It was another Black Mountain weekend for Sonja, myself, and lots of other socal climbers. We started off with a 30 minute hike out to the new area around the hillside. We stopped at the midway boulder to warm up and break the hike up. It was at this point that I realized I left my camera back at the car and had to hike all the way back! A lucky start to the day.
Alex Savage
The big news is that Anthony Tarascio put up an amazing new line at black mountain yesterday, Where the Wild Things Are. It is on a very large 40+ foot boulder in this new area Ian found this weekend. It is easily one of the best lines at black mountain and likely checks in around V8. I have some video from the weekend attempts and Ian has some pictures he may post up at some point. Nice work Anthony!
Like I said earlier, if you want to check out this new area you should give Ian an apple pie and he might take you there!
The other news is that I got my laptop back yesterday so I can start editing again! I will have some time today since I will be on a plane for 5 hrs making the trip back home to Atlanta for a weekend of family and a wedding.
Sorry for the lack of updates lately but I’ve been having some technical difficulty with my computer so it’ll be a couple weeks before I get a new video up.
In the meantime we’ve been having lots of adventures up at Black Mountain. Last week we climbed at the corral, the chappies, and the boulders near groupsite four. At the corral Alan put up a new line he’s calling LohBoh which starts on Lobotomy and finishes on Loh’s Roof. Later Ian found some secret beta for this line and we both sent quickly. It is a fun one and is probably in the V8 range. Bridget got agonizingly close to sending this one using short beta which makes it way harder. She climbed all the way to the jug at the lip but didn’t have the wing span to reach the next flat hold in order to finish the climb.
The Mountains
Here’s a video from the past two weeks at Black Mountain including first ascents of Blenny Run and Megalomania as well as repeats of Dark Horse, Lightning, and Moondrop! In retrospect, Moondrops is probably V7 but I think the other grades are accurate.
I did it all this weekend, from scrubbing boulders to putting up rad new lines to leading my first real trad route to groveling up a chimney. Well the last part isn’t quite true, I’m still projecting the chimney…
I started off at Black Mountain, bouldering with Ian and B. Ian brought us to a new area that is actually just a short walk from the road. We spent the day scoping new lines and cleaning rock. What we ended up with was a surprisingly quality circuit of climbs ranging from V0 warmups to V9’s and projects. In total we ended up with 7 or 8 new problems for the day. One of the lines I put up with Ian is a rad arete to the left of Moondrop. It isn’t a short climb and the landing drops away so it is a touch commiting. We think it is around V5 and I’m calling it Blenny Run.
The highlight of my day came in the evening at the striking 20 foot bloc you see when first entering this new area. Ian showed me two projects on either side of the 20 foot wall. We started on the right line which appeared to be more feasible. It is an overhanging face with small sharp crimps to start, leading to a dynamic throw to a jug and finishing with a couple of really lengthy moves to top out. The start of this problem is rather difficult, featuring some small crimps and only one decent foot. I spent about a dozen attempts just trying to pull off the ground! Then I finally figured out a method that worked and pulled on to stick the first move. From there I setup for the large semi-blind throw to the jug of the climb. I barely caught it and proceeded to setup for the last hard move. A very long move up and left to a flat crimp rail which I failed to reach several times but finally found a foot that helped to give me that extra inch of stretch to gain the hold. So I managed to finish this line the first time I stuck the opening move! It was rather exciting being high up on a project, being the first person to test the integrity of the holds, hoping that nothing snaps under your weight! Ian was super psyched after seeing the project go so he booted back up and gave it some more effort. He quickly repeated the line, using a different method for the crux. This new line is now called Megalomania. I have video of my ascent that I will post up soon.
After finishing the day on a high note I made my way over to Idyllwild to meet Sonja and Nick for some camping followed by some trad adventures at Suicide. Sonja managed to beat me out of bed early and we were on our way to the opening hike up the mountain. After a few warm up routes, we rolled up to Johnny Quest which is a sweet looking 10b crack line. Sonja led it and I followed her up. Luckily this line didn’t require much actual hand jamming because the crack formed natural constrictions, so I managed to cruise up it no problem. After that, Nick was psyched to get back on this 5.9 chimney called Hot Buttered Rump so we went and did that. Nick and Sonja climbed it no problem but after I pulled a few chimney moves I gave up. I haven’t learned the ways of the funky trad climbing yet so this type of thing still seems really weird to me. To finish the day they brought me to a climb called hernia and made me lead it. It’s only 5.8 but it was still a little scary, only because I don’t trust the gear yet.
We went up to Black Mountain yesterday for a fun session with Aron, Ian, and a smurf. We managed to persevere over the heat, rattlesnakes, and ticks. We started the day warming up at the corral and then proceeded downhill to Loh’s roof to work on lobotomy and a few other climbs. Lobotomy still feels hard but I’m feeling better on the crux moves now and I think it’ll go in better conditions. The “Visionary” proceeded to clean a dozen or so lines and climb several of them. Mostly cool slab lines. We also worked on this really cool looking line on the side of the Great Dane boulder. It’s a tall overhanging face with enough holds to be climbed. The first move is a long one off of two small crimps to a small sidepull. At first I wasn’t sure if it could go but after some work we got more comfortable with the move. After sticking it the first time, I started to adjust my feet when the hold ripped off the wall! Then when I chalked up to try out the with what’s left of the hold, I found the rock I ripped off in my chalkbag. The good news was that the ‘new’ hold was bigger than the old, but unfortunately the rock was still crumbling when we grabbed it. So maybe with some more work this one will clean up, but at least I got a souvenir out of it.
After this we went uphill to another newly cleaned boulder that Ian was psyched to get on. The line follows a short steep section with positive crimps and rounds out to better holds and finishes with a spicy slab topout. I wasn’t psyched at first but it usually doesn’t take long for me to decide to boot up and give a try. On my first attempt of the day I managed to pull through the steep section to gain a decent sidepull but I fell trying to setup for the last move. So I cleaned up some feet I could use and then pulled through all the moves for the FA! The line is better than I was expecting and is probably in the V9 range but I’m not sure. This new problem is now called The Smurf, in honor of a smurf and also because the overhanging section is short and some of the moves are bunchy. The visionary and the smurf were close on this line so hopefully we’ll have some second opinions and maybe a video shortly.
And after a full day of hard bouldering, we walked back up to the cars to learn that Dom turns into a wizard after dark. He waltzed up OK Arete at dusk. Quite impressive.
Made it out to Black Mountain on Saturday for some bouldering & exploring of new terrain. We started off with a hike up to OK Corral since the gate is closed and warmed up there. I managed to quickly repeat Dark Horse (vid soon) and then we moved down the hill to Morphic Resonance. I was psyched to give this problem a good first attempt but the crux was harder than I anticipated. I gave it about four more attempts, each time arriving at the same spot and not being able to static the last long move. Morphic is one of the sharpest climbs at black so we had to move on in order to avoid splitting a tip.
Next we arrived at Lobotomy, Ian’s new classic on Loh’s roof. It is a stellar line that starts with some fun roof moves, then moves into some crazy arete climbing with small pinches, and finishes with a delicate and scary slab traverse to top out! It is full value and took some work to figure out. I didn’t have much energy left after working it out so I wasn’t very close to sending it that day. I think it will go and I’m psyched to return to give it some solid fresh attempts.
After Loh’s we headed downhill a little further to a big bloc that team BMB had just cleaned up. Alan and Ian had given it a few attempts before I managed to pull off the flash FA of this cool line. Unfortunely I am not fearless so I didn’t even try to top out this 40 ft (?) boulder! As much as I hate not topping out, it actually works well enough to climb through the initial 10-15 feet of v6/7 climbing and then traverse out right and step off onto another boulder. I’m dubbing this line Great Dane. Alan later made an attempt at climbing to the top, with a brush in hand, cleaning as he went. But he decided to downclimb when it got thinner and he tired of cleaning.
Lots of excitement at Black Mountain right now with plenty of FA’s to be done and a solid crew coming out to partake in the festivities.