This is from my lost blog... I'm reposting this becasue it was just too cool. The picture is the route we took on New Year's Day 2005.
Yesterday was a brilliant, beautiful day. I climbed my first three pitch climb. It wasn't a particularly difficult climb but it was very cool. New Era in the Garden of the Gods. It’s 5.7 and really the two lower pitches can be combined to make it a two pitch climb but we made it three. It’s also VERY vertical and all trad. The day started off very nice. Crisp. We met in the parking lot and arranged our gear at 9am. By 10 we were at the approach and preparing to climb. Bill learned the hard way never to carry my water for me. The seal hadn’t done its job and leaked on his back before we even started. Lance began to lead the first pitch. He placed three pieces of pro and then wasn’t feeling the confidence. He hadn’t been climbing enough to get himself to proceed so he backed off the lead and handed it to Bill. The plan was to have Bill lead, I would follow then belay Bill up the second pitch and then Lance up to me. We would continue until we were all at the top. Bill took off and arrived at the first belay station with no problems. The sun had left the rock before we began and although it wasn’t cold, it wasn’t particularly warm either. We all had fleece. I had taken off my shell but left on my fleece. Nine pieces of pro to clean and then I joined Bill at the first anchor. There were two bolts and Bill added a third piece to make it bomber. For some reason I couldn’t look at the anchor much. I studied it to see the system he set up and so I would know what was happening there but I didn’t want to think about what I was hanging off of. I don’t know if it was the steepness, the day or the fact that I realized this was only the first of three pitches. Most of my climbing only goes to this height, about 60 feet I guess, so thinking about not rapping off from there was a little difficult for my mind to wrap around. I decided not to think about it and just do the job I needed to do. Bill proceeded to move on to the second anchor. Once Bill was secure and off belay, Lance tied in and I pulled up the slack. While I was pulling up the slack for Lance, Bill started pulling up the slack from my tie in. As I was belaying Lance up I had to watch the rope above me and untangle any kinks for Bill at the same time. I was constantly busy because Lance was moving pretty quick. Whenever Lance paused I’d try to free up as much of the upper rope as I could, then Lance would be moving again. Lance clipped into the belay anchor with me. He seemed tired, the vertical was getting to both of us. It’s a very “in your face” climb compared to what we are used to. Lots of holds and not difficult climbing but the vertical is intimidating. I think it was making us burn more juice than we needed to. As I left Lance at the first anchor the weather was getting a little chillier. The wind was intermittent. When it was still we were fairly warm when the wind blew it got pretty cold. Unfortunately a lot of time was spent sitting at the belay station waiting. The wind would blow and chill us and then, sitting there we never really got warm until we had a turn to climb again. The approach to the second belay station was intense. The whole second pitch was more vertical than the first and then the crack and face climbing turned into a smooth sheet of rock on the right and clean face on the left. The only path was a layback of about 4-5 moves to the shelf below the belay station. I’ve done laybacks lots of times and they are not hard. I could see the moves in front of me but I couldn’t make my body do what it needed to do. My feet were too low for my hands to get a good grip. My hands were cold and didn’t want to grip the way I needed them to. Finally after struggling a little I realized that I could inch myself up little by little and that’s what I did until I could reach the belay. When I got there my forearms were fried. Especially my right arm was totally shot. At least I would have time to rest while Bill and Lance climbed on. The second belay was inside a crack with a small shelf about the size of an easy chair. Above us the crack came together about 5 feet up into a roof. The route actually went up behind where I was facing so it was difficult to keep my eye on Bill’s progress. He struggled to find gear placements at first. It was a little unnerving to think about the possibilities of him falling until he got 2-3 pieces in above me. He would have landed on me, and the anchor directly. Bill blew through the third pitch pretty quick. I took that as a sign that the more difficult climbing was beneath me. I didn’t ask for confirmation, I didn’t really want to know. Once Bill called down that he was on anchor I began to pull up Lance’s slack. Lots of climbers prefer a sitting belay because it’s more comfortable but to me it’s more difficult because it’s awkward. From a standing belay I have lots of mobility and leverage, from sitting that goes away. Lance had had lots of time to cool off down there hanging from the lower belay anchor. It continued to get colder. The laybacking was extremely difficult in those conditions and Lance and I were both thinking about the logistics of him lowering off. The difficulty of that, and the danger if the rope didn’t get him to the bottom caused him to make one more effort. When I saw that I began to urge him upward. I knew the voice in his head probably shouted the same as it had been in my own. It was saying things like “just lower off, you don’t want to be here, you’re going to get hurt.” I kept telling him that he was making progress. I held him on a tight belay. From my sitting belay it was tough to hold all his weight on the rope without letting him slowly slip backward. I found I was able to do it only if I wrapped the rope around my break hand and extended it completely out so that I wasn’t using muscle as much as bone. After a lot of effort he finally grabbed the bomber hold just below the anchor. I extended the anchor with a temporary draw so that he could rest a minute. There wasn’t room for both of us at the station until I began to move upward. The anchor consisted of two bolts, one with a spinning hangar, two pitons, one of which was angled exactly wrong for a fall. Bill had backed those four pieces up with a cam so it was pretty secure. I called up for Bill to put me on belay and then began to position myself so I could begin climbing. As I started up, Lance made himself more comfortable on the belay perch. We made a deal not to ask or tell if the third pitch was as difficult as the second. As I started up and got past the chimney portion it was clearly much easier so I passed that on to Lance for encouragement. On the second pitch I really didn’t study many of Bill’s placements. I was imagining what it would have been like to be on lead and didn’t particularly feel comfortable with it. On this third pitch the climbing was easier but Bill ranout the last placement pretty far. Something I wouldn’t have liked. But there wasn’t a place to put anything so his choices were pretty limited. Ten feet from the top was a bolt so he put in a draw and topped out. Lance was growing cold and impatient as we readied to bring him up. Once he topped out we all gathered at the top and went to the summit. On the summit we took some pictures and Lance said he wanted to offer thanks. His prayer was heartfelt and it was an honor to be there. Lance had previously decided to make this his last climb. He will probably do some top rope or sport but he’s planning to retire after some 30 years of climbing. In his prayer he thanked God for safety throughout the years including this climb. He mentioned times of peril and thanked God for the day of climbing with Bill and I. Being mentioned in that prayer was a privilege, being part of this climbing party was a privilege for me. We ate some lunch and then organized for our decent. The plan was to rap off in a two pitch rap to some belay anchors below on a different climb. Somehow standing around at the top was getting to me mentally. Lance was setting up the rappel while Bill and I packed up the gear. For some reason watching Lance go down to the rappel anchors was bothering me. He said there was a ledge there but it wasn’t visible from where I was. It just bothered me. Bill rapped first but when he got to where the anchors should have been, the bolts were there but all the hangers had been removed. I couldn’t see or hear Bill so he and Lance discussed the situation and passed their thoughts on to me. The first option was to have Bill ascend the rope (that would take about 45 minutes) and then we descend by the southern walkoff. All together that would probably take us a couple hours. The other option was to pull up one end of the rope, tie the two together and have Bill descend to where there would hopefully be another set of anchors. We decided on the second since we were running out of daylight and Bill was pretty confident the anchors would be there. When Bill found the anchors he was out of earshot so Lance just had to keep a hand on the rope to see when it went slack. As he worked into position I lowered onto the rap. I’ve rapped lots of times but for some reason my nerves were giving me fits right then. As Lance readied to rap he talked through what he was doing, probably out of habit. Then as I began to get ready for the rappel I talked out loud to nobody. “Tying klimheist… clipping in, biner locked. Threading ATC, clipping in, biner locked. Checking rap biners… coming off first anchor, coming off second anchor… On rappel” “Rappeling!” Lance mentioned that there would be some cool photo ops on the way down this rock. I don’t think I had ever done a longer rappel. On the way down I did pause for a moment to look around. I said “Holy crap!” and then continued. I watched my feet most of the way down from that point. When I arrived at the anchors Bill and Lance were, of course, tied in already. All three of us were clipped into two bolts. I looked at them enough to see what was going on but then just didn’t want to think about it anymore. We started pulling the rope. They already had the end threaded through the anchors so as we pulled it dropped right into place. Lance rapped first since he was in the best position. I went next and when I landed I had a feeling of great relief. “Terra firma! It’s good to be on the ground again.” Lance concurred. When Bill joined us we packed up and headed for the cars. It had been a day of mind over matter for me. It had been a day of body over rock. It had been a day of keeping my emotions and imagination in check. I made it and it was good. A beautiful day.
Yesterday was a brilliant, beautiful day. I climbed my first three pitch climb. It wasn't a particularly difficult climb but it was very cool. New Era in the Garden of the Gods. It’s 5.7 and really the two lower pitches can be combined to make it a two pitch climb but we made it three. It’s also VERY vertical and all trad. The day started off very nice. Crisp. We met in the parking lot and arranged our gear at 9am. By 10 we were at the approach and preparing to climb. Bill learned the hard way never to carry my water for me. The seal hadn’t done its job and leaked on his back before we even started. Lance began to lead the first pitch. He placed three pieces of pro and then wasn’t feeling the confidence. He hadn’t been climbing enough to get himself to proceed so he backed off the lead and handed it to Bill. The plan was to have Bill lead, I would follow then belay Bill up the second pitch and then Lance up to me. We would continue until we were all at the top. Bill took off and arrived at the first belay station with no problems. The sun had left the rock before we began and although it wasn’t cold, it wasn’t particularly warm either. We all had fleece. I had taken off my shell but left on my fleece. Nine pieces of pro to clean and then I joined Bill at the first anchor. There were two bolts and Bill added a third piece to make it bomber. For some reason I couldn’t look at the anchor much. I studied it to see the system he set up and so I would know what was happening there but I didn’t want to think about what I was hanging off of. I don’t know if it was the steepness, the day or the fact that I realized this was only the first of three pitches. Most of my climbing only goes to this height, about 60 feet I guess, so thinking about not rapping off from there was a little difficult for my mind to wrap around. I decided not to think about it and just do the job I needed to do. Bill proceeded to move on to the second anchor. Once Bill was secure and off belay, Lance tied in and I pulled up the slack. While I was pulling up the slack for Lance, Bill started pulling up the slack from my tie in. As I was belaying Lance up I had to watch the rope above me and untangle any kinks for Bill at the same time. I was constantly busy because Lance was moving pretty quick. Whenever Lance paused I’d try to free up as much of the upper rope as I could, then Lance would be moving again. Lance clipped into the belay anchor with me. He seemed tired, the vertical was getting to both of us. It’s a very “in your face” climb compared to what we are used to. Lots of holds and not difficult climbing but the vertical is intimidating. I think it was making us burn more juice than we needed to. As I left Lance at the first anchor the weather was getting a little chillier. The wind was intermittent. When it was still we were fairly warm when the wind blew it got pretty cold. Unfortunately a lot of time was spent sitting at the belay station waiting. The wind would blow and chill us and then, sitting there we never really got warm until we had a turn to climb again. The approach to the second belay station was intense. The whole second pitch was more vertical than the first and then the crack and face climbing turned into a smooth sheet of rock on the right and clean face on the left. The only path was a layback of about 4-5 moves to the shelf below the belay station. I’ve done laybacks lots of times and they are not hard. I could see the moves in front of me but I couldn’t make my body do what it needed to do. My feet were too low for my hands to get a good grip. My hands were cold and didn’t want to grip the way I needed them to. Finally after struggling a little I realized that I could inch myself up little by little and that’s what I did until I could reach the belay. When I got there my forearms were fried. Especially my right arm was totally shot. At least I would have time to rest while Bill and Lance climbed on. The second belay was inside a crack with a small shelf about the size of an easy chair. Above us the crack came together about 5 feet up into a roof. The route actually went up behind where I was facing so it was difficult to keep my eye on Bill’s progress. He struggled to find gear placements at first. It was a little unnerving to think about the possibilities of him falling until he got 2-3 pieces in above me. He would have landed on me, and the anchor directly. Bill blew through the third pitch pretty quick. I took that as a sign that the more difficult climbing was beneath me. I didn’t ask for confirmation, I didn’t really want to know. Once Bill called down that he was on anchor I began to pull up Lance’s slack. Lots of climbers prefer a sitting belay because it’s more comfortable but to me it’s more difficult because it’s awkward. From a standing belay I have lots of mobility and leverage, from sitting that goes away. Lance had had lots of time to cool off down there hanging from the lower belay anchor. It continued to get colder. The laybacking was extremely difficult in those conditions and Lance and I were both thinking about the logistics of him lowering off. The difficulty of that, and the danger if the rope didn’t get him to the bottom caused him to make one more effort. When I saw that I began to urge him upward. I knew the voice in his head probably shouted the same as it had been in my own. It was saying things like “just lower off, you don’t want to be here, you’re going to get hurt.” I kept telling him that he was making progress. I held him on a tight belay. From my sitting belay it was tough to hold all his weight on the rope without letting him slowly slip backward. I found I was able to do it only if I wrapped the rope around my break hand and extended it completely out so that I wasn’t using muscle as much as bone. After a lot of effort he finally grabbed the bomber hold just below the anchor. I extended the anchor with a temporary draw so that he could rest a minute. There wasn’t room for both of us at the station until I began to move upward. The anchor consisted of two bolts, one with a spinning hangar, two pitons, one of which was angled exactly wrong for a fall. Bill had backed those four pieces up with a cam so it was pretty secure. I called up for Bill to put me on belay and then began to position myself so I could begin climbing. As I started up, Lance made himself more comfortable on the belay perch. We made a deal not to ask or tell if the third pitch was as difficult as the second. As I started up and got past the chimney portion it was clearly much easier so I passed that on to Lance for encouragement. On the second pitch I really didn’t study many of Bill’s placements. I was imagining what it would have been like to be on lead and didn’t particularly feel comfortable with it. On this third pitch the climbing was easier but Bill ranout the last placement pretty far. Something I wouldn’t have liked. But there wasn’t a place to put anything so his choices were pretty limited. Ten feet from the top was a bolt so he put in a draw and topped out. Lance was growing cold and impatient as we readied to bring him up. Once he topped out we all gathered at the top and went to the summit. On the summit we took some pictures and Lance said he wanted to offer thanks. His prayer was heartfelt and it was an honor to be there. Lance had previously decided to make this his last climb. He will probably do some top rope or sport but he’s planning to retire after some 30 years of climbing. In his prayer he thanked God for safety throughout the years including this climb. He mentioned times of peril and thanked God for the day of climbing with Bill and I. Being mentioned in that prayer was a privilege, being part of this climbing party was a privilege for me. We ate some lunch and then organized for our decent. The plan was to rap off in a two pitch rap to some belay anchors below on a different climb. Somehow standing around at the top was getting to me mentally. Lance was setting up the rappel while Bill and I packed up the gear. For some reason watching Lance go down to the rappel anchors was bothering me. He said there was a ledge there but it wasn’t visible from where I was. It just bothered me. Bill rapped first but when he got to where the anchors should have been, the bolts were there but all the hangers had been removed. I couldn’t see or hear Bill so he and Lance discussed the situation and passed their thoughts on to me. The first option was to have Bill ascend the rope (that would take about 45 minutes) and then we descend by the southern walkoff. All together that would probably take us a couple hours. The other option was to pull up one end of the rope, tie the two together and have Bill descend to where there would hopefully be another set of anchors. We decided on the second since we were running out of daylight and Bill was pretty confident the anchors would be there. When Bill found the anchors he was out of earshot so Lance just had to keep a hand on the rope to see when it went slack. As he worked into position I lowered onto the rap. I’ve rapped lots of times but for some reason my nerves were giving me fits right then. As Lance readied to rap he talked through what he was doing, probably out of habit. Then as I began to get ready for the rappel I talked out loud to nobody. “Tying klimheist… clipping in, biner locked. Threading ATC, clipping in, biner locked. Checking rap biners… coming off first anchor, coming off second anchor… On rappel” “Rappeling!” Lance mentioned that there would be some cool photo ops on the way down this rock. I don’t think I had ever done a longer rappel. On the way down I did pause for a moment to look around. I said “Holy crap!” and then continued. I watched my feet most of the way down from that point. When I arrived at the anchors Bill and Lance were, of course, tied in already. All three of us were clipped into two bolts. I looked at them enough to see what was going on but then just didn’t want to think about it anymore. We started pulling the rope. They already had the end threaded through the anchors so as we pulled it dropped right into place. Lance rapped first since he was in the best position. I went next and when I landed I had a feeling of great relief. “Terra firma! It’s good to be on the ground again.” Lance concurred. When Bill joined us we packed up and headed for the cars. It had been a day of mind over matter for me. It had been a day of body over rock. It had been a day of keeping my emotions and imagination in check. I made it and it was good. A beautiful day.
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