Reconnaissance

Last week Dave and I conducted a little recon mission to HCR. The goal was to get a little climbng in a familiarize ourselves with some routes that were new to us, and we also discovered some routes that were new to the ranch! We concentrated on the North 40 on this trip for a couple of reasons. One, to celebrate my 40th birthday. Two, because the North 40 offers a variety of shaded climbs even in the heat of the day. We were fairly lucky because the temps were tolerable and the climbs were shady for the most part. I did manage to get Dave stuck in the beating sun as he worked "Mo' Better" 5.10b. But he didn't sweat away completely and we were able to try out a few new routes on the east end of the 40. The first route wasn't really new to us, as it was a trad line the I had put up in January called "15 degrees" (5.7) in honor of the high temp that day. But this spring the line was bolted, so we had to give it a try without gear. In my opinion it's a good line, and a little more appealing placing gear, but it will certainly see more traffic with the bolts in place. Either way, it was fun. Then we headed down to the Kindergarten Boulder to try out 3 new lines there. The first was a 5.7 trad line called "The Poison Ivy Route" that was put up last year. It was a decent line, but nothing spectacular. One more easy one to run for the comp. Next to that line were two bolted lines that both went around 5.7 or 5.8. I don't know any names for those two routes, but I bet they will be in the new guidebook Cole Fennel has written. It is set to be released around the 24HHH comp and is sure to be a hit! Cole and Stark Ligon won the team competition last year. You can check out the book at Fixed Pin Publishing.