Friday 6th “Psst. Hey you … yeah you … listen up. We’re gonna skip out of class on Friday afternoon and go climbing. OK?” This from Gary Sax, the Budget and Planning Director of Yale University. Gary, somewhat ticked off at the struggle he and I had doing a supposed 5.5 on Monday, has been doing his research. He pinned down and grilled no less than half a dozen people that he knows can offer him beta on the true identity of a route called Elegant Monkey. By Thursday he had the goods, including a top-secret Mk III topo map for Cathole Pass supplied to him by David Fasulo, the local climbing skunkworks director. James Rush wanted to come along as well, having been out on CT rock but once before he was hoping to increase his mileage on the local stone. Gary said he would pick us up from my place at 1pm. Fine, all went well … although James had to sprint (on foot) through downtown New Haven to make it. Piling ourselves and our stuff into Gary’s car we rocketed off up the I-91 and then the I-691 to Meriden. Snatching an easy parking space beneath the cliffs we racked up and hiked the short path to the base. There were a couple of young blokes top-roping Pegasus. Sure is a popular route, although I haven’t seen anyone leading it lately. We three followed the path leftward along the cliffs and went back to the start of Elegant Monkey. With new topo in hand we looked up at the line that maybe we could take. The plan was that I would lead it up again, following the same path I took on Monday except this time use a leftward deviation near the top on to what promised to be slightly easier territory. David Fasulo has Elegant Monkey rated at 5.6 … it was rated at 5.5 … and his topo is better than the one in the RMF guide. So we think we’re onto it this time. Gary will go second, cleaning the route of gear that I place and then the rope will be lowered to James so he can finish up in third. I wont bore you with the details. Suffice to say that when the time came to make the leftward traverse I was frightened off by the lack of available pro. The face where I was supposed to make the cross looks like it has eroded in recent times and if there were any protective features before they are not there now. I was in no mood to run it out to the top from here. So I backed off and looked with mild concern above me. That horrible, over-hung, desperate finish I did Monday was again on the menu. So our “Lost in the Outback” variation returned. I found my feet with marginally more confidence than last time, but it was still a scary trip. After placing my last piece (a #1 camalot) just a couple of feet from the top I was deadly tired. My arms were suffering from months of relative inactivity. Gary offered to take up the slack and give me a rest. I had to do this last time. Stupidly I waved him off and tried to find a position I could wedge my body in for a more acceptable (i.e. unaided) rest. But I just couldn’t get comfortable. The very top of the overhang was particularly dusty and I was constantly blinking crud out of my eyes. I was going to have to try and fist-jam in the one crack that remained. Ok, well … in principle I know how this is supposed to go. But it didn’t work out so well. I lifted myself up, jamming like a madman, and then tried to make a grab for the top of the crack. The #1 camalot was at my hip. My right foot and my remaining hand popped from their perches and I was dropping like a stone. On the way down I was thinking to myself … wow, that’s a lot of slack. I came to a relatively gentle halt about 10 to 12 feet or so below my high point. Such was the degree of overhang that I didn’t hit anything at all. Down below, a nut placed somewhere around half-way slipped free of its crack. I thanked Gary for his catch and he asked me if I was ok. I replied that I was going to have a little break. He offered to lower me, saying we could walk around up there and set a top-rope anchor instead if I wanted. Lead-head check. Zzzzip, click … hmmm, it all seems pretty much ok in there. “Nah, I can finish this.” I said. It occurred to me that I had just been caught by an active camming device. Now I guess there are people who swear by them and there are those who don’t give them the credit they may or may not deserve. For example John Peterson, whose opinion I value very much, has said to me that too many people are too casual about relying on these things. Whether he meant that too many people don’t know how to properly use them, or that they are just not as intrinsically safe as people think … I don’t recall. That comment has, however, put an end to any cavalier usage of these items that I may have practised in the past. When I put a camalot in a crack, it’s because I can’t find a place for anything else first. The point here is that it held. Great. After a while I worked my way back up and had the strength to muscle it up to the top and over. Not quite as adrenalin pumped as last time, but still with a much elevated heart-rate. Quickly I set up an anchor station and found a comfortable seat from which to belay and watch my fellow flailers. Gary got through the relatively hard start pretty quickly. As he was pulling over the first overhanging hand-crack thingy I noticed that my camera’s soft-cover had tumbled away during my fall and was lying on the ledge just above and to his left. “Gary, could you grab that for me?” I asked. Like the gentleman he claims he isn’t Gary did the deed, climbing up, around and then down to it. Cursing lightly at every step. Jamming it into his pocket he resumed the line. Climbing up to where we thought Elegant Monkey should deviate from my route, Gary started a leftward traverse. I had to pay out a little rope for him to reach a comfortable stance. He claimed to spot a protectable flake, something I didn’t (and, from my current position, couldn’t) see, although he conceded that it was a little bit of a run-out to reach it. Gary made his way back to my line, although he was a little uncertain at first how to backtrack the traverse … if he fell he would stand a good chance of smacking into the other side of the corner. He got through and grunted and swore his way up and over the overhanging finish. Up top he retreated from the edge, disengaged from the rope (so I could coil it before throwing one end of it back down to the patiently waiting James) and tidied up my gear which he collected during his climb. James had a bit of a struggle on the start, but by arm-force he pulled himself up and over to the first ledge and scrambled along the middle section pretty well. However his arms were pumped out and when he found himself under the overhang they began to give out. With a thunderous expression of frustration James struggled in silence to overcome the betrayal handed him by his arms. Eventually he had to let it go and asked me to lower him. Leila and I talked a little about this on the weekend and she made the salient observation that when overcoming the demands of gravity ”… big guy needs much more power per unit guy than little guy.” So James, who is quite tall and has a history of playing Australian Rules and Rugby (which are not sports for weedy little dudes) has quite the job ahead of him in the gym. I lowered James to the ground in fits and starts. I never had to do this with a gi-gi before (although I had learned what to do during a self-rescue clinic I took in New Hampshire last year) and the poor bloke was jerked around like a rag doll from time to time. In any case, despite my inexperience with the method, he was safely on solid ground once more. Gary checked his watch and announced we had time for another one if it was fast. We found a second climb, Catwalk (5.2), a relatively new line that is described only in David Fasulo’s nifty new guide to the area. It was a big corner with a big crack just to the right of Elegant Monkey. Halfway up, a juvenile tree was sprouting from a ledge and offered good slinging opportunity. This was a pretty easy line and apart from slinging the tree I went up it without placing any gear. The crack was so wide that at the top it was actually a chimney. The holds were jugs and there were plenty of platforms for the feet. Quick and easy. The thrill for me came in doing the climb with next to no pro. James romped up this one, as did Gary, up top we coiled the rope and shook hands all round. It had been another enjoyable day on the rock. But what the heck is the deal with Elegant Monkey? We think now that it's a top-rope only climb, or that it at least deserves an R rating for the long runout to protection near the top. I also think that no-one else has looked at it since some features have come away from the face. I can recommend our variant finish though, it's a pretty exciting top out. Gary dropped us off at my place and we said our goodbyes there. He’s off to Tucson for a life of leisure the lucky bastard. Thousands of high-quality climbs within an hour and a half of his new home. How can he do this? Why that’s easy … he retired at noon that very day. Good luck Gary!
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