Jen, Scott, and myself loaded up in the truck, fought gnar traffic on the way out of town, and met up with some other friends in Virgin. While Jen headed off for a ride, Scott and I went into Zion to do Headache and anything else that seemed like fun. While we waited for the classic three-pitch route, I got on Migraine and soon regretted it. The pitch finished with some not-so-fun 5.11 face climbing way above pretty bad gear. I’m really happy that I got off that pitch without going for a big ride. Eventually, Headache cleared up, and Scott and I took a lap and enjoyed every move. I’ll never get sick of this route.
On Sunday, our entire crew went to the Extreme Caffeinated Sugar-Infused Cough Syrup Rampage and got to watch seriously rad mountain bikers doing seriously rad things. I don’t have any photos, but if you know what I’m talking about, then you’ve already seen the highlight reels and… damn.
Scott and I spent Sunday night packing up, and on Monday morning we rode the shuttle, crossed the river, and started up Moonlight Buttress. Our plan was to haul the entire kit, including a portalege, stove, and so on, and climb until it dark or until we got to the top… whichever came first. That’s almost funny now. While our belays were relatively organized and smooth, and we didn’t have too much trouble with hauling, we were not nearly as fast as we would have liked and only made the top of pitch 5 before we decided to set up the ledge an hour before sunset.
After a very uncomfortable night on a pre-production proto version of a ledge that isn’t made anymore, we got up and started climbing again. After topping out, I begged some painkillers off a tourist on the Angel’s Landing trail, and we hiked all the gear down, ate, and drove all night to get home. These are the things I learned on this climb…
-The crack jumar is an awesome technique, and definitely the best way to handle continuous cracks.
-A warm meal is worth the weight of the stove.
-Drink twice as much as you think you need. I had cramping hands and a brutal headache on the top.
-Hanging belays suck big time, especially during two-hour aid leads.
-Take a bit of wide-ish gear even on the thin pitches.
-Wear free shoes on any pitches with a chance of free moves.
-Offset stoppers are awesome.
-The haul bag is always a pain to get into.
-The novelty of sleeping on a portaledge wears off quickly.
