After 6 weeks of sitting inside watching the spring season pass by while waiting for my knee to feel better, I was abnormally psyched to meet up with Nic (of Five Ten fame), Steve and Remo for a day of bouldering at Devil’s Lake. Of course, I didn’t actually climb anything as I’m still trying to be “patient”, but it was fun nonetheless.
I had a bit of time to kill before everyone arrived so I took the Merrimac ferry and walked on the Ice Age Trail near the east entrance to the park. Unfortunately, my attempt to reach the railroad grade near tempting looking rocks on the south bluff were repelled by a weird marshland of sorts and I retreated to drier ground.
After killing a sufficient amount of time everyone showed up and we immediately headed to the talus beneath the West Bluff to check out Alpine Club (V9) and Beautiful Soup (V8/9ish).
Alpine Club is a short problem of pure difficulty that revolves around locking off a bad right hand edge long enough to hit (and hold) a small horizontal crimp.
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After working out a sequence Nic manage to do the problem starting on the 2nd hold, but he wasn’t able to add in the first move.
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Next trip for sure.
This is a sequence of pictures of what a send might look like
Locking off the bad right hand
Hitting the bad crimp
Each streak of blood represents a time Nic’s hand blew off the slick hold and crushed his knuckles into the rock. Ouch.
Steve trying hard
After an exhausting number of attempts on Alpine Club, the crew moved one boulder uphill to try Beautiful Soup. Beautiful Soup is relatively short, like Alpine Club, but the method is quite a bit different. From the start you reach up with your right hand and establish on a sharp right hand crimp. Then you find a glassy hold to paste your foot on and explode to the less than juggy rail at half height.
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Witness several explosions below:
Josh Helke shout-out
Despite my having several frames of everyone’s hand ON the jug, noone was able to hold it. Next trip for sure…
Here are the rest of the pictures:
Nice pics Narc, it was a beautiful day out there. We’ll have to make plans to get back out and clean those lines up. Cheers, Remo
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Wow. You guys are badass. Inspiring.
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If only you saw the pictures of me sending in my tennies…
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So what are those skin-thin shoes Nic’s wearing? New, not yet released follow up to the Projects? I want INFO!!
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[jedi voice]Those are not the shoes you are looking for[/jedi voice]
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That would have been much more appropriate yesterday as it was “Star Wars Day.” May the 4th be with you.
Nice pictures! Did being occupied with the camera make it any easier to not climb?
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I would say that it definitely helped keep my mind occupied. We also spent plenty of time talking shop so it was big fun either way.
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In all seriousness, the blue shoes are something we can look forward to seeing (in some yet to be determined form) next year apparently.
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has the key maker seen a second ascent yet? id figured it would by now but who knows.
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Not that I am aware of. Alpine Club has very few (known) ascents as well.
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Blurring shoes = lame…
They looked cool before you blurred them out. Looks like good rock too.
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Seconded. Luckily I downloaded the picture, magnified, and digitally enhanced all CSI-like before the blur and will be posting them all over the internets! BWAHAHA!
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if you wanna see the shoes, just watch the video on dpm (paul robinson sending psychedelic) 😉
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Must censor it! CENSOR!
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what gives with the blurr?
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considering you can find pics of these shoes at other various locations on net seems like a shameless ploy of self promotion. pretty weak in my book.
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Heard Nic sent A.C. and B.S. the next day. True?!?!?!?
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Yes, Wednesday I believe.
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Brian- on Steve’s blog it sounds like Nic traversed left off of Beautiful Soup, but on your photo on mountainproject the arrow points right. What was the original line? Maybe Nic traversed right too, kinda hard to tell but from his description sounded left? ce
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I was always told that Eric Z traversed off right to finish when the problem was first done. Not sure which way Nic went, but to me traversing in either direction is kind of pointless.
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Hey Chris, sorry if i didn’t make it clear!! Probably should have!! Nic did end up traversing off right to finish off the problem. That’s the original way that Eric Z. did it. I think Nic fell off twice on that part. It’s no gimmie.
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Thanks gentlemen. Yeah Sweaty said that Nic had said that just the traverse was like V7 move(s). Interesting. Hope to get there today or tomorrow to go look at it myself. ce
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Just drop off…
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Narc how could I look at myself in the mirror then?
LOL. I realize we’re talking about bouldering. Who are we kidding. ce
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Oh and I think it’s a bit premature I guess for me to be talking about this. Many a stronger climber than me has been shut down up there… ce
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yes, I did traverse of right. And no, I do not think you climbed the problem if you drop off. the traverse is hard, v7 or v6?? could be really easy.. I had no spotter and no pad below me (the first time I fell). The reason it felt so hard was because of the lack of chalk and dirt on the holds.
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by the way greg..
yes, shameless but profitable it was.
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I saw Todd Mei traverse right as well. Just dropping off is not finishing the problem.
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Sorry to open the can of worms. Turns out it’s gonna be a while before I sack up for that one anyway, burly! ce
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