Greetings comrades!
This is a very late post, but I felt it was a story that needed telling.
I climbed a rock just before Thanksgiving this past fall.
It was pretty big. Here's a picture:
This particular rock is called Seneca Rock. It's in West Virginia. It stands about 900 ft tall above the ground, and looks like a fat slab of rock jutting out of the ridge.
Me and about 10 other JMU students decided it would be fun to climb it to properly earn our turkey for Thanksgiving.
So we jumped in a van and drove out to WV.
The first day we climbed, it was nice. And cold. Very cold. But super sunny!
Then the cold front came in....
It snowed. Not a lot, but when you have to climb a big old rock the very next day with your bare hands (because gloves are ill-advised for climbing...falling, you know) any amount of snow is mildly frightening.
Better yet it was windy.
We split up the team into two "summit teams." The first summit team climbed the day after the snow, the second team climbed the day after that. I was on the first summit team, along with Caruso, Freddie, and Dylan.
Our guides, Guy and Matt, led us on a multi-pitch climb called Old Man's Route. That particular route is rated slightly lower on the climbing toughness scale, and we picked it for our summit day because it was about 10 degrees, plus wind chill, and we wanted to be able to wear gloves for as much of the climb as possible.
For those of you who don't know what a "multi-pitch" climb means, it means that an experienced climber leads a team up the route on the rock, building anchors with technical climbing equipment as they go up, and hooking themselves and their teammates into the anchors using carabiners. The leader builds the anchors as they climb, and they are belayed by their team members below. That way, if they do fall, they only fall about 10-15 feet before the anchor catches them. Helmets are necessary. When they reach the top of the pitch, the leaders swap the belay, and they belay their team members below as they climb up the pitch one by one. The last person to climb the pitch has to take the anchors out of the rock, which is actually easier than it sounds.
Hello Caruso! He looks cold.
Matt led one team with Freddie and Caruso, and Guy led the second team with Dylan and myself. It was very windy, even at the base of the rock. Dylan was smart and packed our boots in his climbing pack for us to wear at the summit. Climbing shoes are not very warm. They are basically just a thin layer of rubber at the toes. I don't know if my toes have ever been colder than they were that afternoon that we climbed Seneca Rock.
Our fingers froze. I want to personally hug the man who invented hand warmers, because I am certain I would have lost a finger or two without them. But my gosh it was gorgeous.
It was slow going. The wind and the cold made it difficult to climb, we kept having to take breaks to warm up our hands and huddle against the wind. But we finally made it to the top of this usually very easy route...5 hours later.
Brief breakdown of the number of layers I was wearing:
1 long sleeve underarmour shirt
1 tshirt
1 Underarmour brand sweatshirt
1 Patagonia down jacket
1 Athleta puffy vest with faux fur-lined hood
1 puffy 1/4 zip (borrowed from Guy DeBrun)
2 pairs of leggings, fleece lined
1 hat
1 Buff
1 pair of gloves
2 pairs of Smartwool socks, long
Still cold.
But we were victorious!
Here's were we were!
The best team. Guy forgot to smile.
West Virginia did not kick our butts. We earned our turkey. Go team!
More stories coming soon!
