Revenue Village: 3 more routes on the Morning Glove have been climbed

Kyler, Manfred and I spent a day climbing routes that I cleaned and bolted but hadnt climbed beyond top-rope soloing. I parked my Trooper and camper where I always do and hopped in with Kyler to drive up to the approach. It was fun showing somebody with 1000 times more experience than me my new area that I have put soooo much time and effort in to and get nothing but positive and excited feedback. I knew I wasnt just floating my own boat! We warmed up on Bear Aware a 30m 10 bolts to chains 5.8 sport route. Then, off the same anchors, top roped The Better Half a 30m 5.7 crack that shares one bolt with Bear Aware. Next I got to lead a climb that has been keeping me awake at night, Tradventurous 60m 5.9 all gear to chains. It was everything I hoped it would be. I used 14 pieces of gear, mostly small stuff. We walked off (mandatory unless you have a half or twin rope set up) and cracked a beer just as the rain started coming down. A few beers later (cant hike full beers out right!) the rain stopped and we walked over to Friction Impossible a 7 bolts to chains sport route project that has still not been sent. On our way we encountered a tiny little shack nooked way up in some 4th class talus. It has one little window looking West but is not situated over any kind of field or pasture or anything advantageous for agriculture. We hypothesize that its an old bootleggers hideaway or maybe an old horse thief's hideaway. I have been walking by it for years and just this trip noticed it. I love the Village. I have found ancient Native American artifacts, morel mushrooms, matching moose shed horns, epic first ascent rock climbing and zero homo sapiens. Kyler gave Friction Impossible his all but it remains an open project. Upon returning to my campsite, I noticed that the cattle taking advantage of the forest service grazing used my Trooper and camper as scratching posts! The ENTIRE driverside of my car and camper was dented to the max. They rubbed on it so hard that they shattered my driver side front window! If I wasnt so happy about the climbs we got done that day I would have been pissed but I just had to chuckle. Should have known. Its not like you can get mad at a cow! Luckily Broadwater Ford in Townsend was having a cash-for-clunkers sale and I was able to find myself a nice new pick em up truck.

Bear Aware is more or less the left rope line and The Better Half is the obvious crack to the right with a super fun start.

KP following on Tradventurous. He is already over half way up at this point.

A well deserved break.

Hmm...

The bench is maybe 5 ft long. 

The thing is freaking tiny. Weird.

I had never seen traces of humans out there before but this day we found a cabin and an fresh fire scar/pit. 

Whomever it was brought a hand-planer up with them. I cant imagine why. 

I got beef with a cow somewhere.

That'll do. 

Morning Glove climb day

Sam, Manfred and I went out for a climb day on the routes that took me 7 days to find, bolt and clean. Im pretty happy with how things are turning out. We climbed all the routes on the Thumb except for Axolotl chimney (previously called Pillow Fight cause I couldnt remember our name for it). Aristocrack 5.7 all gear, Love Crack 5.8 all gear, BumHug 5.8 gear to 4 bolts back to gear, Obnoxious Weeds 5.9 11 bolts and Cadillac Poops 5.10 1 cam to 11 bolts. All these routes end at one of two sets of anchors. Above each set of anchors is another pitch going to the top. FAF1, FAF2, Aristocrack and Love crack all share an anchor with an all gear upper pitch that will go at 5.6. Axolotl, Cadillac Poops, Obnoxious Weeds and Bumhug all share an anchor. The second pitch has one bolt above the anchor to an awesome crack finishing on chains. Everything on the the thumb is 30m. The upper pitches are about 25m. Im a huge fan of all the routes and will give them all 4 or 5 stars. I still have some unclimbed routes on this rock that I cant wait to get my hands on.

The rope is running up BumHug.

Looking up Obnoxious Weeds with BumHug to the right and Cadillac Poops to the left.

Sam on Cadillac Poops.

All smiles after sending 5 first ascents in a day!

So dry out there that even the mushrooms are cracking. 

Revenue Village: Morning Glove; The Thumb (right side) is done!

Got to spend a day wrapping up one of the biggest and best spires in the Village. With an arsenal of wire brushes, regular brushes and a nut-tool I scrubbed that rock clean! It took a couple of bolts to finish BumHug and the rest of the day was spent getting covered in dirt. The fine dirt was sticking to my sunscreen and I looked very peculiar when I was all done.

Our anchor from 5 years ago! I left it for nostalgic reasons. 

MUU style. It seems like your beer is always empty when its 90*!

That old cord anchor is exactly 30m up this lower chunk. You can see my rope running through the roof/notch on the upper pitch. 

A pic of one of the many perfect parallel cracks out there. That crack is called FAF1 and we climbed it years ago on our maiden voyage to the glove. 

There are 2 awesome continuous cracks running up the slab starting at the base of the tree. 

The Village: Morning Glove; right side development

Saturday I ran out to the village with 30 more bolts and hangers thinking that battery power would be my limiting ingredient but my Bosch is a beast and I got every bolt I had sunk into the rock. I got Radventurous done (60m 7 bolts and a rack), Tradventurous partially cleaned (60m crack, doubles on the small stuff), Cadillac Poops (30m 1 #1or2 cam and 11 bolts), Obnoxious Weeds (30m 11 bolts) and BumHug (x2 30m pitches mixed). This spire is quickly becoming the best craig in the Village hands down. Radventurous will go at 5.10 but everything else is easier, though sustained. I want to finish BumHug (as close to Humbug quality granite cracks in MT that I have found) and clean a couple more 30m cracks climber's right and this bad boy will be ready for the crowds (which I think it deserves). Pillow Fight is the obvious (but not pictured in this post) offwidth that Lucas, Travis(?) or Mike(?) and I climbed about 5 years ago. Ill have to sort through the archives to check on whether we named it or not but Pillow Fight seems appropriate cause Lucas was wearing his Patty Puffy when he lead it and scraping through the face crystals opened a few holes in the jacket and the feathers never stopped falling on us.

A pretty place to spend a day.

This photo doesnt do this crack justice. Its perfect and runs the length of the face. It has a lil shrubbery but not for long. Its parallel and deep.

The lower right side of the glove has 6 awesome 30m routes, 5 will probably be 5 star! 

One of my new favorites that I didnt get a chance to finish. The flakes/crack are bomber!

The Village: Morning Glove; more new routing

Two more days with the brush and drill produced 5 more routes out at the Village. I finished JP Memorial which cam out as a 40m 5.8 10 bolts and gear (and a slung tree) to chains. Climber Quotes is another 40m 5.8 (maybe 5.9) 7 bolts and gear to chains. R, Like Rain is also a 40m 5.8 (maybe 5.7) 4 bolts and gear to chains. There are two ways to finish R, Like Rain. Sunday produced two more routes: Bear Aware and The Better Half. Bear Aware is 30m 10 bolts and one medium/small cam to chains, somewhere around the 5.8 realm. The Better Half is the bottom half of a crack system running to the top but the top half is full of shrubbery and clearly a water run-off crack. It'll go at 5.9-5.10 (not sustained) 30m and shares two bolts with Bear Aware with chain anchors. I started work on another 60m route climber's right but ran out of drill juice. Sam showed up later in the day and we got some top roping done on JP's and C.Quotes and were really happy with how the routes turned out. One more weekend and the Morning Glove should be all done! It will have the most routes of any rock out there so far.

Left to right: Climber Quotes (cant really see), JP Memorial (roughly center of photo) and R, Like Rain (can only see top half)

Bear Aware is roughly the rope line and The Better Half is the crack to the right.

There are 8 routes in this photo, 6 are 60m tall!

An unfinished 60m project. 

Memorial Day Weekend route development out at the Village

Finally! A new post! It hasnt stopped raining since I got back from California! My outings have been numerous but unproductive, un-blog-worthy. This is also the time of year to get your garden in so every spare minute I have had has been occupied by my garden. But last weekend I got to hang out in the Village for 4 nights, 3 days and got some new routing done. Saturday I got some chain anchors installed on Cube Crack Left, cleaned it and added 3 bolts. By the time I retrieved my gear cache and moved it to the Morning Glove, it started to sprinkle. It wasnt bad enough to stop drilling so I scrambled to the top of the Morning Glove and low and behold I found some old anchors! This is my 5th season out there and I have never seen another human being let alone evidence of old climbs but alas, all my first ascent trad lines pretty much became second ascents. Im not one to claim something that isnt mine. First ascents can be a touchy subject and I would rather just avoid the hoopla and climb on. The anchors, I estimate, are between 5 and 10 years old. I backed each set up with one of my big anchor bolts just to be safe. The old anchors are situated right on top of two beautiful trad lines that Im sure were the original parties objectives. Slightly disheartened and with the sprinkle becoming a torrent, I started the walk out. A couple of buddies said they would come out and find me but I hadnt heard a thing from them so I assumed they bailed due to the rain. About a minute into my walk out I heard and saw them crawling around on top of Ol Two Tier. I walked over and we checked out some other formations. We even found some (black capped?) Morel mushrooms which I had never seen out there. Sunday was all rain all day so I took the trooper for a drive all the way through to Roots and hit the highway just North of Virginia City! I spent a lot of my day at the Gravel Bar and Willies Distillery with a soak at Norris to cap it off. Monday I got the sunshine I had been waiting for and got to work. In between the two cracks that had the old anchors is a huge face that needed bolts, 17 of them to be exact with 3 pieces of supplemental gear. The Raven Memorial (it was Memorial day after all and my hero Dean Potter had just died) route goes at 5.8 55m. I added 4 more sets of anchors on top and started another route, JP Memorial but only got the bottom 1/3rd done.

One set (of two) of old anchors. 5 piece bolts with Metolius hangers and caulk.

That dog can sleep anywhere through anything! That doesnt look comfy at all!

Zero fear of heights.

These guys....

Ol Two Tier in the rain.

Would have picked 'em but the bugs had already eaten a whole in them.

A lil different brand than normal.

The Raven Memorial is left of the rope. Most of the bolts are on that upper face. JP Memorial is around the corner to the left and closer to 30m.