January 11-13, 2013
We headed up to Blowing Rock NC to a small crag I had never
been to called “The Dump”. Many of the
climbs there are less than vertical with a few sections overhanging. We stayed on a lovely site at Grandfather Mountain
Campground right on the river.
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| Lukas enjoying the fire and the river at Grandfather Campground |
Saturday
morning it was misting rain but we headed to The Dump anyway. We hiked around checking everything out and
then headed back to the cars to hang out and waited for it to dry up enough to
get on the rock. There
was one section of rock that we'd admired earlier in the day for its
unique reptilian texture and it was the one section that seemed to be
dry. I was stoked that the rightmost route on it, Slimen Hymen", was
just the grade I was looking to start out on - 5.10a. With all of the cracks I'd anticipated plenty of options, but once I
traversed left, I was immediately hit with a blank section. I could
see a great hold above but there was no foothold/handhold combination
that got me to it. After thinking it over, I realized the last good
hold and the hold I couldn't reach were so juggy I could probably dyno
to it. Once I made that decision, I just had to decide which one of a
hundred tiny cracks to place my feet on to get enough support to launch
with the correct trajectory. I launched and easily latched onto the out
of reach hold. I decided to start from the beginning, traverse over,
get situated for the dyno and jump! Once I got there however, all of
the tiny cracks serving as footholds looked the same and I chose wrong
twice. I finally chose correctly on the third try.
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| Lukas spotting me on Slimen (10a) |
After
all this monkeying around below the first bolt, I considered switching
off with Jason, but decided to go ahead and try to hang all the draws
instead. I progressed easily to the second bolt and clipped. I'd heard
the crux was down low, and I'm usually very comfortable onsighting 10a
so I didn't even rest before going on towards the third bolt. It became
tenuous almost immediately however, and I momentarily considered
retreating. So many thoughts swirled through mind.
"Yes, I don't like slab, but that doesn't mean I can't do it!"
"The holds are really thin here, but if I keep moving, it will get better above."
"I've fallen on slab before. I had a perfect fall! I'll be fine if I fall!"
But most of all, "My goal is to fall trying, not retreat when the going gets tough!"
I continued on. I reached a point where I realized in the back of my mind that if I continued, there would be no way to retreat because the holds were so thin. I wasn't thinking about the fact that the last time I had climbed slab was two years ago, or the fact that falling on slab meant that I would most definitely hit the rock and maybe hard enough to hurt. (For non-climbers, slab is less that vertical rock. When you fall on less than vertical rock, you are guaranteed to hit the rock. If you push off evenly with your hands and feet, your hands and feet will hit the rock below resulting in a comfortable fall.)
It was at this point that my husband and belayer began asking me "Is it runout?", to which I screamed "DON'T SAY THAT! DON'T EVER SAY THAT!" I resolved not to let negative thoughts enter my mind, especially about the third bolt being runout.
At this point I was tired from my many attempts at the low crux but I had already made the decision to proceed beyond the point of no return, and found myself precariously perched left of the third bolt. I was as high as I could go above my last piece of protection. I was staring at the bolt to my right but felt so precarious that I didn't even feel comfortable reaching for my draw much less actually shifting right to reach the bolt to clip. Apparently there was a good hold hiding somewhere that would have saved me, but I hadn't found it. Suddenly I was peeling off the wall and screaming "Shit!" (Sorry kids). There was no time to push off evenly with hands and feet so as soon as the rope began to tighten, the slight twist of my body turned into a full 180 degree rotation. There was nothing I could do; there was no way to stop it. I slammed into a protruding ridge on the rock just above my right butt cheek. It was extremely painful. I had trouble just getting onto the ground, but standing hurt too. Moving or using any muscles in that area was very painful. Finally we started talking about getting me up. When I was pulled up to standing, I didn't want to lay back down so some fellow climbers allowed me to put my arms over their shoulders and walk leaning heavily on them (thank you Jeff!). A few times another kind gentlemen put me on his back until I got too tired and felt walking was safer (thank you Mark!)
Within
a few minutes I was feeling pretty happy, very loved, and relishing in
the fact that at least I had gotten a GoPro video out of it! (Click to check out the video.)
"Yes, I don't like slab, but that doesn't mean I can't do it!"
"The holds are really thin here, but if I keep moving, it will get better above."
"I've fallen on slab before. I had a perfect fall! I'll be fine if I fall!"
But most of all, "My goal is to fall trying, not retreat when the going gets tough!"
I continued on. I reached a point where I realized in the back of my mind that if I continued, there would be no way to retreat because the holds were so thin. I wasn't thinking about the fact that the last time I had climbed slab was two years ago, or the fact that falling on slab meant that I would most definitely hit the rock and maybe hard enough to hurt. (For non-climbers, slab is less that vertical rock. When you fall on less than vertical rock, you are guaranteed to hit the rock. If you push off evenly with your hands and feet, your hands and feet will hit the rock below resulting in a comfortable fall.)
It was at this point that my husband and belayer began asking me "Is it runout?", to which I screamed "DON'T SAY THAT! DON'T EVER SAY THAT!" I resolved not to let negative thoughts enter my mind, especially about the third bolt being runout.
At this point I was tired from my many attempts at the low crux but I had already made the decision to proceed beyond the point of no return, and found myself precariously perched left of the third bolt. I was as high as I could go above my last piece of protection. I was staring at the bolt to my right but felt so precarious that I didn't even feel comfortable reaching for my draw much less actually shifting right to reach the bolt to clip. Apparently there was a good hold hiding somewhere that would have saved me, but I hadn't found it. Suddenly I was peeling off the wall and screaming "Shit!" (Sorry kids). There was no time to push off evenly with hands and feet so as soon as the rope began to tighten, the slight twist of my body turned into a full 180 degree rotation. There was nothing I could do; there was no way to stop it. I slammed into a protruding ridge on the rock just above my right butt cheek. It was extremely painful. I had trouble just getting onto the ground, but standing hurt too. Moving or using any muscles in that area was very painful. Finally we started talking about getting me up. When I was pulled up to standing, I didn't want to lay back down so some fellow climbers allowed me to put my arms over their shoulders and walk leaning heavily on them (thank you Jeff!). A few times another kind gentlemen put me on his back until I got too tired and felt walking was safer (thank you Mark!)
 |
| Enjoying some medicinal Brandy |
The next day I wasn’t able to wear
a pack but since the hike is almost nonexistent, that wasn’t a problem. I was so happy to be able to walk and climb, but I had no desire to lead on
slab. Jason was kind enough to put a few routes up for us. Afterwards I had a nasty bruise (and I still
have a small knot in that location 6 months later.)
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| Noah on Homegrown (5.9+/5.10a) |
February 2, 2013
Crowders Mountain
My first lead after the fall was Opinionated (5.9 at Crowders)
and it felt TERRIBLE. Opinionated is one of those routes that can be completely
easy or completely awkward depending on how you’re feeling that day. One month after my whipper, it felt SUPER
awkward. I was really slow and I swear I
almost had Elvis leg a few times. Aaron and I moved on to Master Beta, a route I had onsighted in May 2012. I definitely felt
more confident and it flowed much better, but when I got the slightest bit
nervous I stopped and rested rather than risking a fall. Still, I felt a lot
better and more confident. Next I lead the Gimp. It was pretty cool to run into Diab Rabie, the man who'd put up the Gimp years ago. I’d done the Gimp once before and I had hung
once, so I was more nervous about it than MB. I still hung once and had
to push down that falling fear again going to the anchors, but it definitely went better than I expected. Afterwards, I played around on Fashion on TR
since it shares anchors with Gimp. I
worked out beta for the first three bolts but it was getting cold and we
decided to make it an early day. I'm
not there yet, but I hope to have my lead head back soon.
