Canada #1

Just after we posted our last blog we drove to Canada. Brilliant though Smith Rock is, we both wanted a change of venue and it had started to get hot and muggy in Oregon, so we decided to get into the mountains.

Now, we've been getting weather reports from all over North America from the various people we have met and talked to since we've been out here. They all talked of rain, which isn't what we wanted to hear. However, after several hours of intenet research, some discussions, and the purchase of a new guidebook, we decided to take a bit of gamble. We decided to drive north and east into Alberta, and on to Canmore.

It took 2 solid days of driving before we arrived at Canmore in torrential rain. Fortunately (well, okay, we'd seen the weather forecast), the next few days turned out to be beautiful weather, and we spent the time getting to know the local area a bit.

We climbed at a few different venues above Canmore. One venue in particular - Yamnuska - is reputed to be the birthplace of Canadian rock climbing back in the '50s. To be honest, after climbing a route on 'Yam' I'm surprised that climbing ever really caught on at all in this country. It was pretty grim. We'll give Yam another chance though, as I think we made a bad route choice by picking a 'classic' route to climb (it seems that Canadians are tuned into using euphemism in their route descriptions, just like us brits).

We did manage to visit some really good crags around Canmore, and spied out some stunning high mountain routes, which we hope to get on as soon as we get a weather window. But, a few days after we arrived another weather system rolled in and it started to rain and even snow. So, we quit Canmore for a while.

For the last week we've been chasing the weather, stopping off at some nice valleys around a place called Revelstoke, until a few days ago when a little patch of stable weather appeared in the forecasts to the south - so we drove straight under it asap.

We were after climbing a mountain called 'Gimli', which has a highly regarded route up its South Ridge. Just getting close to the mountain was a bit of an expedition, involving half a day's drive, a ferry crossing, 20 km of nerve wracking off-road driving (remember we're driving an RV here. Eeek!), another 12 km approach walk, and 1,600 m of ascent on foot... just to get to start of the climbing. Phew!

Luckily, it was worth it. We hit a 'blue bird' day of perfect weather, and climbed what is probably our favourite route of the trip so far. Gimli is a beautiful little mountain (see picture above). The South Ridge is a stunning line on perfect rock. But, more than that: not only did we have a world class route to ourselves, we had the entire mountain to ourselves, and the valley, and the next valley too. Pretty special really.

We've spent today relaxing and scoffing double rations of food. The weather seems to be looking good in and around Banff and Lake Louise for the next few days. So, we're gonna have a wee look over there tomorrow.

Innes

Photos in sequence:

1. Gimli shortly after sunrise. The South Ridge is prominent between the light and the shadow.
2. Route finding is easy - just follow the ridge skywards. If you look closely you might see me here on pitch 5. (Note to self: wear brighter colours when climbing)
3. Ruth descending the East Ridge, sans ice axe (thats another story though...)
4. On the way down from Gimli - only another 12 km on foot and 1,600 m of descent to get back to the RV from here! It was a long day.
5. This is Grassi Lakes above Canmore. We stopped over here for a few days. The local crag is really steep and stays dry in the rain, and we found a place to park the RV for free next to a lake. It's very nice here.
6. Chipmunks - Canada is lousy with these critters! They are constantly trying to steal your lunch, rock boots, or anything else that you may turn your back on momentarily.
7. Bard owl with chicks - it took us a while before we spotted these residents of the local crag. They are pretty darn big birds, but perfectly camouflaged in a cave half way up the local limestone crag. I suspect they like chipmunks more than we do. We like owls!
8. Trees. Canada does trees.

Smith Rock

Photos from the top

1) Dihedrals sector at Smith Rock - many quality routes packed into a short area of cliff 2) Ruth setting off up Moonshine Dihedral (just to prove that we don't just go sport climbing) 3) The Monkey Face - the route we did goes up the face you can see and into the "mouth" cave on the right, then out the other side of the cave

4) Ruth aiding the bolt ladder up the Monkey Face, etriers flapping in the wind

5) Innes exiting the mouth cave - he looks relaxed for a man with a 200 foot drop under his feet

6) Abseiling off the Monkey Face - that dot in mid-air is Ruth

After leaving Yosemite we drove north for two days to Smith Rock State Park in Central Oregon. This is primarily a sport climbing destination, and is famous as the place where American sport climbing began. We have ended up staying just over two weeks, because the climbing is excellent and it is a really nice place to be. The State Park itself is lovely - very well cared for, with loads of wildlife including Golden Eagles (although we are still not sure if we saw the eagles, or just saw turkey vultures which look pretty similar).

One of the highlights of Smith Rock was climbing the Monkey Face. This is a 400 feet free standing pinnacle. It's got lots of climbing routes up it, some of them very hard, but we decided to climb the traditional and easiest route to the top which is called Pioneer route and involves some trad climbing, some sport climbing, a bolt ladder which you have to aid, and to top it all off a 150 foot free hanging abseil to get back down to the ground. It was brilliant and incredibly exposed, made more so by the fact that it was very windy.

We also did a lot of sport climbing, and both felt that we were climbing well. There are two types of rock here - volcanic tuff and basalt columns. The climbing on the tuff is generally technical on small holds. The basalt is just weird - the climbs generally have no holds, and you make progress (you hope) by bridging and palming and all kinds of contortionist moves.

However after two weeks here we are ready to move on and ready for a change. We are both knackered, and also would like to get into the mountains and do some longer climbs. So we are setting off for Canada this afternoon, and will probably head to the Canmore area in the Rockies, although we need to check the weather forecast first.

Ruth

Calling GMIAU staff

This is just a quick message to all at GMIAU, to ask if any of you have received any emails from me since I've been away. I've sent a few, and I can't believe that none of you would reply! And I was very happy to receive birthday wishes from you all, and touched that you remembered. Maybe my emails have been stopped by GMIAU's officious anti-spam software? More photos on the blog and stories of what we've been up to soon - the reason for the slight hiatus is that our camera broke, and we have only just got a new one. Ruth

Yosemite

We've just left the Yosemite after spending the last eight days in the park.

We've been kinda looking forward to Yosemite as one of the 'big' destinations of our trip, so it was a bit of a shock to arrive at the gates to the National Park only to be refused entry! This was on account of a snowchain restriction being in force on the roads (we don't have snow chains for the RV!). All of this a result of yet another winter storm coming in late season, and depositing a good few inches of snow all over the Sierras.

So our first day in Yosemite was spent waiting to see what was going to happen with road access. Luckily the weather cleared and the roads became passable, and so we got into the park after a few hours of waiting at the entrance gates.

Now I was almost bored of hearing people tell me about how awesome the Valley is when you first drive into it and see El Cap, etc. I'm invariably sceptical on hearing things being so hyped up. But, yes, ok I'll agree - The Valley is awesome when you first see it, and every other time you drive down the road for that matter.

One of the nice side effects of all this precipitation the Sierras have been having is that all the waterfalls in Yosemite are absolutely thundering with water. Some waterfalls which normally start to dry up about this time of year are still flowing with massive amounts of water. Also, there is still quite a lot of snow on the higher peaks, which makes the landscape look even more impressive.

All of this made our trip to the valley incredibly picturesque, but it wasn't really conducive to our climbing aspirations, especially on bigger routes. We did manage to get some good days out on the cliffs - even if it did entail crossing snow slopes to get to the base of the cliffs, and even on one occassion tunnelling under snow on the descent!

Definite high points included climbing The East Buttress of Middle Cathedral Rock, which is one of The Fifty Classic Climbs of North America, and getting to the top of Serenity Crack seconds before the storm we'd been watching come up the valley finally hit and forced us to retreat. Both are world class climbs, for sure.

In the end it was the National Park regulations/access that has moved us on. Its really hard to get a campsite in Yosemite at this time of year, and even if you do get a site it is now restricted to a maximum stay of 7 nights (that includes Camp 4 these days if any climbers out there are thinking of visiting), or 14 days in total for all sites in any one year. Oh well, I guess its an inevitable consequence of so many people wanting to visit what is a very small area of land.

Anyway, we've moved on. We're starting to head North now. The sun is getting so strong these days that at some point soon it has to see off the last of the winter/spring storms and summer has to come now (surely?). I think we'll stay clear of mountain areas for a few weeks yet though, and just seek out some lower level destinations.

We'll let you know how things go, but in the mean time above are some pictures from the last week in Yosemite, which are:

1) Day one at the entrance to the Park;

2) Yosemite Falls;

3) oh, go on then... here's a picture of El Cap - Ansel Adams eat your heart out ;-)

4) Ruth and shadow pitch 4 of Central Pillar of Frenzy 5) Black Bear

Since Innes' last update we spent another week in the Bishop area. Matt and Anna had to go home at the end of April - unfortunately their plane was not delayed by volcanic ash. We spent a week sport climbing at the Owens River Gorge. No photos I'm afraid - now that we are on our own there is nobody to take them. Also our camera has stopped working properly.

Then we spent a slightly surreal evening in an RV park watching the UK election results come in over the internet. At least we didn't have to stay up all night to find out that nobody had won, as we are 8 hours behind the UK. I can't really believe that the Lib Dems will do a deal with the Tories, but you never know. If there is a Tory Government will I have a job to come back to?

The day after the election we moved on to Lake Tahoe, which is about 200 miles north of Bishop and on the other (west) side of the Sierra Nevada mountains. It is a complete change in climate - much colder but also a lot greener. We enjoyed the absence of sand and dust, the grass and the big trees. However we didn't get that much climbing done in Tahoe, because for the first time this trip the weather got bad. We managed two half days climbing at a place called the Sugarloaf, and then it started raining. After that it started snowing, and didn't stop for 24 hours. So we decided to cut our losses and head to Yosemite a couple of days early. Now we are ensconced in an RV park about 30 miles from Yosemite Valley, and looking forward to our first glimpse of El Cap, Half Dome etc tomorrow.

Ruth

Photos:

1. Me seconding Fracture 5.10d at Sugarloaf, Lake Tahoe

2.Innes and big tree near Lover's Leap, Lake Tahoe

3. Snowy Lake Tahoe

4. Campsite at Owens River Gorge

Bishop Photos

Just a quick blog to upload some photos from the last 3 weeks. Lots of good times have been had, and I think that everyone who came out had a good time - ask them about it, and I'm sure they'll update you with the all the stories when they see you next. In the mean time - in order above:

1) Matt - Bouldering Team Safety Officer;

2) At the Buttermilks;

3) Important public information at Owen's River Gorge;

4) Rattlesnakes emerge at this time of year;

5) Anna tops out at the Pollen Grain boulders;

6) The Gramdma Peabody boulder!;

7) Ruth sticks the top hold;

8) Innes pocket pulling;

9) The hillbilly telephone.

Red Rocks and Bishop

Apologies that it has been so long since Innes' last post. We've just been having too much fun to seek out an internet connection.

After leaving Arizona we spent just over two weeks in Red Rocks, which is near Las Vegas in Nevada. Red Rocks is a set of sandstone mountains and canyons which are literally about 3 miles from the edge of Las Vegas. There are all types of climbing available there - long multi-pitch routes, sport climbing and bouldering.

Our time in Red Rocks was pretty sociable, as when we arrived there we caught up with Tom and El, and later were joined by Kimm, Amy and Sheona. We had arrived at Red Rocks with aspirations to do a lot of long routes, but somehow that didn't happen. This was mainly because it was pretty cold and windy most of the time, and we didn't fancy trying to abseil off any of the big routes with our ropes flying horizontally and getting snagged everywhere. However, we did manage to get one of our big ticks done, which was a long route called Epinephrine. We knew about this route before arriving in the US, as it features in various selected climbs books. It is 2,000 feet long and the first half goes up these incredibly smooth chimneys. I've never climbed anything like this before - the sheer effort involved just to stay in one place was incredible, and making upward progress was very difficult. Afterwards I was tired for days. The whole route was brilliant - it definitely lived up to its reputation. Apart from Epinephrine I also did a classic route called Chrimson Chrysalis with El. This was also brilliant, and we were very proud to get up it without our boyfriends!

During our time in Red Rocks Sheona and I went off for a little holiday within our holiday to see some of the non-climbing sights. We went to both Zion National Park and the Grand Canyon. Zion National Park has the tallest sandstone walls in the world. I was glad we weren't climbing, because it all looked very hard. At the Grand Canyon, we walked from the South Rim down to the river and back up. This was a bit like climbing Ben Nevis in reverse, and going down through the layers of rock and geological time was very interesting. There were lots of warning signs saying "do not attempt to hike from the rim to the river and back in one day" and "what goes down must come back up". We decided to ignore these, as we figured that they were aimed at people who never walk anywhere, and who try to do it in the middle of summer. In fact when we were there it was pretty cold - there was snow on the rim at 7,000 feet, and at the bottom at 2,000 feet it was just pleasantly warm.

Then Sheona and I returned to Las Vegas to meet up with the others, who had been enjoying the delights of the Las Vegas strip in our absence. Kimm and Amy had to go back to the UK, and we set off for our next destination which was Bishop in California. To get there we drove across Death Valley National Park. This involved going down to 190 feet below sea level, the lowest point in the USA. It was actually less arid than I expected, with the desert floor being carpeted with lots of tiny yellow flowers. To get out the other side we had to climb from below sea level to a pass at 5,000 feet. We were proud of the RV for getting up this hill without overheating.

When we got to Bishop we met up with Matt and Anna who had just flown out from the UK. Bishop is in the Owens River Valley, on the eastern side of the Sierra Nevada mountains. It is in the rain shadow of the mountains, meaning that it is dry and sunny about 300 days a year. There is world class bouldering here, on both granite and volcanic tuff. We've been here about a week now, and have all managed to wear out the skin on our fingertips. The bouldering is pretty hard - some of the V0's are savage. However after a hard days bouldering you can go and relax in one of the many hot springs in the area, which is pretty cool - hot water, cold beer, view of snowy mountains - what more could you ask for?

Sheona left today to fly back. We hope she will be able to get on her flight, as we were shocked to discover last night that the whole of Europe is under a cloud of volcanic ash. Looks like we picked a good year to go away. We're also not sorry to be missing the general election campaign.

The pictures are from top to bottom:

Innes on Iron Man Traverse, Buttermilks

Anna making a cool shape on Buttermilks Stem Me in one of the chimneys of Epinephrine

Innes at the bottom of a route in Red Rocks called Unimpeachable Groping

Rainbow Mountain at Red Rocks (can you guess why they called it that?)

Ruth