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MisterE
Gym climber
Small Town with a Big Back Yard
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Topic Author's Original Post - May 18, 2016 - 05:41pm PT
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For me, it was definitely "Mines of Moria" in the Lower Gorge of Smith Rock - the recommended rack includes a headlamp:
http://www.mountainproject.com/v/mines-of-moria/107118805
The other crazy one was last year at Tai's new Pine Creek area the "SuperFun Site". This 5.10 he put up starts with a chimney, the transitions through a horizontal wiggle through a detached flake in a roof. At the end of the wiggle, you pull yourself out of the slot on good holds with a lot of exposure.
What are yours?
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NutAgain!
Trad climber
South Pasadena, CA
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May 18, 2016 - 06:09pm PT
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Mr E, there's a climb at Jtree that is very much like what you describe... It's in a popular area... maybe northwest side of Echo Cove? To get off the ground, you are doing hand/fist stacks and knee jams. Then a horizontal squeeze chimney that slowly spits you out while you face straight down to the ground.
Besides that... my weirdest: chainlink security fencing surrounding the balconies 3-4 flights up a hotel next to a police station in the Soviet Union, after curfew.
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Gunkie
Trad climber
Valles Marineris
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May 18, 2016 - 06:20pm PT
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Odyssey of an Artichoke on Cannon Mountain in New Hampshire. The 5.10 stuff was no problem. I almost called for a rescue on the final pitch rated 5.6. I couldn't get on top of the damn flake with a helmet on and the gear was 10 feet below on a slab. Weirdness.
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Curt
climber
Gold Canyon, AZ
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May 18, 2016 - 06:39pm PT
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"The Tunnel" at Skytop in the Gunks is a bit like that. It goes up about 50 feet, then sideways about 100 feet (through a tunnel) then goes up another 80 or-so feet.
Curt
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Reilly
Mountain climber
The Other Monrovia- CA
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May 18, 2016 - 06:46pm PT
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Mousetrap at Anglesey, no contest. It's like Salvador Dali created the rock.
I've posted picks here of it before but I'm too knackered to look them up.
Besides, my oysters are trying to escape and that's just knott gonna happen
on my watch.
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donini
Trad climber
Ouray, Colorado
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May 18, 2016 - 06:47pm PT
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I did the FA of Siberian Swarm Scew...the only weird thing I remember was Bev Johnson puking at the crux with others still to follow. We did call it SWARM screw
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PhilG
Trad climber
The Circuit, Tonasket WA
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May 18, 2016 - 08:11pm PT
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healyje
Trad climber
Portland, Oregon
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May 18, 2016 - 08:18pm PT
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The one that used to go up the middle of this tunnel entrance...
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Fritz
Trad climber
Choss Creek, ID
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May 18, 2016 - 08:25pm PT
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I was climbing at a granite dome on the S. Fork Clearwater, 150 miles from my home in Moscow Idaho, when Mt. St. Helens exploded in 1980.
We didn't know anything had happened until we stopped to buy some beer about 60 miles from home.
The last 30 miles to Moscow was: grey-ash snow and zero visibility when another car went by.
It was a very weird day.
Spring 1980 climbing on the South Fork Clearwater River in North Idaho.
There I was, 30 feet out from a #1 Chouinard wired stopper, on loose rock, with a bad case of rectal seepage. I needed to vomit from drinking too much the night before, a dear John letter was stuffed in my back pocket, and from the bottom of the cliff, my near-sighted three-legged cat, Ralph, was yowling incessantly at a rock it mistook for a cougar. The ash from erupting Mt St Helens started falling thickly. It blotted out the sun, like a grey snowstorm. Ashfall had already covered smaller ledges & was sluffing off the slabs above us like spindrift...
Then I saw the tornado.
It was clearly heading our way.
About that time: an old Ford pickup skidded to a stop at the base of the obscure Idaho cliff we were climbing. As I looked down, two locals in camo jumped out, and I heard one scream: Gol-durn rock-climbers-----shoot em!
Just when I thought: this is the end!
The Volcano-related earthquake started shaking the livers out of us. A dump-truck sized boulder broke loose just above me, as I skidded back down to just below my belayer, and I enjoyed a soft catch. The boulder missed us by 5 feet, but squashed the two shooters.
We called it a day, rapped off the route, rounded up Ralph, broke out the left-over beers, and drove through 120 miles of light, fluffy volcanic ash back to scenic Moscow, Idaho. The last 30 miles to Moscow was: grey-ash snow and zero visibility when another car went by. It was a lot like driving through fine cold powder snow.
The next morning, I looked out my window at 6 inches of white volcanic ash, and said: Oh fuk----it didn't melt!
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Reilly
Mountain climber
The Other Monrovia- CA
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May 18, 2016 - 08:48pm PT
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Edge, the thread is about weird, not perverted.
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Edge
Trad climber
Betwixt and Between Nederland & Boulder, CO
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May 18, 2016 - 09:16pm PT
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But Reilly, the line was Divinely inspired!
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looks easy from here
climber
Ben Lomond, CA
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May 18, 2016 - 09:24pm PT
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PhilG, those are RIDICULOUS! I thought they were like tufa pinches when I first scrolled past. Then I looked again and saw the climber. I'm still in shock.
Do you mind sharing a location?
My humble contribution:
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MisterE
Gym climber
Small Town with a Big Back Yard
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Topic Author's Reply - May 18, 2016 - 09:44pm PT
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Nice contributions, everyone!
PhilG - also blown away by the scale on that first shot...
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jogill
climber
Colorado
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May 20, 2016 - 11:41am PT
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The north face of Teewinot, with its tunnel to the other side near the top. 1956 or 57.
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looks easy from here
climber
Ben Lomond, CA
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May 20, 2016 - 12:03pm PT
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Thanks Reilly. Part of me really wants to go, but then again, British climbing? I've heard what they're like over there...
;p
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brotherbbock
climber
Alta Loma, CA
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May 20, 2016 - 12:24pm PT
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Impeachable Groping in Red Rocks has a 30ft tree climb to start the route.
Stem to the first bolt from the tree.
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Spider Savage
Mountain climber
The shaggy fringe of Los Angeles
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May 20, 2016 - 02:26pm PT
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Solo the big S-Crack on Jesus Wall at Stoney, with a clove-hitch belay. I was strong that day and the bee-hive was on haitus for the winter. Plenty of bat & bird guano to wallow through. It would be a five star route if not for all the poop and bees.
Next to that was doing a long right hand traverse about 3/4 way up Sespe wall and finding a snake coiled up in a hueco.
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TahoeHangDogger
climber
Olympic Valley, CA
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May 20, 2016 - 03:07pm PT
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Labyrinth at Black Wall is an interesting adventure.
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yanqui
climber
Balcarce, Argentina
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May 20, 2016 - 03:19pm PT
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A climb we called "This will feel a little weird"; following the 1st ascent:
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Vitaliy M.
Mountain climber
San Francisco
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May 20, 2016 - 03:20pm PT
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No one claimed Jeremy's MOM yet?!
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cragnshag
Social climber
san joser
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May 20, 2016 - 03:39pm PT
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In the far out backcountry of Jtree sometime in the mid 1990's, we climbed up a crack and into a horizontal cave for a distance, then popped out on the other side of the rock to continue up the face. I think we called it Captain Caveman or something silly. Good place to contract the junta virus, I'm sure.
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Rolfr
Trad climber
La Quinta and Penticton BC
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May 20, 2016 - 07:36pm PT
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The Creature, Joshua Tree.
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Trad
Trad climber
northern CA
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May 22, 2016 - 10:03pm PT
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Mine (so far) was Candyland (.10c) at Phantom Spires.
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MisterE
Gym climber
Small Town with a Big Back Yard
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Topic Author's Reply - May 22, 2016 - 10:39pm PT
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^^Nice, Trad! That is on the list - looks awesome!
Thanks for the eye-candy!
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Dr.Sprock
Boulder climber
I'm James Brown, Bi-atch!
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May 23, 2016 - 02:09am PT
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Goat Rock (across the street from Castle Rock)
went there to get stoned at night, no light, hide out in the cave, true nut cases would do the overhang in the cave, sometimes people would already be in the cave and you could hear them having a party so we sneak back out, parking on slyline at night was legal back then, now they give you a parking ticket for just being alive,
then there was the cliff above the pavilion on Catalina, 12 years old, big ass crowd gathered at the ticket line, all of them looking up and saying
your gonna die!
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mouse from merced
Trad climber
The finger of fate, my friends, is fickle.
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May 23, 2016 - 04:18am PT
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The hands down winner is Depression, II, 5.2/Tenaya Cyn.
http://www.supertopo.com/tr/Overcoming-Depression-5-1-X/t12504n.html
Sad to relate, folks, but this route is now buried by a large-ish tree which fell over on it. It's impossible to do the route again until it has decomposed or burned.
To my knowledge, it never received a second ascent. It's just as well. The low rating would have led to an eventual death, given the X rating.
But in the real world the climb would have to be Agassiz Column below Union Pt. on the Glacier Pt. Trail.
There is some element of doubt as to calling the experience an ascent, first or otherwise.
But no one can call me a liar if I call it a "first descent."
Jerry Coe was the "leaper" and I the "treelayer."
We climbed a tree part-way to its top and I held the rope, a 150' Mammut.
Jerry jumped and landed on two feet. He then put in a 1/4" bolt, anchored to it, and held the rope while I made my leap, using a belay from the tree.
I remember hurting my palms as I slapped them on the top of the pillar.
We rapped off the bolt like heroes instead of trying any fancy lowering with the treelay.
The experience is mentioned in the fairly recent past here on ST by yours truly.
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Fossil climber
Trad climber
Atlin, B. C.
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May 23, 2016 - 10:04am PT
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Giant sequoia in Yosemite during filming of that short Universal series. The old branch stubs had been protected by the canopy forever, were full of pitch, weighed as much as rocks, and would fall at a touch. And when you got well up the tree you couldn't see the ground or much of anything, and the tree didn't sway smoothly in the wind, it sort of shuddered.
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Fossil climber
Trad climber
Atlin, B. C.
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May 23, 2016 - 10:53am PT
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Sometimes it's not the rock that is weird - it's your partner.
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MisterE
Gym climber
Small Town with a Big Back Yard
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Topic Author's Reply - May 23, 2016 - 03:18pm PT
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^^Nice to meet and climb with you yesterday, Jebus!
Another one is Volunteer Park Water Tower. It's bricks with irregularities sticking out of many of the bricks.
It is a popular place to go and traverse boulder - there is a route all the way around the tower, going over the entry-ways.
The climb up the tower has been lead with gear in between the bricks and slinging bricks & the bars in the windows,
but I top-roped it from one of the top window like in this video:
[Click to View YouTube Video]
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Reilly
Mountain climber
The Other Monrovia- CA
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May 23, 2016 - 03:44pm PT
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I've got miles in on the Water Tower. Would even go up there in the rain
if it wasn't windy and sometimes if it was to HTFU. I would often wear
my Peutereys and even my Makalus on occasion. Oh, and a loaded pack!
What a loser.
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MisterE
Gym climber
Small Town with a Big Back Yard
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Topic Author's Reply - May 23, 2016 - 04:29pm PT
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LOL, Reilly! Got Mountaineers? ;)
Did anyone ever hit on you? That was an interesting aspect of climbing there...
that and the noises from the ground-cover.
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Stone Cowboy
Trad climber
Livermore, CA.
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May 23, 2016 - 04:39pm PT
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that one at the trailhead of Princess Owatonna
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Reilly
Mountain climber
The Other Monrovia- CA
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May 23, 2016 - 05:14pm PT
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LOL, Mister E! Yes, at times I felt like a Chippendale dancer,
so to speak. Did you ever go towards downtown from REI? There was an
old sandstone building* there which had some wicked hard traverses on it.
*at Pike and Broadway IIRC
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FTOR
Sport climber
CA
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May 23, 2016 - 06:22pm PT
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candyland weird? first ascent was done onsight, without falls, with gear.
my weirdest? possibly wild thing.
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jonnyrig
climber
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May 23, 2016 - 07:03pm PT
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The social ladder.
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TRo
climber
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May 23, 2016 - 07:50pm PT
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TRo
climber
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May 23, 2016 - 07:54pm PT
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MisterE
Gym climber
Small Town with a Big Back Yard
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Topic Author's Reply - May 23, 2016 - 09:29pm PT
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Very cool!
The cuts are masonry blade marks from cutting blocks?
I guess they don't mind bolting - why are the anchors crappy?
Edit:
Did you ever go towards downtown from REI? There was an
old sandstone building* there which had some wicked hard traverses on it.
*at Pike and Broadway IIRC
Reilly yes, we tried that traverse as part of our Capitol Hill circuit - never got far on it...
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Edge
Trad climber
Betwixt and Between Nederland & Boulder, CO
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May 23, 2016 - 09:46pm PT
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Sierra Ledge Rat
Mountain climber
Old and Broken Down in Appalachia
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May 24, 2016 - 04:23am PT
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Did a Sierra climb that involved jumping from the top of a small tower to a ledge on the main peak
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TRo
climber
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May 24, 2016 - 04:47am PT
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FTOR
Sport climber
CA
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May 24, 2016 - 04:43pm PT
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someone just posted an account of wild thing. pretty much how i remember it, but not many brain cells left from that period...
i do recall falling in the summiting slime/bat sh#t chimney for a ways. i always wondered what would happen if you fell in one of those tight squeeze things, you sort of rattle down like you'd expect until you wedge in.
of note, my partner for this adventure was the infamous edward drummond. someone posted up thread about sometimes its not the rock but the partner.. in this case the best/worse of both worlds.
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Steven Amter
climber
Washington, DC
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May 26, 2016 - 02:16pm PT
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In about 1977 I put up an unreported route in the Cirque of the Towers area of the Wind River Range. It was with a climber whose name I have long since forgotten (he was a teacher from upstate New York - Albany or Syracuse area?).
We started up on an established route that near the top entered into a large chimney with crappy protection (old pins) that led deeper and deeper and had us doing big stemming moves. Rather than continue up the chimney, we elected to go deeper into it an found ourselves in a cave where we could see a little bit of daylight at the other side.
The light was from a small hole in somewhat broken rock - an opening smaller than a bowling ball. We spent the better part of an hour whacking away at the rock until we widened the hole enough to crawl out onto a decent, steep face that, as far as we could tell, had never before been climbed. Some more pitches and we topped out. At the time, I felt somewhat embarrassed by the whole episode, so I never reported the "route."
But in my head I have always remembered the route by the name "Caver's Delight."
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mike m
Trad climber
black hills
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May 26, 2016 - 03:02pm PT
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Ames memorial at vedawoo
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localdan
Trad climber
Visalia, CA
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May 27, 2016 - 06:29am PT
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Humanality, Tonsai beach, Thailand. I hadn't climbed limestone much, not used to looking for tufas to stem off of.
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__e Whitehouse
Social climber
Ouray, colorado
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May 27, 2016 - 09:30am PT
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FA with Derek Hersey in Wild Iris, named it Nothing to do with cowboys so what anyhow.
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Tork
climber
Yosemite
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May 27, 2016 - 10:05am PT
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chainsaw
Trad climber
CA
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May 27, 2016 - 11:08am PT
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Was climbing "Under the Bigtop" at the leap recently, when I got to the wide horizontal opening at hand hight. The sloper is covered with birdcrap so I endeavered to jam a foot in that thing to rest up. To my surprise, when I reached into it to place gear I had to scrape out about six large fishheads that the falcons left there. Bones and all.
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k-man
Gym climber
SCruz
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May 27, 2016 - 11:17am PT
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The Embarrassment of Rich's was kinda weird. The first piece was a #6 Friend, followed by a purple TCU. The the overhanging hand crack, filled with fresh bat guano.
The route changes with every ascent!
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le_bruce
climber
Oakland, CA
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May 27, 2016 - 11:23am PT
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Chockstone Chimney has some good-weird elements to it.
*The crux is weird in that you have to do a balancy sequence to a boa-like tree limb, then monkey up long, smooth, cascading tree limbs for a while.
*The core of the climb is comprised of a series of weird and beautiful chimneys, all distinct from one another. The first is clean and tree-choked and all kinds of fun, the second is pitch-black dark, the third is angular and bizarre with all kinds of geometry afforded by a massive intruding flake and a large roof that caps it and chops up the light coming in from the top, and the last is the namesake chockstone chimney.
The descent is almost as strange and wondrous as the climb, involving a traverse through Sherwood Forest (really cool), unlikely and hard to find raps, steep raps, questionable raps, and finally a waltz down the El Cap Gulley and past the Hourglass Flake.
Great day, the Chockstone Chimney, full of weirdness and a damn good outing.
Here's Pellucid's TR: http://www.supertopo.com/tr/Chockstone-Chimney-with-LeBruce-Photo-TR/t12154n.html
Book of Job isn't weird except in that when looking up and sussing from the base it looks like it's a steep line. When looking down on your second as they come up to your belay it also looks like a steep line. But while you're climbing it, there's nothing steep about it.
Hmm seems steep
Still looking steep from below
The fall of the trail line, the body position, the roof - seems to indicate steep climbing. But when you're on lead wow nope not at all.
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shylock
Social climber
mb
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Tork, where the heck is that route with the tubes?
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L
climber
A place where Blue is the new Black...
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I'm wondering where the heck MisterE is.
Of all the MIA Tacoians, I miss his posts the most.
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