Anyway, on Sunday, I left Moab and drove back to the creek to climb at Way Rambo Wall in the afternoon. There was still a ton of snow, so I was skeptical that it would be good. Fortunately, it was perfect in the sun. I did a toprope lape on the 5.9, the 5.10 to the right of it called "Fuzz" and Way Rambo (which I sent on TR - yay!). Then I tried Slice and Dice, fell early, and then had a hard time getting psyched to try hard for the rest of it. By then it was getting dark, so I ran a quick TR lap on it while I was still pumped, got worked, and then belayed Seth on Way Rambo. As there were no sends, I hope that we go back up there before I go back to CA. I'd also like do to this thin hands crack called "The Inhabitants" that I remember toproping 3 years ago. I recall it being difficult.
Monday we went to Second Meat Wall, and I led Cube Steaks, which is a cool .10+. After that I tried T-Bones Tonight (see previous post for a photo), fell low, and then hung in the roof. I tried it again, made it through the bottom, and took the winger out of the roof after a desperate and valiant fight. By now it's become clear to me that I was much much fitter last year! I guess that given the health issues I had in my past year, it's not too unexpected. After that I ran a toprope lap on Top Sirloin, a corner thin hands splitter that I'd done last year.
Tuesday I was feeling pretty rough when I woke up. In fact, I woke up in the middle of the night groping desperately and blindly for aleve, neosporin, and band-aids. I felt a little better in the morning. We decided on Scarface wall, and I decided that I was going to love the toprope. I toproped an unnamed 5.11 thin hands crack to the left of Big Guy, then I toproped Steel Pulse, an .11+ that is super hard! there's an awkward start to an offset .5 splitter over a roof. As soon as I saw Tom put in .5s in that section, I knew that I was going to bring cams to aid that shit if need be. The rest of it was greens and reds through a small roof and a flare, and that was fun. Seth and Steve had put a toprope on Torque Wrench by that time, and I was convinced to toprope it. I think that Torque Wrench is my favorite route in the creek now. It's 150 feet long! It starts in a varied lieback up a face/arete, and then you get into a rad chimney, and then you're climbing on the right side of this huge fin that's wedged into the rock. You jam the steep right side of the fin, stem your left foot waaay out, and desperately get higher until you can reach a jug on top of the fin and pull yourself up on to it so that you can squeeze it with your thighs, and subsequently hump it to get on top. Then it's a lot more of a corner crack that varies and has lots of holds and feet. Epic. Oh and then I tried some .10+ crack which I whipped on the bottom of called Dirt Cheap. Fitting, because that's how I felt by pitch for on day 3 on. I'm seriously wrecked.
Today I rest. I'm hoping that I'm not coming down with a cold, because that would suck. I also hope that the heinous winds that came up today stop, and I hope that it doesn't rain on Saturday, which the forecast says it's supposed to do. At the moment, I want to do as many new routes as possible. I dream of sandstone.
Right now I'm looking out of the window at clouds of dust blowing by, and it's not making me psyched to get back to the creek.
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