Larry Day Story From KY Wilderness #2

[Ascentionist]

I thought this was an appropriate story to post considering the recent thread.

"DIAMOND IN THE CRACK FIRST ASCENT
This route isn't exactly burned into my memory the way some of the scarier stuff is, but here goes.
Routes that topped out on a great summit were kind of our holy grail in the early days. Frank Becker and I couldn't help but notice Jewel Pinnacle, thought it looked really cool, and began to ask around as to it's history and whether or not it had been climbed. We probably got the info that it had been attempted from Bill Eidson. He was closely connected to the '60s era climbers (who were all cavers I believe).
For whatever reason, Frank wasn't with us when we actually did the first ascent. I remember that the somewhat rotten and unpleasant first pitch was actually the crux, and that the spectacular second pitch was really quite moderate. Anyway it was a beautiful climb, one that we returned to do time and again. On the second ascent we shot a 16mm color movie that I have long since misplaced. Too bad I don't have that one anymore. See bluejean and flannel clad hippies in jungle boots, power layback their way up sandstone pinnacles in Eastern Kentucky! In living color!
As was fairly typical I didn't name the route. Though I remember considering Dead Horse Point, for the horse that was lying in the big meadow below on one of the early (possibly first) ascents. It was an impossibly beautiful and peaceful day and this horse was just lying there dieing a very slow death with apparantly no one but us aware of it's struggle.
I have no recall of the splitter crack. We had this kind of Alpine esthetic. Routes just had to go from bottom to top or they didn't count. I passed on many beautiful lines that didn't summit with nothing more than a fleeting thought that "What a pity it doesn't top out."
As a result we hiked too much and climbed too little. But still the quest for routes that summited lead to, among others, Good Tang, Foxfire, Arachnid, Frenchburg Overhangs, Devine Climb, the Underling, the Prow, Meteor Maker, Jungle Beat, the Quest, Fallout, Insanity Ceiling, Last Day, and of course the incomparable Tower of Power."

-Larry Day (from www.kywilderness.com)

[J-Rock]

To the summit! Hell yeah!

[ynot]

Makes me want to go do the half of those routes that I havent done yet.