Tyler and I took my Aunt climbing today at Deception Crags up at Exit 38. It had been nearly a decade since either of us had climbed there – so we went up without a guidebook and kind of played things by ear.
Unfortunately, I picked a 5.9 for my Aunts first climb – Knife in the toaster. It is smack in the middle of “Write-off Rock”. She did awesome, but it had a 5.4 on the left and a 5.6 climb on the right – so I just totally miss called the difficulty of the climb. I felt especially bad since right after she left we ran up flammable pajamas next which was the super easy 5.4.
Probably the first lesson of the day was that I look ridiculous in a pony tail. I’m choosing to ignore that lesson though.
Knife in the toaster had five bolts and was my first lead of the season, and first in nearly a year.
Its actually more like a 5.7 climb, with a 5.9 crux move at the end. I just was not seeing the last move though. I got the bold clipped, and kept going up and down looking for the next move but just was not seeing it.
Here you can see the line for the climb – I just need to head straight up and to the left a bit to nail it. In the end I finished by going round, and to my right. The lead for flammable pajamas was next, and it was super weird. You have to climb half way up the climb to get to the first bolt, so the climb with only two bolts, feels like it is over before it feels like it starts.
All in all a lovely day – we need to go out there again soon.