Spring Break, Day 2: Oompa, Loompa and Glass Elevator

After a long first day of the trip, especially the couple of laps I ran on that damn offwidth, I was feeling pretty beat up on Monday morning. Drizzly, dreary weather meant we wouldn't be climbing very hard.  It was a perfect day for a rest day.



We've visited the Chocolate Factory in PMRP four times.  Every time I've been in need of a rest.  And every time I get on Oompa (5.10a) and Loompa (5.10c).  And every time they completely kick my butt.

These are the pair the kids warm up on before they wander off to go hurl themselves at hard stuff farther down the cliff.  Both routes are fairly overhung, without many holds to hang below and rest up. It's side pulls, body tension and positioning, and smart footwork all the way up.  I don't think I've ever gotten one of them without resting on the rope or hanging for a moment to scope out a sequence of moves.

On the plus side, Ana got up Oompa for the first time, so at least one of us was making forward progress.

I had more fun on The Glass Elevator (5.10d) to the left of Oompa.  It's a similar style of climbing on even smaller holds, but for whatever reason it didn't make me want to give up and cry.  I got up this on top rope without much fuss, in spite of the fact that it's the hardest of the three routes there.

By this point the team kids had finished up with the silly hard stuff, so we wandered over to the Motherlode.  It's an insanely overhung cliff face full of 5.12+ routes, but had so much condensation on the rock that it was virtually unclimbable.  After watching kids slide off greasy holds for an hour, we packed it in and went back to camp.