So back in Washington and back on my Gold Bar project. I headed up to the Equinox boulder this afternoon to arrive just as the sun was hitting the holds straight on. 80 degrees and 70% humidity! Despite that, I came the closest I have been to climbing this one, latching the right hand crimp a couple times only to have my heel blow just milliseconds after. I think next time I head up it will be earlier in the day before the sun reaches this bloc. Here is some bits and pieces of my day:
And a video of my friend Kelly doing Equinox:
7 comments:
plz expln vegetable finish moves.
rock looks ill.
Hayden, A few years ago I went to Leavenworth and I wasn't very impressed. I thought the rock wasn't so good. that being said, gold bar looks insane. How does it compare? quality? quantity? obviously there is alot of potential in WA. and I think it could be really sick. any thoughts?
the rock in gold bar is better but there is less of it. it is this really fine grained granite, more so than evans and does not have any of the hydrothermal viens running through it (think the pink strips on the dali wall around ode that tend to be blocky). it is also amazingly solid. i only know one problem that has ever broken there. there is a ton more rock around gold bar that is similar. johnny g and crew have been putting a lot of work into new problems near the town of index about five miles down the road including an 8b that is supposed to be second only to the teacup (8b, leavenworth) in terms of quality of rock, visual aesthetics, movement, and difficulty in washington. if you are willing to hike (multiple hours to days) then there is a ton more rock like gold bar to be climbed on near alpine or subalpine lakes.
as for if you did not like leavenworth, i would be tempted to say you did not see the right things, since i don't enjoy some of the older problems as much in the area. a huge amount of new stuff has been put up in the last couple years and tends to be cooler lines in my mind but this could be a personal opinion and leavenworth just did not mesh with you. there is a ton of other cool stuff to be climbed and since it feels like there are really only about 10 people in washington putting time into new development its there to be done. the same as gold bar in terms of willingness to hike is true for surrounding alpine areas.
on a separate note, a friend of mine got word from one of the main sport climbing developers that the north cascades town of mazama has amazing bouldering to be developed. his words were think bishop next to rmnp next to joes. while this sounds too good to be true i checked some books out on washington geology and found that there are indeed granitic, migmatite (the highest metamorphic facies, rmnp rock but more swirly), next to sandstone formations, all within 20 or so miles of each other. who knows, it could be amazing.
as for finish moves, you top out between two trees but the holds are good enough it really is not scary or an issue. slab continues for 20 feet or so and then you come down the backside but i downclimbed the tree. however, if we wanted to go tactical error style and create a stand start then i guess i dabbed on the topout but not going all the way.
i was asking b/c kelly yards on the tree to top out. just curious if this was proper, or just messing around on his part.
cool, i got a very thourough tour from kelly sheridan. I was also told Leavenworth was better than Squamish, and I very much disagreed with that. I just wasnt psyched on the grainy nature of the granite. Very pretty and there were a couple of really nice problems, Cotton Pony and that V7 at the beach, but other things like the Peephole, the sail, Goicechea, the practicioner etc I thought were not that great. Boulder canyon quality on worse rock.
there was a nice project, the finish to the hueco wall near the peephole, has that thing been done? I thought that was really nice.
anyways, gold bar looks very good. i think I just heard alot of hype and was expecting park/poudre/evans quality.
anyways just my 2 cents
Jamie: the rock in Leavenworth is definitely grainer and I would imagine you would enjoy the bouldering around the gold bar area more then. as for the hueco wall project, it got done this fall and wall called something like clorica V10.
JJ: the topout is easily done without the tree but you have to know what you are grabbing cause it is a bit of a blind reach over the lip to some seams. i know other people have topped it out with the tree.
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