Wild Runouts on New Hampshire Granite
Posted: Tue Sep 07, 2004 1:04 pm
Karla and I just returned home from an awesome trip to Rumney and North Conway, New Hampshire. The weather was perfect and the climbing was sensational.
Day 1: Climbed 16 routes (sport and trad) at Rumney at the Darth Vader Crag, Waimea Wall, Triple Corners, and Jimmy Cliff. There were not many climbers there on Friday, but the ones we did meet were super friendly. The friction on the wavy schist was phenomenal and the climbs were well bolted with many large glue-in eyebolts. The grades felt a little soft and we onsighted nearly everything we touched (except for a very bouldery 5.12 that took a couple of tries).
Day 2: Climbed 4 easy routes at Rumney (The Meadows Area and the Parking Lot Cliff). Then went BOULDERING. The Pound Boulders had an ideal approach and a few scary highballs. We took lots of great photos then drove to the badass trad area: North Conway!
Day 3: Climbed a long and wild 10 pitch runout route at White Horse. None of the pitches were less than 100 feet. After only 4-5 pitches we were already looking down onto Cathedral Ledge and enjoying a spectacular view of the White Mountains. This place was SERIOUSLY sandbagged and all but two pitches had incredible runouts (sometimes an entire rope length). The 5.11? crux of our route was a delicate and balancy friction traverse 6 pitches up with terrible pro. I just imagined I was on a V4 water groove at Horse Pens, trusted that my feet would not slip and set a goal on getting to a crack another 40' up that I could use to place some pro and build a belay. A couple of easy pitches we even rope-soloed and belayed from a single 1/4" rusted bolt or ancient piton.
Finding the mile and a half descent trail from the summit was the best part. We decided we didn't want to climb any more runout multi-pitch slabs this year. The next day we went to Boston and walked the historic Freedom Trail and saw my great uncle's grave: John Hancock.
Anyway, we'll post some pictures soon and get back to work at Muir now.
Day 1: Climbed 16 routes (sport and trad) at Rumney at the Darth Vader Crag, Waimea Wall, Triple Corners, and Jimmy Cliff. There were not many climbers there on Friday, but the ones we did meet were super friendly. The friction on the wavy schist was phenomenal and the climbs were well bolted with many large glue-in eyebolts. The grades felt a little soft and we onsighted nearly everything we touched (except for a very bouldery 5.12 that took a couple of tries).
Day 2: Climbed 4 easy routes at Rumney (The Meadows Area and the Parking Lot Cliff). Then went BOULDERING. The Pound Boulders had an ideal approach and a few scary highballs. We took lots of great photos then drove to the badass trad area: North Conway!
Day 3: Climbed a long and wild 10 pitch runout route at White Horse. None of the pitches were less than 100 feet. After only 4-5 pitches we were already looking down onto Cathedral Ledge and enjoying a spectacular view of the White Mountains. This place was SERIOUSLY sandbagged and all but two pitches had incredible runouts (sometimes an entire rope length). The 5.11? crux of our route was a delicate and balancy friction traverse 6 pitches up with terrible pro. I just imagined I was on a V4 water groove at Horse Pens, trusted that my feet would not slip and set a goal on getting to a crack another 40' up that I could use to place some pro and build a belay. A couple of easy pitches we even rope-soloed and belayed from a single 1/4" rusted bolt or ancient piton.
Finding the mile and a half descent trail from the summit was the best part. We decided we didn't want to climb any more runout multi-pitch slabs this year. The next day we went to Boston and walked the historic Freedom Trail and saw my great uncle's grave: John Hancock.
Anyway, we'll post some pictures soon and get back to work at Muir now.
). Told him to check out Muirvalley.com and redriverclimbing.com.... Bill, if you read this, sorry we lost you during the 6-10th pitch... we do still owe you beer for the gear. So PM me for the payback. And thanks again.