Originally, this trip (led by our fearless V.P. Sharri) was planning to head for New River Gorge in West Virginia. We wanted to do some whitewater rafting and climbing (like the 2000 October break), but decided against such an epic endeavor due to extremely cold weather forecasts. Well, this was the consensus; I personally was ready to go rafting with an ice-axe if necessary.



So instead, we decided to spend all four days at Red River Gorge, KY. This is the climbing spot we go to almost every weekend, so I was a bit disheartened about spending the 4-day break doing what I could have been doing at any given weekend. The group that gathered was quite large, with POC alumnus Adam Glass coming down from Wisconsin in order to school us amateurs.



The climbing started on Saturday, and Adam suggested that in order to beat the crowd (which was quite large judging by Miguel's parking lot), we had better stay away from the real common crags. With this in mind, he top-roped some trad for us: a warm-up '5.easy', and Green Eggs and Ham (a couple of 5.7 cracks). With all of the team climbing, these three climbs took up the whole day, but everyone did quite well and with high spirits we headed for Miguel's.



That night we stayed at Koomer Ridge campground, an establishment with rules much stricter than our normal camping spots. In fact, we got an early morning visit from the man, who loudly informed us that a tribe as large as ours ought to pay for more than one campsite. Undaunted, we ate some breakfast and went off to climb. Keeping with the philosophy of 'beating the traffic', we went to Purple Valley. This prophecy soon became all too self-fulfilling as we bushwhacked through an illusory 'faint trail', free-soloed some limestone, and separated into 3 independent factions a-la POCAR before the ladies of the group finally found the wall. Once at the wall, we picked out two 5.10 sport climbs: Come in your Lycra, and .... and one I can't remember. I started leading the former, took entirely way too much time doing this, but nonetheless got to actually touch the anchors. However, while this constitutes success on sport climbs, touching isn't good enough while leading, and I had to have Adam finish this last stretch for me. Meanwhile, somebody (sorry, horrible memory) led and top-roped the other .10, so after a substantial break I went and did that one. My what a difference a toprope makes: this second .10 went smooth as silk, with me hardly noticing the tricky start. The hero of this crag was our newest climber, Joerg, who was doing 5.10's on his very first climbing trip. He surprised us not only with his natural ability, but also with his tendency to take a seat in the middle of a 5.10 and eat a candy bar. While we were messing around on the sport climbs, Adam took his trad gear and wandered off. He came back rather shaken, muttering something about an ominous crack. Apparently, he bailed off of a pinkie nut, and seemed quite ready to call it a day. Indeed, the climbing adventures for the day soon ended, with me going up to clean the "easy" .10 without taking slings or draws. Dinner: Miguel's. Supper: Koomer Ridge campground (this time properly allocated to 2 sites).



On Monday, the throng of climber bums had largely left Miguel's, so we could now pick any particular crag, without having to worry about crowds. We chose the familiar Phantasia for its variety of sport climbs. I led Pogue Ethics, a very tall but juggy (black-routish) 5.10 which I haven't done before, giving Ryan a chance to learn how to lead belay. After learning that, he decided to learn how to actually lead, so he tied in and did a marvelous lead job on the same climb. Meanwhile, others were setting up Perverse Intentions, a 5.10 with a short but puzzling "no-feet" crux that I've previously done on top rope. It seems that most everybody was thwarted by the crux, and understandably so; the crux is an uncomfortable distance above the previous bolt. In fact, Ryan - who had just done his first lead - did a couple of his first lead falls here. Jackie (who had arrived the previous night) saved the day. I didn't see her do it, but I'm sure it involved something painfully flexible or acrobatic. Unfortunately for our beginning climbers, the two 5.10's are the only climbs we did at Phantasia. I felt a bid guilty about this; after all, we picked the crag for its variety of skill levels, but we were forcing the beginners to kill themselves on .10's.



After Phantasia, Adam took some of us to the Zoo so that he could work on some sickly overhung 5.12. He nailed it quite well, with an acrobatic double-heelhook at the anchors. Ryan, understandably aggressive after his first leading experience, also wanted to try this .12. After playing for a little bit on the gri-gri belay, he was replaced by Jackie, who got to clean the climb, albeit with some gri-gri assistance. By this time, poor Sharri had gotten quite sick, her symptoms ranging from mild nausea to more severe: reading Jane Eyre. On the way back from the Zoo, Jake tried to imitate Little John on a log across a stream. However, since we never had money to begin with, he couldn't extort a toll and we settled for harvesting some unclaimed firewood at Roadside. Dinner: Koomer Ridge with said firewood.



On Tuesday, we needed to head back to Purdue before 12, and the people who haven't been to the Red before wanted to see the Natural Bridge. I was actually eager to do some hiking as well - perhaps I'm not enough of a die-hard climber since I get bored with it after 3 days. But in the final consensus, Joerg got dropped off at the Natural Bridge while a larger group went to Roadside for more climbing. We went straight to the 'hidden' section of Roadside: a secret section with a 5.8, 5.9, and a 5.10. Since Jake and I had previously done the 5.8 (which is a very interesting story in itself), we waited for someone (either Tim or Ryan, sorry for the bad memory again) to top-rope it, and I went off to lead the 5.9. While waiting, there were references made to "sticking it in your fat eye" and even a minor knife injury. This being our 4th day climbing, my performance on the 5.9 was somewhat lackluster. This was illustrated especially sharply when while I was resting between the last bolt and the anchors, one POC member went too far in mocking my progress - to the point where it was no longer a friendly taunt. Insulted, I went to pull the move, relied on unsteady footing, and took a whipper almost to the bottom of the climb, yanking poor Ryan (on belay) nearly into my arse. I was uninjured and - since pride is a Deadly Sin that I try to eschew - nothing was hurt. Since Joerg was at this point probably cursing us for forgetting to pick him up, I resolved to finish the god-forsaken climb and get the hell out of there. This decision was substantially aided by the previous fall: it went smoothly and I had nothing to fear now. So I chose better footing, got to the top, and cleaned.



Since we were already late, we decided to forfeit the trail leading back to the cars, and simply slide on our collective asses into a ravine that eventually led onto the road. This was probably more exciting than any climb we had done so far, and certainly more dangerous (Jake chose an unorthodox but effective ass-sliding method that cleared some logs).



We finally headed home, passing a[n imaginary] banana between cars, stopping to eat at the much-hyped Golden Corral. A corral is of course a livestock enclosure, but this one turned out to be a buffet restaurant with admirable rolls but offensively dry lemons. After stuffing ourselves silly, mutilating gummy bears, and trying to cure Sharri with different foods, we left the Corral for the final trek home.



--Vladimir