Gregor Peirce, The Buttermilker (v13)

I have to report that Gregor Peirce climbed The Buttermilker (v13) yesterday, declaring, "I've become man enough for the real start."

Nice work Gregor! Charlie tells me you made it look easy, despite refining the beta on the fly! Hey, anyone who declare's Wills's Seam (at Way Lake) "the best boulder problem I have ever done," deserves a mention on here! Gregor, you are the best! Thanks for that, and good luck on your next projects! Hope you send everything!

Oh wait a minute ... now he's saying The Buttermilker is probably his favorite problem so far... Lame ...

Sit Start to Grindrite

Tore Årthun, over from Norway on a bouldering tour for a couple months, asked me if a sit start to Grindrite at the Happy Boulders had been done  (v3, page 125 in the new guide). I wasn't sure, as I had seen chalk on those holds below the regular (high) start for a while, but hadn't done a sit myself or known anyone to do it.

Anyway, Tore went back to complete the line: "The way I climbed it was from a sit start at the big undercling under the roof," he says, "slapping up right to a nice sloper, then moving left hand into a big undercling and slapping with the right to join the stand start." He suggested the difficulty was probably somewhere in the v8 to v10 range, though was more likely at the upper end of that.

Not sure if this is an FA, but it's not in the guide, and certainly should be now! Tore has suggested, Slave to the Grind as a suitable name, unless it was previously climbed. I'll go with that unless someone tells me otherwise. Thanks for the info Tore.

Karma, v6/7 by Matt Arnold

Matt Arnold told me about this line at the Happy Boulders a while ago, but not soon enough for me to include it in the new guidebook. Matt named it Karma, and I went to check it out today with a few others. We found a striking line--an overhanging double arete--that is climbed using a bit of trickery, a bit of slapping, and some staying power to pull the lip. The moves are fun and the rock is solid, though a bit rough. Matt's original beta forced the line up the left arete, but a motivated crew today worked out a new sequence that goes at about v6/7, beginning at the obvious horizontal crack and topping out left. It's worth a look if you want something at about that grade--it could be a classic in the making...! Take three or four big pads. You can see the line up on the northeast rim (right side as you walk up canyon), a little beyond the Serengeti boulder.

This is a shot of Ian Cotter-Brown climbing Karma

Lessons at Rock Creek (v13?) by Charlie Barrett

Today Charlie Barrett sent his project at Rock Creek, the extremely hard sit start to the beautiful prow on the right side of the talus (across the river and up the hill from the Campground Boulder). The line has stood out as the "last great problem" at Rock Creek for several years, and Charlie put a dozen or more visits into it over the past year. He has named the line Lessons.

 Charlie eying the second move on the project last year

Charlie, who has been working his way through the eastside's hardest boulder problems (including ascents of Spectre, The Mandala Sit Start, Thunderbird inTuolumne, etc.) describes this as probably his hardest ascent to date! Lessons, which is a sit to Compression Session (v9) requires a huge amount of compression and body tension and some dynamic slaps to complete. The crux (the first few moves) requires squeezing between a good arete with the right hand, and some terrible glassy undercling/sidepulls with the left. The link for Charlie depended upon securing the left hand into the upper part of the key left sidepull with the second move--gaining the hold in the perfect position with the thumb on poor but crucial pinch. See the last paragraph of a previous post that also mentions this project.
 

 Charlie on Compression Session (Rock Creek), now completed from the sit start

New line on Upside Boulder

Ian Cotter-Brown has reported a new line that traverses from left to right on the Upside Boulder before topping out. This boulder, which is located up past the Saigon Boulder about 200 yards or so, is newly included in the 2nd edition of the guide (page 299). The problem begins to left of the west face down low on a good hold and moves low right to top out on  Early Exit (a v5 mentioned in the guide). The traverse could also potentially be linked into Upside (v8) to give a harder link. The problem done is somewhere around v8-v10, but needs confirmation.

Wildflowers

The wildflowers are amazing around Bishop right now. It is great to see the blooms across the Buttermilks and beyond ... Above is a shot taken near the Birthday Boulders yesterday evening. Below is looking toward Basin Mountain.

Ambrosia--Direct Start and Third Ascent by Isaac Caldiero

This afternoon Isaac Caldiero made the third ascent of the amazing highball/solo Ambrosia (v11) on the Grandpa Peabody at the Buttermilks.

 Isaac Caldiero, up above the hueco on Ambrosia (Photo: W Young)

The impending stormy weather presented an extra challenge. It was a warm, but windy day with a mist of rain occasionally drifting in from the mountains to dampen aspirations. But that light intermittent rain evaporated as fast as it arrived and Isaac was motivated by the cooling of the breeze that provided conditions far better than he'd seen over the last warm week.

 Isaac nearing the top. Photo: Devlin Gandy

Interestingly, Isaac was able to make a direct start that had eluded Kevin Jorgeson, thereby straightening out this already fine line. He began with some intriguing technical moves to pull onto a good hueco about four feet off the ground. This quickly led to crimps and sidepulls and some more hard pulls and high-steps to gain good edges below the rest-point hueco a little below half-way. There, Isaac took a long rest as a buffeting wind threatened to blow his pads away. Then, using another original sequence, he pulled into an undercling in the top of the hueco and stretched up past the mid-point crux. Isaac's familiarity with the moves meant the top was more or less a formality for him, though the wind did its best to take the feeling out of his fingertips!

"The main attraction was that it's a huge obvious line on one of the most notorious boulders in America," says Isaac of Ambrosia. "I've been doing highballs for a long time and as soon as I heard Kevin had done the proudest line on the boulder I knew I had to check it out. Finally all the stars aligned and I was able to get out here and suss it out on a TR."

Breather before the committing finish. Photo: Devlin Gandy

Other big lines Isaac has done are some proud FAs in Turkey including Kumar Bas (v8) as seen in the video Herakleia (by Mike Call), plus several highballs in Southern Utah such as a second ascent of Somewhere Over the Rainbow (v9) and also the second free solo ascent of The Present (5.14). But Ambrosia was his hardest highball to date.

"Most highballs I've done have hard moves down low that lead to an easy top out, but this had small smears big moves and technical pulls all the way to the end. Right off the start I realized the seriousness of this particular line. For the most part it is super solid, but there are a couple of holds near the top that are definitely questionable. Usually when I think of soloing that high off the ground I wouldn't want to have any doubts about the rock at all, but I really wanted to do this line. It's a really, really cool boulder and to top out on the most highball line on it was really inspiring. I think doing the top several times was a lot about gaining confidence in the rock as much as my own ability."

 On the summit. Photo: Devlin Gandy.

Nice one Isaac! Thanks to Devlin Gandy for these images! Check out more including a video on Isaac's blog.