Back in February I received a friendly email from Dana Perry. He was looking for some clues as to what he had climbed the day before at Sleeping Giant. I don’t exactly remember what his original intention was but it turned out that he had climbed up a line very close to my first ever lead with Leon Islas back in August 2000.

It was an interesting day that Dana had. He started up with his wife and 5 year old girl, everyone keen as mustard to climb. However, his little girl’s enthusiasm for the adventure had waned mid-climb, leading to some protest. On top of this some hikers mistook Dana’s family for a group of desperate people in dire need of assistance. An emergency services team had been summoned and were driving up the tower path just as Dana topped out.

Dana’s route is now called Search & Rescue and it’s got a 5.4 rating.

Anyway, he figured that the line was pretty close to Gumby’s Delight (also 5.4) and they had enjoyed the experience. I have to agree, Sleeping Giant really is a great find. We arranged to climb together sometime and I would point out a few of the more popular routes.

That was then …

Friday 29^th

I swung into the Park just on 9am. As we arranged Dana was there waiting for me. After a brief exchange greeting we decided on taking both racks and his brand new 70m Mamut, and hiked off towards the chin. Dana is some sort of advertising executive (I think, I’m terrible at remembering this sort of detail) and he’s been climbing on and off for decades. His favorite haunts have been the Gunks (New York), Red Rocks (Nevada) and just about everywhere in New Hampshire, probably still are, but now he is beginning to explore what Connecticut has to offer. Poor guy. But then it could be worse, could be Florida. By the time we reached the chin I was learning that he was the least insane of three brothers. Cool.

I pointed out to where Gumby’s Delight lay and he indicated that it was indeed in pretty much the same place as Search & Rescue. I pointed out the line of Weissner’s Rib (5.6) and the nearby Radamanthus Corner (5.4). Dana was pretty keen on doing the Rib so we haul-assed it up the scree field to the base. Dana told me that he is a solid 5.4 leader, so I thought that perhaps I would lead it and let him get the feel of it sans-grippage. He was fine with that.

So, like, I’ve described this route a bunch of times. The tricky first crack with difficult to find footholds and a blank right wall. The sweet but committing little friction traverse above that. The marvelously demanding, yet mercifully short, layback dihedral. The lightning-bolt finger crack which leads you out over the void and up to a big fat belay ledge. I took my time and got through all of these without any real trouble. I really do like this climb. Dana followed up, I couldn’t see him until after he worked his way up and over that first crack. He glanced up and gave me a grin.

“It’s harder than it looks.” He noted.

He did the friction traverse by the book, accepting less than positive holds and learning that the friction really is pretty good. Marching up to the smooth dihedral directly above Dana made application with a strictly disciplined lieback and gutsed it out flawlessly. The lightning-bolt finger traverse went fast and pretty soon he was sitting up there beside me.

We were both enjoying the day and the sun was bright. It was bloody marvelous to be out there. While we exchanged gear and got ourselves sorted for the next pitch I pointed out some of the aspects of Radamanthus Corner, just to our left. I also indicated where the difficult Defender (5.11) was a little way off to the right, and the less troublesome Frenchman’s Cap (5.9) immediately beyond it. Soon we were both ready for me to get on with it.

Again, I’ll be brief, though it’s worth going over again. Step right off the ledge over the never-never, great handholds and then your around and looking up at cracks and ledges. Keep the body away from the rock, give your feet room, mantle here, mantle there. Up to a pocket decorated with the rusty and ragged remains of the worlds oldest pin (I bet it is one of Weissner’s). Protect, pause and then push off left. Finally I can do this without too much pause. Swing around the arete, get the feet set and the rest is a sure bet.

At the top I anchored from a tree and then called off belay to Dana below. Once he got going he found the first set of ledges, angled enough to make it feel like your being pushed away with every step, more than a little thoughtful. Like everyone new to them he was sticking too close to the rock, not giving his feet enough room to maneuver. He didn’t slip though. The traverse back left was no problemo and in no time at all he was scrambling up over the top beside me. Ha! We live!

We discussed doing another climb and decided on going back to the Gumby’s/Rescue area. There we would compare notes on our separate routes and decide what to do. I got a little lost on the way (I hadn’t been to that end of the cliff in about 18 months!), but we found the top and suddenly the memories came flooding back to me. The principal rememberance was topping out beside Leon on our first lead. Ah mate, I wish you were still here.

We downclimbed a little bit, set up an anchor which (eventually) satisfied the both of us. I would rappel down first and then Dana would follow. On the way down I would attend to some business. Dana had left behind a #1 camalot back in February. He had tried to pry the damn thing out twice but had no luck. We could see it was still there and I promised to have a go at it myself. See, it’s all about motivation. Now Dana is not a starvingly poor life sciences post-doc like myself. So he can replace a #1 camalot without hesitation. But a life sciences post-doc … surviving by the skin of his teeth on an income that’s probably considered below minimum wage in Bangaladesh … would not be in the same sort of position, that camalot is COMING WITH US DAMMIT!!

So I got on rappel, discussed the merits and deficiencies of my setup with Dana for a bit and (satisfied that neither of us was going to fully understand the other on this point) went down to the stuck camalot. Grunt, hack, pull, hammer, bang, crack (ouch!), grrrr, hammer, wiggle, wiggle, shake, rattle and roll. Popped it out in under three hours, wooohooo! Cor blimey, it’s in a bit of a bad state tho. I clipped it onto my harness and proceeded to proceed down. The remainder of the descent was uneventful except for the GREAT WACKING ROCK WHICH FELL ON ME! Actually, it was a moderately sized rock that fell perhaps three feet from a ledge before RIPPING OFF MY LEFT ARM!! … er, actually it just hit my left shoulder in a solid sort of fashion (I still have the arm, attached) … but I was pretty amped about it for a few seconds. Anyway, like I said, it was a relatively uneventful descent from a statistical point of view. Hmmm, I thought to myself as I went down, this is surely some of the chossiest choss I’ve seen in a very long time.

I got down, off the rope and walked out of range for Dana to follow me to the base. He did this pretty quick and soon we were pulling the rope down. With rope down I returned his errant camalot and we worked out who would do the lead. Let’s see now, me I’m still sort of young, single, no kids, 63% of life still in front of me. Dana is probably exceedingly old (ok, probably not), he has children (1) and is married (1, unless he’s from Utah … then the number is 5 ± 1). Above us is about 30 metres of crappy chossy deathblocks all piled up on each other like a house of cards just waiting for a stiff breezing to bring it all down. Ha, easy, Dana goes. And, with nary a discouraging word, he did. I made sure my escape routes were clear (don’t wanna be crushed to death by falling rocks and climber) and put him on belay. He took neither Gumby’s Delight on the right, nor Search & Rescue on the left ... splitting the difference instead and doing a line that could be called Gumbies to the Rescue (5.4). He ran it out a good 10 metres before finally finding somewhere protectable, then he moved up and fought for a long while to adequately protect a rather committing step. Eventually he got it going again and finished off the last of the technical moves up to our rap anchor.

Down below I was looking up and thinking Jeez this looks easy, we could have soloed this no sweat and remembering that I thought exactly this sort of nonsense back in August 2000. Trompe l’oeil … sort of. Anyway, Dana put me on belay and I followed up. It is definitely a 5.4 climb, it is definitely loose in many places, and protection is difficult to find. It was a good lead, one done not without the uncertainties of the terrain. We wrapped things up at the top and then walked back down to the carpark. There Dana introduced me to his wife and his little girl. It had been a fine way to spend the morning.