bunch latley, working on stretching/balance/core

ready to start heading up to tahoe, then bishop and yos...

what the hell is going on here?

well.. not much.. as you can see..

been getting back into it.. got sat/sun off, so the weekends in the valley will be starting up soon..

went to mortor and did some laps on the ramp, good to get back out on real rock and grate my tips up.

lemme know if you do wanna go climbing with me.. probably stay local untill it gets good in the valle.

Climbing ? whats that ?

Yah, been quite a while since I've been climbing.. but been keeping in shape and working hard to fix my bad posture/shoulder.. been trying to build strengh in it and workin on stretching/flexibility/core strenght.

waiting on the spring temps coming through and for me to start working a steady M-F 9-6 job.... yay heh

Yos (april 13,14)

Cave Route/Sentinals

Went up to the valley for the weekend with Scott Monica and Drew Dog..

We started at the Sentinals at the midget boulders to warmup on. Scott brought me over to a problem he had put up a while ago (Sent Arete) that was really cool, it has some technical/powerfull moves down low, then some really technical moves to gain the lip. I found some new beta that may make it a lil bit easier. the line is definatley ***.

We then headed down to the B1 boulder and I got on No Holds Bard & Cave Route, both great problems. I got beat up so I didn't finish either of them, but I got most of the moves worked out. I had some trouble with the first strong move of No Holds Bard.

We then headed in for the evening to camp.

Saturday morning looked like it was pretty overcast, and we didn't really get an early start. We headed to Camp4, warmed up at the wine boulders then headed to the Goodrich Boulder to get on Tendons Give. This problem is awesome; long, pumpy, with a definate crux in the middle. I had worked out some of the moves a while ago, but I put it all together to get all the way up to the last few moves, but my lack of endurance pumped me out. I can't wait to get back on it and blast through the thing :)

I did a problem that may be a new one, it starts on the lowest jug just after the crux of Tendons Give. It goes up to the crimp you use for Tendons, and then you use a crimp in the small seam and another little fin to gain a good jug up top and a fun mantle. If it was an FA, I am naming it Moss Monkey.. I think it went at v4 maybe because it used some smaller overhanging crimps.. no one else around tried the problem, so it will need a repeat to get a solid grade. We did get rained out and spend the rest of the day at camp.

While drinking i was upset because we got rained out and decided to go check out this project I have seen a few times a little better. It is awesome; starts on a prow, matched on this huge pinch. you then move to to another pinch that is a flake with your right hand. then move to this undercling/gaston thing. then it looks like you grab some bad sloper pinches and the crux is through here to get to a really good ledge (hasn't been cleaned yet, so there may be more then meets the eye). from here you mantle and then a little slab bit.

I had to head back home; luckily enough I made it back home through the snow without getting stuck in the valley and missing work the next day :)

An awesome trip ! And I'm so glad to get back into climbing and be out in Yos again :)

Stinson/Mickey's

Z and I headed to Mickeys & Stinson on friday.

we hitup stinson first. we headed to the are you experienced boulder and got on the v4 arete first. the sit-start seemed like it was pretty hard, you start on a decent shelf and then huck up to an undercling. I was able to find a decent edge to avoid the huge undercling move, but this was my warmup and the crimps weren't feeling so great so we decided to move onto another problem. Next we got on this cool problem called 'super slope'. you start on good holds, then move out to a gaston, where you get a heel hook and rock all the way up to this huge bulge. but it's not over yet.. you then move to the lip witch is just bad slopers :( didn't get the finish, but the bottom steep moves are great fun.

We then headed over to the south-side and got on High Rev Motorsports.. neither of us got it, but we made some good progress... I started some work on a crack problem that goes up the north face..

great day of climbing, espically since it had been quite a long while since i've climbed !!

YAY Z :) looking forward to getting out to the valley soon :)

yah, i stopped climbing..

for just a bit.. i think i need to do some fixing on my shoulder and this time off is good for it, although it will hurt my strength horribly. I got a lot of shit that I want to do in the valley this season and a lot of new stuff and a lot of stuff for the website.

i think i'm going to finally get back into it after a few months off from.. yah stupid shit.

been working hard on the betabase website design.. hopefully randy will do some sick backend programming for it, so we get all the cool jazzy stuff.

well...

it's been definatley over a month that I have climbed outdoors.. I cut my hand and that put me out for a bit, but then a few weeks ago, I got this huge lockup of some muscles in my back.. this was a major pain in the ass and they were locked up for good week.. laura was able to massage them back to a better state and I used some muscle relaxors (I hate those f'ing things, but I got some mild ones that the Dr. said would do some good to help unlock the muscle and have very little mental side effects.) to help as well.

So i've been out of the climbing scene for a bit, but I have been working with Paul on the new BetaBase site witch I am stoked on and it should be a really really cool resource for yosemite/tahoe boulderers.

hopefully I will be able to get out and climb.. and probably not this weekend (may try to get to mickeys/stinson or mortor this saturday) but the weekend after.. soon gadget.. sooon !!! hehe

Healing

Well, the wound seems to be healing well, but the weather seems to be fairing poorly. Should be almost fully healed (in climbing condition) for this weekend.

Hopefully there will be a break in the weather for fri/sat and I can make a trip to Stinson Beach or somewhere nearby.

Confirmed.

Well, the Dr. took a look at my wound yesterday and bandaged me up a bit better..

but his initial reaction said it all, I definatley needed stitches. He said that it looks pretty good, not infected or anything, but keeping the wound clean and dry and closed is the best and will help it heal much faster. So he used some butter-fly type thing to keep the wound closed so it will heal in a few weeks rather then a few months ;)

I think i'm going to need and take off a week or so from climbing, the better I let it heal, the faster it will heal :(

The Jungle Gym

Well, I headed up to the valley on friday untill saturday with the dogs.

But my trip got cut short and I headed back home friday night.

I went to explore this new area that I had seen last year and wondered if there was potential. I got there and looked around and found a cool arete that I wanted to do. I setup my stuff and then wandered around with the dogs to see what else lie around. There is much potential for problems, but not much steep stuff I saw as of yet, maybe some stuff up the hill a little bit.

I figured I would call this little area 'The Jungle Gym' because it is decently wooded, damp and there is a lot of lichen/moss around.. a little jungle in the yosemite valley.

Soo, onto what cut (literally) my trip short. I was walking back to my spot, when I slipped on something and put my hand down to catch myself.. on a razor sharp edge of a rock ! It cut my palm pretty deep and took a little while to stop the bleeding, but I figured I should just head back home and take care of my wound. I wasn't feeling too well to start the trip out, Laura has just broken up with me, so that is really hard. We had been together for almost two years now, and I hope that she will reconsider our breakup after she has had some time to herself that she so badly needs.

Yosemite.org Article on Bouldering

http://yosemite.org/newsroom/clips2006/may/051706.htm

Found this article on yosemite.org . Always good to see what others think of our climbing and impact :)

Yosemite Bouldering

(Root Canal ***v7)



Made a trip up to the valley on Friday with Scott, Monica and A-Dog :) had a sweet time !

First headed over to the Awahnee boulders, I got on a cool v2 named 'vague crack' and did this awesome unnamed traverse that went at like v3/v4 (the start to the Myles traverse). Monica got the traverse as well, it was really fun !!

We then headed over to Curry Village. I wanted to get on Root Canal(v7***), a sweet leaning corner/dihedral that has some cool moves, but maybe a little soft for the grade (the crux was pulling off the ground for me). We then wandered around and I put up this cool (v4?) overhanging arete that was also a lot of fun. I named it 'Tree Climbing' because you need to downclimb the tree to get off the boulder ;)

We then headed out of the valley and stopped by this awesome v6*** (Pop Top) near yos falls that had AWESOME moves on it, but no one got the problem. Our excuse... we were too tired ;)

A very very fun trip, hopefully I'll get some pic's to put up soon!

Rainbow, CA (in the snow)

Well, I had a free day yesterday and decided that Taz needed to see some snow. I had been watching the weather and decided that the snow level was low enough to go climb at Rainbow!

I had a great trip, but when I got there, it started to remind me of a experience I had in Rock Creek. I need to buy some snow-shoes :)

First when I got there, I pulled into the usual 'parking' area, only to find out it was completley iced over and my car got stuck in the snow. (2wd yota pickup with hard street tyres). I was fortunatley smart enough to use some towels to gain enough momentum to get out of my prediciment.

After wasting a whole crapload of energy getting my car out, I decided to head over to the Jawbone area. I warmed up on the short slope and bulge next to the jawbone boulder. I wanted to get on Ishmael, but there was ice up at the top, so I figured it could wait.

I started to get on the 'evil arete' but got shutdown because (lame excuse to come...) my shoes were wet ;). I walked over to the other arete of this boulder and found a cool technical crimping problem with GREAT feet that I aptly named 'Righteous Arete' (v5). Lynn and Paul put up 'evil arete' because it was evil and had no feet, so I named this 'Righteous arete' because god gave it good feet :)

The rest of the day I spent hiking around with the dogs and trying this crimper dyno thing that was pretty fun and I almost got.

All in All, a great trip and fun day :)

(update)
Forgot to mention, that it looked like someone had done a sit-start to Ishmael

Black Plague (v6) or Pinkey Paralasys?

Well, a project I had been working on at Mortor Rock finally went, I dunno if this had been done before, the holds I used seemed to be used as gastons on two different problems rather then sidepulls for this 'double arete' bulge problem.

The problem starts just under 'the wave' start on some underclings and uses the first few jugs of 'the wave' to gain two sidepulls to use as a double arete. You then work your way up the bulge to some sharp slopers and topout, the problem has some cool knee-barring techniques. Topping out straight up over the sharp slopers probably goes at like v7, while if you topout right or left on better holds probably goes at v6.

HP40, AL

working moves on Popeye (v5)

Well, on a trip to visit the parents in Georgia, I planned on trying to hitup some of the local bouldering and the classic Horse Pens 40 in Alabama.

The bouldering there is awesome, the rock is bullet hard sandstone, and some of the stuff has little quartz pieces embedded, while other is smooth as glass.

I did some of the classic problems; Bum Boy, Popeye, Hammerhead witch all were great problems with good moves on them. I also got on a couple problems that weren't so great; like Boy Scout Route witch seemed a most contrived problem and a couple v2's that felt more like VB even in my tennies. I even put up a cool new problem out there that requires a huge shouldery move off the bat then some cool moves with a comitting heel hook up an arete, aptly named 'Keebler's Arete' after my family helped with the FA :)

All in all, I really liked this place. I don't know if it would be worth a trip to go to JUST HP40, but a trip to hit-up all the bouldering in the south would be well worth it. This resolved my past experiences with sandstone at castle rock, and HP40 makes castle a choss pile of crap.

Orange Buddah Arete (v8)

Got to go out to Mickey's Beach on friday afternoon before the rain moved in saturday. It was a glorious day and I got a glorious send of one of the best lines out there, 'Orange Buddah Arete' (v8).

Valley 11/4 weekend

Hitup the valley this weekend..

saturday ; got on the 'glass house' area stuff, fun.. then Monica got on Cocaine Corner and got so close to finishing it. We went to try and find the candy-lands, but got a little lost due to road closure, so Monica & Andrew needed to head back to the bay, so Scott and I headed over to curry. I got on Root Canal a sweet dihedrial, and we both cleaned a short arete that Scott got the FA on.

sunday ; we warmed up at camp4, I worked a little bit on blue swede shoes and then we went over to the Thriller boulder. Scott and Lyn got on Thriller while I worked on the Force/Farce. We then headed over to the flatline boulder to do some highballing. We met up with the majority of the yosemite bouldering crew and a bunch of people did the highball. I tried Flat that ends on a jug halfway up the boulder witch had some awesome moves on it.

She Hates Me (v4)

Posts

Well, it has been quite a while since I've posted, but I figured I would post something today. I have been trying to climb a lot latley and been up to tahoe, yos and mickey's beach.

Tahoe has been great, went with scott and got a good stand/jump start to Midnight Train and a cool unnamed climb at the top of snowshed wall.

Just went to yos last weekend and got soo close to a project I have called 'Crossroads Moe'. We have been working on some bouldering development in the valley.

Went to Mickey's Beach and put up three new lines; Wipe Out, She Hates Me and Bye Bye Laura. I got on High Rev Motorsports, but I got shutout by the rising tide getting the holds wet. I also got on Orange Buddah Arete at the end and worked out all the moves and even got to the jugs at top, but was too tired to send the whole thing. Next time...

Yos 4/15

Scott and I headed up to the valley for a day trip, we were to meet Lyn and Paul up there for a day of bouldering.

Scott and I left a little later then planned, but it worked out because when we got there Paul & Lyn had barley got up ;)

First thing, we headed to the wine boulder area to warmup and get on cocaine corner. Lyn and I had both not done cocaine corner, and with a few attempts and some good beta, both got the problem!!! YAY

After that, we headed up to 'sonic wave' aka 'fuck my right bicep'..

Lunchtime... Then headed over to the Crystals where I had a problem that I had found a few months ago and Scott and I cleaned like last month. Paul got the problem and one of the huge jugs that we thought were good came off with a 3' piece of granite..

Paul got the problem and then everyone else got on it and got the problem WOOT :) Its a sweet problem, very technical with the footwork. You have to step through while smearing, what fun.

Scott then showed Paul his problem 'fold your pad' witch is a short, yet wicked hard bulge.

We then warmed down? on another good problem at the crystals that both paul and scott got.

you can see some pictures at Bler Photo and Raw Fingers

untouched

god, its been at least a month since i have been climbing outdoors...

my project remains (hopefully) untouched.. and clean... ready to be sent down this summer..

mantle start into henious slab..

too bad i'm not heading to the valley.. rain this weekend, but bishop (and surrounding areas) the next.. hopefully we will make it out to crystal ridge as well, sounds like a sweet spot..

saw a photo in the new UC mag of Rock Creek (another bishop bouldering area that I want to visit)..

the valley 2/25 to 2/26

headed to the valley for the weekend..

got in fri evening with the GF and setup camp around 11PM.

sat morning got up early and wandered over to mirror lake(almost) to take some pictures and hang with the GF. we then headed back to camp4 to meetup with scott and do the breakefest rituals (coffee, lots of it). after coffee, we headed to the crystals to warmup and I had a project there as well.

at the crystals, scott found a sweet warmup arete and cool (and much charder) stand start direct.

i spent a decent amount of time cleaning my project and trying to figure out the beta. the problem starts standing in a scoop that you mantle into and onto some slab. the slab either continues up about 20' left to a bold, proud topout, or bails out right to a slopey ramp.

after this, laura and I decided to head to get food. upon reaching into my bag to get my keys, I found my car key at a 90* angle. after trying to bend it back, it broke. i spent the rest of the day helplessly at the garage while they looked for a blank that fit my truck (to no avail). the mechanic recomended that I just put the broken key in there and drive it home. the rest of the evening I hung out at camp and cooked dinner. scott went and got another FA of the trip on a project that he had been around and helped clean a few weeks back. i checked it out but was toot tired and hungry to do anymore climbing.

Sunday ; we planned on making the hike to vernal falls. we were hoping to do this via the mist trail, but it was closed for winter that we found out from a ranger.

headed over to the trailhead after packing up camp and started our hike. the dog was not allowed, but we decided that since it was not busy and there were probably not going to be any rangers we would take the dog. it turned out really well.

we started the first part to the bridge and mist trail entrance, but it was locked and gated shut.. do you think that stopped us? hell no. we went up to find a somewhat slippery approach up the stairs that others had ventured up with us. we noticed that it actually got better with less snow once we started to get up to the top!

after reaching a small area blocked from the barrage of cold damp mist, we thought we were home free only to find... the next 20' of stairs were completley covered in 12" of ICE ! and to top it off, there were 6' icicled hanging above our head and saw many that had fallen in the past (some were almost 8" in circumfrance).. haha talk about a hike..

once at the top, we decided to take the 'open' trail back down witch was longer, but not as henious.

the dog loved the hike as we all did and it was quite the adventure that I will never forget.

you can checkout some of my photos at RAW.FOTO

sunday, 2/12

headed up to the valley for some photography and bouldering.. tried to get on 'crossraods moe' and failed agiain, also got on 'athletes die young' and worked all but the big throw..

headed over to the crystals and messed around there and found a cool new scoop problem that i didn't get an probably will go around v4-v5 (forgot the stick brush and trying to clean slab while smearing is, well, can you say, not fun ;) ).. then went to curry village to wander around and see whats out there.. found a cool v2-v3 problem that starts on a large 'chockstone' hence I named it 'chockstone'

Sat 2/11

Well, while wandering around in a nameless are of Mt. Diablo, I found some bouldering potential that I will be working to develop soon!

Bishop 1/27-1/28/06

Made a trip to bishop with Scott C. last weekend.

Got stuck in snow chain requirements on the way down, so it took forever to get there.

All in all, it was a good trip, we didn't get a copious amount of climbing in, but it was still fun.

1/27 ; went to the sads, scott got on 'enter the dragon' and made some great attempts at a brutally hard v10 that has a hard mantle at the end. I got on molly and made some progress but still have not got this (definatley the most projected problem I have). we hitup 'hotpants' on the way out, but I didn't get that either (although I did get most of the beta worked out).

1/28 ; at first we wanted to go the buttermilks, but when we heard that they were snowed in, we thought about going to 'crysta ridge' witch a few people scott had climbed with before were heading. But we decided to go to the petroglyphs because we didn't want to drive so far and then home again(i think it actually took longer to get to the petros instead of crystal ridge).

scott got to go four wheelin in his jetta to get to this place, it was awesome, scott is a four wheelin pro!

we mostly explored and found some other petros and a few good boulders nearby. we found a new line up a slopey rail. i guess i got the FA, because scott found a good edge just beyond the lip that i used to bailout and mantle to the top ;)

we aptly named this problem 'jetta four wheelin' due to our experience just gettting there!

we found some other good stuff and a hard v9-v10 project that we found some people working on.

will post pictures soon

Bishop, 12/26

Made a trip to Bishop with the girlfriend for Dec 25-Dec28th...

Seems to me like the less I care or effert I put into bouldering the better I do ;) go figure..

DID :
Ironman Traverse
Funky Tut
some v6? (with weathered edges) on Tut bldr
and awesome problem at some unknown boulders (near the huge petroglyphs)

Yosemite (12/3/05)

One Move Wonder (v8)Munchkin Lunge (v6)Cocaine Corner (v5)

Bishop (11/12/05)

'on' Ironman Traverse (v4)
'on' Cave Route (v6)

'on' Gleaner (v6)

Joshua (v3)

J-tree

Slick Willy (v2)Campsite #21

Laura, J tree & a boulder

JBMF (v5r)

J tree sunset

Joshua tree is an awesome park witch begs for scrambling and solo'ing !

The rock is gritty and kicked my ass the first day there, leaving my tips and palms bloody.

Yos Bouldering

The Hexcentric (v6)One Move Wonder (v8)Cocaine Corner (v5)

weekend trip to yos.. got on cocaine corner & one move wonder... soo close on both, but shutdown.

next day climbed with lyn and paul, we got on 'the hexentric' and i sent it after only a few tries, woot :) makes up for the shutdown..

scott got 'the king' on his second try (the first his foot slipped when starting) and another crazy jump start v9

saddle boulders

went to the saddles, i got a few decent v4's.. the area has a lot of potential.. scott almost got 'midnight train' , a sweet v7.

we went to the snowshed boulders and found a sweet v5? rail that was a lot of fun.

rainbow

'the slope' next to ishmael boulder (v4?)

Evil Arete (v5/6)

'unknown' Sugar Cube (v5)

'unknown' Sugar Cube (v3)

ahhh, rest...

Rainbow has some awesome bouldering !!!

Checkout the 1070 boulders, the sugar cube boulder(just next to the 1070 house) is home to some awesome problems.

secrets & bliss

bouldering crueunknown (v3?)

'Oh Yah', night bouldering

went to the secrets with liane, scott got clandestino (v7).. i was still injured so i layed low, but got on a few good repeats at the secrets and this sweet problem at bliss..

why ask why

Don't you just hate it when what you absolutley do not want happen does ?

Injury blows the big one, and espically when your climbing hard. But what can you do ? I injured myself on 'the bubble' at indian rocks establishing in the pocket.

I guess there is nothing to do but RICE it and work on my other weaknesses such as core strengths. Give it a few weeks then wean back into it !

YAY injury !

shhh, its a secret

Ever get tired of a million people bouldering next to you outside and feeling like your at a gym ? Ever wait in line to have a try at a boulder problem ? Feel like your bouldering at the happys ? Well, you will never deal with that at 'The Secrets'. In the cource of a whole weekend there we saw three total people and only one there to do any sort of 'actual' climbing.

Scott and I visited this area and got in some great climbing. The rock here, is.. well.. bomber, granite, tough, gritty, knobs, typical tahoe granite.

Saturday we visited The Sticks & The Mystics, both great bouldering areas. Both Scott and I got FA's (Moonshadow [Scott] & Flesh Wound [Me]) on some great problems.

Sunday we visited The Snags, witch also had great bouldering.