Diablo Canyon Again, October 29, 2006
A few (!) pictures from a quick trip to Diablo with Aaron and Elliot. Aaron conquered his new wide crack route, "Airbus," with a nice first ascent. Aaron claims it's a fantastic climb but some of us would consider it pure torture.....a very hard smooth bombay squeeze chimney thing, followed by steep off width, followed by runout face climbing. We also checked out one of the cool caves at Diablo.
But first, this is our adorable kitten, Petra, who is probably about 9 weeks old.
Pet.
Aaron and Elliot.
Aaron gets ready to leave the comfy belay ledge for the wide crack nightmare.
Elliot on belay duty.
Aaron placing his first piece before entering the bombay squeeze.
Head jam.
Not much to hang on to...it's pretty featureless in there, with bad feet.
Aaron tries something new.
Chickenwinging.
Arrrr
This bombay chimney is really...really....hard. I couldn't make the first move into the chimney, let alone climb up it.
Aaron is finally done with the business and is reaching for the money "hold," a hand jam on the underside of a chockstone.
But then there is even more off width joy to be had.
Aaron placing a #4.
Aaron placing the #3.5 in a small roof.
Aaron looking cheerful to be done with that crack stuff.
Just some runout face climbing left.
Finishing it off.
Does he look glad to be done, or what?
Aaron downclimbing in the cave inside one of Diablo's cliffs.
Aaron and Elliot.
Late light on the cliffs.
The moon and pink clouds.
Sunset and Diablo's lovely canyon walls.
©2006 Amy Jordan; Email Me.