I then had a "mini breakthrough" on Ebriosity... mini because I didn't send it, but figured out a way to make the previous crux move much easier. Now the crux is going to be keeping my heel on. Curse my baggy heeled 5.10s... I want some Pythons, or Asps, or a shoe named after an even more venomous snake.
After leaving the Five Star I met up with Sam and Joe, and we were later joined by Kelly and Cortney, for a party at Midnite. It's amazing how much moss grows in that part of the forest... just since last year all sides of that boulder had a new 3 mm fur. The fungus grows like crazy too.
Nobody sent this perennially tough line today, but at the very least it got a good scrub and the company of some happy climbers. Towards the end of the day, Sam and Joe and I visited the Boxcar boulder at Index Town Walls. It's namesake, the Boxcar Arete, was a very fun problem and the landing not nearly as bad as I used to think. We eyed up some projects on that boulder, and I wondered why there isn't more activity in that area... oh, maybe it's the world-class trad climbing 20 feet away! Bouldering and trad climbing can only coexist in weird places like Joshua Tree, I guess.
just an fyi...what's being called "boxcar arete" was climbed back in '01, prior to any cleaning of the boulder, and was called "yellow fever". no biggie, just a historical clarification.
ReplyDeleteright on. not surprising, we were just talking about how this sort of thing happens a lot around the west side areas. something gets climbed, the years go by, moss reclaims the boulder... and somebody else comes along and claims an FA. Yellow Fever is a much better name anyway!
ReplyDeleteAre you familiar with any other lines on that boulder from "back in the day"? I heard that there was a line or two right of the arete on the face that had been climbed in the 80's.