He's done it now...

High Exposure that is. I finale led High E with minimal beta on a beautiful September day. Meghan and I warmed-up on Horseman and broke it into two pitches to give her some practice at breaking down the anchor and giving me a little bit less rope drag after the traverse. Then we made the long walk down the carriage trail to a place I've never been, the base of High Exposure. It's only rated a 5.6+ but the final pitch has a lot to do with that. It sounds strange but my first reaction when we got to the base was, "I thought it would be bigger."

The first pitch was simply a means to an ends, it got me to the GT Ledge, the real exposure. When we first got to the ledge I didn't know what to do, organize myself for the next pitch, rest, take pictures. For the first time I was at a loss. I was just taken in by it all, the view, the people around me and what I was about to conquer. Now, that first reach around to the face where there is nothing but air to your left, right, above and below you was exhilarating, frightening and accomplishment all wrapped into one moment. The holds are all there, it just messes with your head a bit. I was so jacket up preceding the last pitch that I forgot to give Meghan and indication of what she was in for or how to approach this climb, not that I really knew myself, I didn't know what was in store for me beyond the roof, but I should have at least given her a little pep talk. When I reached the top I was hooting and hollering and dropping F bombs like a drunk trucker. Yes, I was excited. Meghan had a different expression on her face when I saw her at the top. Her face said it as well as her voice, "I'm so glad to see you." So, after she whipped the tears from her face she started to smile again. All was good as we rappelled down, Meghan likes the repelling part possibly more than the climbing.

We headed down the carriage trail back towards the parking lot and stopped at Ken's Crack for one last climb of the day. I was dreading the though of putting my shoes back on but I made it quick and as painless as possible. Meghan was just too tired to complete the route but it still ended off as a great day at the Gunks.

Another good day at the Gunks...

Seeing as how I'll be leaving for Florida in about a week to open a new restaurant, I won't be climbing any time soon. So I was going to make the most out of the time I had. I was meeting up with several people today, Meghan at Rock and Snow, and Danny and Angela at the base of Horseman. A foursome, I've never had one of those before... So, after suiting up Meghan with all the appropriate gear we were off to the Gunk's. Despite the many times I've visited, I'm still amazed at how easy the access is to some of the best climbing in the north east. We literally got out of the car walked down a flat carriage trail and were climbing in under 10 minutes. Yeah, I got a little side tracked...

Danny and Angela were running late so I decided to set up a top rope on the first route I saw, Black Fly. A nice little warm-up to get the blood flowing. After cruising that route we headed down the carriage trail even further to meet up with the rest of our group. With guide book in hand and eyes looking up to the cliff, like a Japanese tourist, I knew this had to be them. They had that look about them that I all know too well. The look of excitement and awe that most of us get our first time to the Gunk's. So lets get it on...

Getting four people to the top of a 110 ft. cliff is no easy task with two ropes. I lead, of course, and Meghan followed cleaning the gear as she climbed. Nice job by the way. Danny was next to climb. He seemed to struggle with this one a little. Trust me, going out on to the traverse can be a bit scary. No worries though. We all made it to the top and down safely. Next up was Rhododendron, a beautiful 5.6 crack. This was my highest on site at the Gunk's and it felt great, I only wish the route was longer. Angela did a nice job using some text book techniques and Meghan learned a couple of new ones herself. The ever popular foot jam and her first lay back. (tear)

To finish off the day I was looking for a nice easy multi pitch, Belly Roll is what I found. (I love the names) The first pitch might have taken a little bit too much out of Meghan, that or it had just been a long day of climbing but she just couldn't muster up the energy to finish the second pitch, so I lowered her to the bottom. Luckily two climbers on a route near by were willing to do a double rope rapell and let me clean all my gear on the way down. Thanks Max and Dan. The sunset from the top made the day a little bitter sweet. By the time I had reached the bottom the darkness had closed in and we were collecting our gear by flash light. I've said it before and I'll say it again, "I've never met a climber I didn't like." Today proved me right once again. Thanks again to Dan and Max as well as Angela and Danny for another good day at the Gunk's.

Rain at the Gunks

Well, I had planned on camping and climbing at the Gunks Wednesday threw Friday But it seems mother nature had other plans. Wednesday night was perfect sitting by the fire with a couple beers some cheese and crackers and relaxing with a good book. It was warm, the bugs stayed away and other campers in the park weren't obnoxious or loud. I was very much at peace. Now it did rain a little over night, approx. three to five in the morning, but most things seemed dry by ten o'clock. The sky was blue the sun was out and Jeff was pulling into the West Trapps parking lot to meet up with me. I though for sure we had threaded the proverbial needle.

Now Jeff had never been to the Gunks and the first climb we approached that struck my fancy was "Horseman." I started clipping gear to my harness when Jeff asked if he could take the lead on this one. I told him to have at it and I'm kind of glad he did, because the traverse around the block was a little heady even on top rope. Next on my to-do list was Middle Earth, because I still haven't lead the first pitch, but of course another group was on it. So we decided to do "Minty," a nice little 5.3. I figured it would be an easy onsight and kill some time until M.E. was available. Well, it turns out that Minty also intersects with another climb, "Tipsy Trees" that is also a 5.3. To make a long story short, we climbed the first pitch of minty, kind of, and the second and third pitch on "Tipsy Trees." It doesn't really matter because it was a fun climb either way, and thats all that matters in my book.
So, back to "Middle Earth" we go. So as I'm climbing I feel a little sprinkling of rain. I don't think anything of it because most of the day at one point or another it sprinkled a little bit. So I keep climbing and the sky just opens up and lets loose. In the words of Jeff, "the wrath of God." I've never been caught in a flash flood, but I imagine this was pretty close. Now at this point I had about four pieces of gear in and was about thirty feet of the ground. I made the decision to traverse to a near by tree and have Jeff lower me down instead of continue up the route. Jeff then cleaned the route and rappelled from the tree. We quickly packed up our gear and headed back to the parking lot. As if the rain didn't piss me off enough, the sun started to come out as we got back to the parking lot. At that point everything was soaked and we had already made the decision to leave. There is something about the first pitch of "Middle Earth." I swear there is a force that is constantly preventing me from leading it. The last time I was at the Gunks it was another group doing mock leads, and today it was another group plus the flash flood. Next time I visit the Gunks it WILL be lead, come hell or high water.

Stir Crazy in The Gunks

So a couple of my co-workers wanted to try rock climbing...
Of course they really had no idea of what to expect. All I was expecting out of the day was for everyone to have a good time, enjoy the beautiful spring weather, and as always know one getting hurt. The forecast called for sunny sky's and a high in the 70's all day. I couldn't have asked for anything better.

I would expect nothing less of James than to roll out of bed and still be in his pajamas when we met at 9:00 at "Rock and Snow." Me on the other hand had been up since 6:30 and had already packed up our gear and food for the day, stopped by the "Muddy Cup" for a bagel and coffee and was waiting outside R&S for them to arrive. So next up was getting these guys some shoes and helmets. I knew that fitting them for shoes would be interesting... If you've ever worn climbing shoes you'd know that they fit extremely tight and aren't comfortable to wear for more than about 30 minutes or so. I opted for having their shoes on the looser side because I was not about to listen to them whine all day about how their feet hurt. As I would find out later, these two where not whiners and they were more determined than I thought.

And we're off!!!! I had a couple of routes in mind that would be good first time climbs. (Black Fly, Shit or go Blind) But being a busy day at the Gunks and close to the West trapps parking lot, they were already taken. So, "Boston" ended up being our first route of the day. A nice little 5.5 crack climb that I could set up by hiking up to the anchors and rappel down to where Meghan and James were putting their shoes on and attempting to figure out how to put the harnesses on.


Jim was stoked and took the leap to go first, without any knowledge of how to climb this 50 foot crack. Putting total trust in the system and me to make sure that he wouldn't be injured. OK, somethings I just can't prevent... Maybe wearing shorts wasn't the best choice. He scraped up his knees pretty good on the first, second, third, basically on every route his knees took a beating and he just kept pushing on.
I'm pretty sure that everyone has a fear of heights, at least in one form or another, and some people react differently than others. Of course, Meghans' reaction was one that I wasn't expecting. It seems she has an extreme fear of heights that I didn't know about until she completed the first route. The only reason I could tell were from the tears dripping down the side of the cliff. When she got to the top of the route she needed to let go of the rock and lean back, trusting that the rope would lower her safely to the ground. That took a little coursing, but between Jim and I we got her to let go.

Now in true trooper spirit the two of them were ready for our next route, Betty (5.2). Now I could go on and on about the details of every route we did but that would get pretty boring pretty quick. I just wanted to say that I was blessed with a great day of climbing with awesome weather and some new friends. Here are a couple of my favorite pictures from the day.

Weekday in the Gunks

The Maple stone...

Where do I start, I guess the first impression is always a good a place as any. We pulled up to the stone farm house around 2:00 on Tuesday with not a single car in the lot. It seemed like we'd have the place to ourselves. Just a quick lay of the land revealed an abandoned grain silo, an obviously non working red barn and well landscaped grounds. Just in front of where we parked were purple butterfly bushes with tons of monarch butterflies feeding on them. The whole thing screamed RELAX.... Well, after our quick survey of the grounds we were warmly greeted by one of our hosts, Sean. He gave us a full tour of the house and choice of which room we'd like during our stay. (We ended up taking the room that we saw and chose online, the Jenkins Suite.) He explained the idiosyncrasies of the house, gave us our own key and asked what time we wanted breakfast. I swear it felt like we were visiting family and they were putting us up for a couple nights. O.K. maybe not my family, but like you'd imagine in a movie or something.

Well, since we arrived early in the day we decided to take a hike up at the Mohonk preserve. We hiked the carriage trail and watched the climbers and boulders do their thing. Autumn was taking pictures of textures which got me looking for the same. Oooh honey..... is this texture?

We met our other hostess, Pati, the next morning when she made us an incredible breakfast.

Shawangunks...

Some of the best rock climbing in the northeast, and Autumn actually went climbing with me. I know what your thinking, not our Autumn, but yes and she did great.

We started our day by meeting up with CJ (our guide) in the West Trapps parking lot and hiking the under cliff carriage trail to our first climb of the day, Betty (5.2). CJ cruised the lead to set up a top rope anchor. Then after a little lesson in smearing, Autumn was off and going as well. When all was said and done, CJ lowered her to the ground. I asked her, what do you think? The grin from ear to ear was a good sign as she tried to catch her breath. Her reply was, "it was different."

After our warm-up it was off to Snookies Return(5.8), a different route and a little harder. This one Autumn struggled with a little but she made it past the crux(hard part). She didn't attempt Friends and lovers (5.9), but I can attest that they were both awesome climbs. Moving up through the grades, CJ took us to Never Never Land (5.10a). Now it was serious, this was an intense climb which required a lot of balance and fancy foot work. Autumn sat this one out and relaxed in the make shift rock lounge chair while sipping her ice cold cokes that she had brought in a cooler. (aahh, city folk) While I on the other hand was cursing and grunting like a caveman. After topping out on Never Never Land we followed the cliff base trail to Middle Earth (5.5). Now this would be a three pitch climb. The first would be 5.5, the second would be 5.2 and the third would be 5.5. After a long day of climbing Autumn's body was telling her to stop so CJ and I went alone. The climb was good the views were fantastic. The summit was about 150 - 200 feet, it probably could have been done in two pitches. The finishing moves to the summit was an overhang that truly was the perfect end to a perfect day of climbing. Now for those of you that are asking what is an overhang? Picture, if you will and large protruding rock that jets out horizontally. How do you climb over it? CAREFULLY....

Well, on our final day in New Paltz, we decided to take one last hike through the Mohonk Preserve, sampled some local cheeses and check out the local wineries. All in all a fantastic couple of days for Autumn and I to recharge an enjoy each others company.