The Olympic Mountains!
This range of magnificent peaks taunts me daily. Teasingly they tower above the Straight of Juan de Fuca, a mere forty kilometers and an international border away. I must look at the climbing guidebook that we sell every second lunchbreak. I will visit in time…
Shot from Beacon Hill Park, some summer night at around 2am.
Limestone
Climbing the incredible limestone amphitheater at Horne Lake, Vancouver Island.
This crag is one of Canada’s best kept climbing secret. Officially considered “closed to access”, the crag continues to exist amongst those in the know who have an understanding with the land ownership group that owns the approach to the wall. An amazing group of people have put up some of the best sport climbs in the west, and these climbs have attracted some of the best climbers in the world. The warmup here is a “soft 5.11a”. The 5.12b I have been projecting is considered by some of the people I speak to here to be “a decent warmup” before a run up Adato (5.14b).
Nicole and I closed up the shop at 6:00pm. Quickly sorted the rack and gathered provisions for the coming adventure, then ventured forth towards a pending adventure.
The goal: Climb The Angel’s Crest, a glorious adventure up the northern arete of the second peak of the Stawamus Chief. I had climbed this route a couple months back, but I was keen to get a chance to lead some of the pitches Dan led last time.
After catching the last ferry out of Victoria, and stopping briefly in Vancouver, we arrived at the trailhead on the logging road sometime beyond midnight. We were eager. We wanted to be early, and neither of us wanted to wait in lines. We wanted to be first on route, so we slept in the car, awoke before dawn, and an amazing day ensued.
What followed was one of the best days of rock climbing I have ever experienced! The weather was perfect, the rock was impeccable. It was one of those days when our cheeks hurt from the perma-grins we wore all day. If there was one word to describe it, it would have to be this: Elation.
Many photos and stories to come.
Here is a photo from the top, after we topped out. Look closely, a climber can be seen beginning the crux pitch 13, as another party awaits their turn atop the whaleback arete.
What a line!
Long days, Clean Lines. Challenge & Progression. Blood, sweat, chalk & joy. The human body is an amazing machine, and Rock Climbing is my amazing open-road to take it to its fullest potential. Climb on.
On Climbing:
Climbing is so much more for me than simply the act of ascensding a vertical wall of rock.
Climbing is a lifestyle.
Climbing is ascension of not just rock, but of awareness.
Climbing is trust. Climbing is Comradery between climber and belayer. Lives are handed over from one to the other: for up to 70m at a time you learn to trust the enabling of your continued existance to another human being.
Climbing is the elimination of all politics, drama, and chaos; all the background noise disappears 5 pitches up.
Climbing is the ultimate achievement of living in the now.
Climbing is a challenge.
Goals are set and, with work, amazing things are achieved.
Climbing is chalk and dirt and blood and sweat.
Climbing is screaming like a mad man when going for a dyno above a runout…
Climbing is silence, barely even making noise to breath while balancing through a flowy series of cruxy crimps, birds circling 500m below, a world away…
Climbing is calm. Climbing is peace.
Climbing is the ultimate excersise in focus.
A zen experience.
Climbing is a love that will never die.
