trebuchet

The trebuchet went down yesterday and I can hardly believe it. It is unbelievable to me that a world-class route in a world famous area just 10 minutes from the road can still be up for grabs. Thank you Red River Gorge! The trebuchet is without a doubt one of the best 5.14- routes in the country.

The climbing on this route is simply unbelievable. It really is perfect in every way. The bottom bit alone is one of the best 13b's I've ever been on anywhere. Perfect rock and amazing moves. Lots of cross throughs including a hard cross to a pocket on an otherwise blank face.

The climbing to the roof is pumpy. No stopper moves, which is unusual for the gorge, just sustained big holds with a few cruxes thrown in. At the base of the roof is a good rest where you can get most of it back. In a way, success on the route boils down to how much you can get back before the crux.

Then the upper portion of the route is the business. When I first started trying the roof a few months back it felt impossible. I thought V9ish and it took me a few efforts to do all the moves then a few more before I finally linked the boulder problem. After a few months on the route it feels v8ish??

From the rest you reach way out the horizontal roof and grab a left hand slot, three fingers, one pad deep. Then a right hand half pad crimp. dig your toe in the horizontal and lunge out to a crimp with your right hand. The crux is cutting feet, staying tight, and throwing a heel to the lip above your head. Then a hard match, and some more crimps lead to two deep lock offs and a decent clipping hold on the headwall.

The first 20 feet of the headwall is probably 12d/13a? I thought if I got to this hold that I'd be able to pull it off. Not so. I fell three times past here. Once at the sideways lunge and twice past that just before the jug. It is so pumpy up there. The moves are probably 12c? in this section but there is a ton of hard climbing underfoot.

Pretty nice stone on the headwall huh? The first time I rapped down and saw these crimps I almost pooped myself. Just unbelievable. And how bout that jug? Custom placed for sure. If that jug wasn't there this route would be 14+ for sure. You shake and hang and shake then launch in to the final crux. Left hand undercling under the roof, right hand up to a 1/4 pad three finger crimp and a huge lunge to a jug. Terrifying on redpoint cause you could totally blow it. This section is probably V6? then it's 5.11+ jug hauling to the top of the wall. 100 feet to the ground.

I think this route is 14b. It is the hardest route I've done and one of the hardest I've tried which makes it hard to grade. the only route I've spent time on that's harder is also a project so I have no idea how hard this route actually is. It may be 14a. I tried to compare it to many different routes in many areas to tack down a number. It is for sure a big step harder than Proper Soul. It is harder than Mango Tango. I figure White Wedding is solid benchmark 13d and this route is a good step and a half harder than that....I've sampled transworld and God's own stone also and this route is way harder than those as well, for me. So I hope I didn't throw a fluff grade on it.

But how do you grade a pump? The first time I sent trebuchet to the roof it was the fourth most pumped I've ever been in my life. #1 was satanic verses 13c. when i clipped the chains I almost passed out and it took me 10 minutes to untie and feed. #2 was some weird flash pump I attained on Hand me the canteen boy in rifle and that's only 12d. #3 was a redpoint burn on Proper Soul after eating a peanut butter covered brownie. I lowered and almost threw up and then ran off and had diahrea in the woods! And the first time I sent to the trebuchet roof I was almost too pumped to clip. I called it 13c at first. Then after getting it licked and redpointing it 20+ times I could do it with no pump at all. It feels like mid range 5.12 now??? What the hell? So who knows. Maybe for some super fit 14+ climber this route will be tits. If you can get it all back below the roof the top will feel like 13d. It might just be a super complex 13+?

Time will tell I hope and the Rendevous is next week. Hopefully some rock stars will try it and help me out with the grade. Is this the hardest route at the New? Maybe...

Again, regardless of the grade, this is certainly one of the finest pieces of rock I've ever touched. I'd say it's destined to be a classic but due to it's location at the New River Gorge it will probably never get climbed on. Maybe someday people will wake up to how good the hard climbing is here. We'll see.

1.21 Jigawatts!!!!

I have enough power in this monster to operate a flux capacitor. I'd love to warp back to 1985 to see the birth of Troy and drive him off the showroom floor. But that could have grave consequences for the space-time continnuum. The photo above and left shows the flux capacitor and the warp regulator. This runs through the undercarriage to the fuel rods. U-235 is for sissys and can barely power a Delorean. I'm running on UB 12550! Woot Woot! I'm going back to terminate Michael J. Fox at birth so I can replace him and star in Teen Wolf. Better start growing my beard right now.
"oh God, I don't know how they found me Marty, but they found me."
"Who found you Doc."
"It's the Lybians!"
Some of you may remember this most classic of cinematic scenes and you will also recall that 'the Lybians' are driving a late 1970's Volkswagen Vanagon with the roof cut out to accomodate a terrorist with a shoulder launched RPG. So bitchin'. I may add a gun turret to Max in the future.

we have water

The plumbing is in. It goes through the floor and onto the ground just like I like it. No gray water hassle. I toyed with the idea of throwing a T-junction on the pipe and adding a ghetto urinal. I guess I don't have space for both a urinal and a sink. But I guess the sink could act as a urinal. Or the urinal could act as a sink. Maybe, just maybe, I have both a urinal and a sink.....or did I just blow my own mind?

We have fire.

I got all the cabinets in and the counter top. here are some various photos. The drawer was actually easier than I thought it would be. Nice and smooth. the propane was a pain.

I ended up with 5 fittings between the stove and the rubber fuel line. The guy at Lowes tried to tell me some old wives tale about using soapy water to check for leaks. Pfft. Whatever dude. I told him "yeah man, I've been using the Farmer's almanac as a reference quite a bit and actually my shakra is aligned today so I won't be needing any 'soapy water'. What a sucker.

Got her fired up right at the end of the day. Blasting both burners and the space heater at the same time. After I installed the stove I glanced at the installation directions. They've got all this garbage in there about minimum this, and minimum that. Come on guys, do you really think you need 8 inches between the backwall and the burner? I got 3 and some change. I'm tired of 'the man' telling me what to do. Hopefully hooking up the plumbing tomorrow and then electric I reckon. I still have to build the cabinet in the back but the woodworking novelty has worn off.

Got Wood?

Wait till the fire marshall gets a gander inside this bad boy. I have finally built my dream home. It's like living inside a tree. More wood than you can shake a stick at.

I got a bunch of stuff done today despite the most miserable conditions outside that I have ever seen. Drizzling rain that has not let up. The water table is actually above ground level. The backyard is a mudpit. I walked back and forth from the van to the basement in excess of 50 times through grass covered peanut butter. The river is flood stage. People's homes are flooding and further proof of our state of emergency: The flock of seagulls I saw in the Lowes parking lot.

Good thing it's not decent climbing weather cause my finger tip is ruined. It doesn't look bad in the picture and of course it's no big deal for normal life but for climbing it's a death sentence.

So I got the cabinet in above the counter top. That turned out pretty nice. I was toying with the idea of putting doors on all the little cubbies but I felt like I was goind door crazy. It's OK to just throw stuff up there and it would probably get annoying to have to open a little door everytime you want your toothbrush. I like it open like this.

This will be a great spot for toiletries, paper towels, you could even stuff a jacket in there for quick access. Whatever, I like it.

This is my prototype cabinet door. It's pretty good. I got a catch on it so it will stay closed. It's hard to tell but the shelves inside the cabinet are tiered so that you can see all the food on each shelf. This one door took half a day to fit. I watched some videos on youtube about cabinet building. This one guy is like the cabinet champion of the world or something. Seriously, they have competitions. Anyway, he says:

"Everyone can cut to within 3/10ths of a millimeter. It takes talent to remember where you were 1/1oth of a millimeter off so that you can correct for it later."

Yeah, so I followed his instructions...Pfffffff. Yeah right. Dude, I have a jigsaw and a circular saw not some fancy table saw. I eyeball this stuff. That's talent bro.

The downside of trying to get it within 1/8th of an inch instead of .3 mm is that it never fits. The door will rub somewhere or not close at all. The drilled holes for the handle will be off if you eyeball it. So it's best to go slow and measure twice, even if it means walking through the peanut butter soup again.

split tip

Went climbing today for a bit. Tried the project and redpointed to the roof as usual. The conditions were a bit shmarmy so I kind of wrecked my skin. No chance of sending today with the 90% humidity. So I tried another route called Live and Let Live 5.12b. I kind of froze up then had to try real hard to stay on. I tried a little too hard and fully split my tip. It's a deep one. So I'm off the project for at least two days. Looks like I'll be getting some van stuff done.

Back in the Wagon

Rainy day in Fayetteville. Most of mega proj 3 was probably dry but I'm in redpoint mode on that rig. Redpointed the 13b bit to the roof twice yesterday and stuck the crux move twice on link. Second time I fell throwing my heel to the lip. Had I stuck that I just would have had to hold on for the 13a headwall. Good chance I coulda done it. Getting close though. I'm figuring the whole route is 13b to a 10 move v9 to 13a. What's that equal? 14a/b? I'd like to think b, it is for sure a whole step harder than Proper Soul so who knows. The redpoint crux pocket is usually the only hold that's wet and it's not the hardest move but it's the hardest move you gotta do pumped as the bejeesus, and you have to do a deep lock off until you're kinda pulling out. Bam, off the rig.

So I installed a good portion of Max's guts. Got all the cabinetry framed out for the most part. Still have to get the shelves in and stain a few bits but the majority is in.

I also built a little mock kitchen so I could see how deep the stove and sink go. I wanted to make sure that the cabinet dividers underneath wouldn't interfere. As a bonus I now have a template to trace for cutting the countertop. Only one shot on that cut, want to do it right the first time. I like how the kitchen setup is turning out. It'll look nice with the custom faux granite counter.

I was also able to manage a bit more work underneath and got the basic layout for the cabinets. It'll be three 15 inch cabinets with a single shelf. Lots of storage in this one.

About midday Mike Cole came to pick up Troy. It was bittersweet for sure. I'm glad to have found him a good home and I could tell from Mike's excitement that Troy is in good hands. Mike works for Caterpillar, the heavy equipment company. He says he can use the lift at work to work on the rig and check this out.....He can paint the rig for free if, and here's the catch, he paints it forklift yellow! So Troy is going to get a makeover and he will finally get the color he deserves. Bright yellow for the bad ass piece of machinery that he is. Go on with it Troy. You're going to look like a bad man. Here's Mike turning the key on his new rig. Good luck Mike, Troy's got your back now.