Good Day!

[billcoe]

Got on rock again, did an easier 2 pitch route and the pain in the knees didn't start till I got down and tried to hike out! Been 4 weeks since I could climb almost pain free. Noice day, noice people, Noice route! Adam, his girlfriend Sharon and I hiked in over the boulder field at Jimmies to go do the second ascent of Conga Line, which goes up Rumba Ridge on the far side of Jimmies. Ending the day with some nice Ibuprofen and ice. Small memory, Sharon slips on one of the boulders and gets a goober. Being a fully operational Mazama she has plenty of Neosporin and I wouldn't have noticed at all except Adam was fussing over it. These are like the boulders from hell. They have the feel of a board on a pipe, no matter which part you stop on, they want to rock with you on it, usually at the most inopportune time. We cruised the route, dropped a rope on a line I had barely spied from the boulders, hit the 2nd pitch and rapped.

 

It was super noice.

 

Hope you all had it as good!

 

_________________________________________________________________

Next week (May 30 and May 31st), I thought I'd go back out to Jimmies and jug up and check out the line we'd dropped the rope on when out on Conga Line with Adam and Sharon. Ujahn got busy with his Uncle so I went solo Sat and Ujahn came up on Sunday.

 

I drive up the logging road and turn and drive to a small clearing in the woods that doubles as a parking lot. This pile of Bear Scat - fly encrusted, wet looking and still almost steaming greeted me in the parking space. The fresh aroma was a pungent smell, not one that must have had much meat in it, but closer to a horses. This must have been a sizable bear, and I must have just missed it.

The flys had lost interest by the time I got back to the car in the afternoon. I was happy that it wasn't the cougar who frequents the area and whom I believe to have stalked me on the hike in during an earlier solo trip.

 

I cross the boulder field and 4th class up to the base after a quick stop at the pure water spring that runs year round at Jimmies. Turns out I didn't camel up enough, and it came back to haunt me at the end of the day. This is the view of the start of the line. Loose flakes eh? The rope I have on it is a 50 meter and it has 15' left on the bottom, the top of the route is not visible here, and it overhangs at the start -must have tilted the camera as it looks low angle.

 

I spend some time looking for a spot I can see the full line to the top with the binocs I brought along for that reason so that I have reasonable loose boulder/rock awareness and find the perfect spot against an old growth fir.

 

I have done 2 routes on Rumba Ridge ground up. Both dirty, extremely loose and dangerous affairs, but the view of the many loose flakes and possibly no pro from the ground here has dissuaded me of doing this route that way. These are 3-8 feet across and loose as hell. If this turns into a climbing route, it will intersect with the end of the first pitches of the other 2 lines. Then it can finish with the same line as the others.

 

I jug up, taking care to visualize where the shit was so as to not conk myself with a block.

 

Flakes await.

 

Topping out is a joy as I'm still alive and the view is fantastic. I spend some time, then stuff my rope into my Big Wally which has had the straps tucked and is in haulbag mode clipped to my belay loop so that the rope feeds out as I rappel and it's not hanging below easy to be chopped. Huge boulders and loose rocks get trundled in a major way. Soon the sun has dehydrated me and I start getting muscle cramps and a headache. Time to back out and boogie down to the spring and the shade. Being solo in the woods is no place to be debilitated.

 

 

Getting back down to the spring after 3th class downclimbing the approach unroped with a heavy pack sucked and was dangerous no doubt, but the spring is running full on with cold clear water, and is a welcome sight.

 

The obligatory view of the North Face of Mt Hood as I hike out.

 

Sunday I'm back and had company as Ujahn came along. He tossed off a few more large rocks that somehow I had missed but stopped early so as not to kill his dog tied off to the side below. I had dropped a line off Conga Line and started knocking off loose rocks and put in a bolt low at the crux so the next climbers doesn't have to worry about biting dirt if they boff the move. It would be a terrible place to be injured. I've led it twice and both times my followers commented on the poor nature of the pro.

 

Here's Ujahn coming up. He'd spotted a couple of other variations on the backside I'd looked at and rejected earlier which need to be explored later.

 

I'd gotten some good climbing in solo toproping the moves of Conga Line in my hiking shoes to verify that it needed a bolt, and the location. Good stuff. Ujahn and Bandit hiked around and greeted me at the base to help ease the carry weight of all that drilling crap so my bad knees wouldn't complain too much.

 

We back out via the Spring and the Mt Hood view and are back home early. Knowing I am still recovering form both knees being shit (you can search for "bloody knee" and that story should pop up with some sweet gore pictures. Ujahn takes pity on me and offers to trade his little Lowe daypack for my Big Wally that has both sets of jugs, the bolt gun and metal stuffed in it, for the death march across the boulder field.

 

The knees make me feel like an old man.

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edited next week, 6 8 2009. This weekend sucked. Went to Jimmies to start the trail to Conga Line and it was raining. No rain in the lowlands all day. Rain at elevation all day. Hank and I went for a hike into the cliff and got wet. As I'd face planted last year solo, and my knees are hurting right now, I pass on the wet boulder field death march. Didn't do a damn thing otherwise. Right knee hurt too much to want to do anything Sunday.

 

Monday today and I'm having thoughts of Gothic Rocks and Cathedral.

 

This is last year. Oh yes, she will be mine.....oh yes....

 

 

 

Edited June 8, 2009 by billcoe

[wayne]

Nice Bill,Get better. I had it ok..

[powderhound]

Got on rock again, did an easier 2 pitch route and the pain in the knees didn't start till I got down and tried to hike out! Been 4 weeks since I could climb almost pain free. Noice day, noice people, Noice route! Ending the day with some nice Ibuprofen and ice.

 

It was super noice.

 

Hope you all had it as good!

 

 

how stoked are you for the new movie?

 

I am done with my test next week, we should get out and climb this june.

[Bug]

I got on the rock at Marymoor. Whoop Whoop.

Did ALL those pesky yard and house jobs.

Pretty much free to climb for the rest of the weekends from here on.

[KaskadskyjKozak]

Got on rock again, did an easier 2 pitch route and the pain in the knees didn't start till I got down and tried to hike out! Been 4 weeks since I could climb almost pain free. Noice day, noice people, Noice route! Ending the day with some nice Ibuprofen and ice.

 

It was super noice.

 

Hope you all had it as good!

 

 

No, not good for all. I got my ass handed to me in a handbag on a N. Cascade approach.

[JosephH]

Bill, glad to hear it. Sounds like progress to me...