Thought I would let people know about a fun idea for moderate climbers.
Two summers ago a friend and I decided to climb as many Adirondack Slabs as possible.
Due to scheduling, the only time we were able to do it was during black fly season, which put a short end to our adventure (my partner actually had to get medication from his doctor to deal with his bloated ear from the bites)
Anyway here is what we ended up doing...
12 midnight Roger's Rock, beautiful, fabulous, surreal experience under a full moon. Back to the car about 4 am. Drove over to Moxham's Dome, started hiking in 5:30 am, by the time we got going on first pitch, the bugs were killing us mad crazy bad awful irritatingly terrible like, we did a shortened version of a mixture of routes, came off after about 3 1/2 pitches. Drove up to Chapel, it began pouring, we slept in the van, around 4 pm it cleared up and the rock was dry/drying... .we began Empress... flies still bad but not terrible. From the tiredness and heat and bugs we were zonked, and by 8 pm called it a night. The original idea was to do four slabs in 24 hours. We did three in considerably less, climbing was easy, dealing with weather, bugs, etc. was hard part.
In retrospect we should have begun at 6 am, on the hard climb... Poke-O, which we never got to, then driven south, knocked off chapel, which we've done hundreds of times, run next door to King's Slab, which we've never done but hear is like Poke-O, exposed and scary without much pro, then rest, down to Moxham in the evening, and finish up Roger's at night (which is a good one to do under moonlight)
Partners being what they are, I don't know what will happen, so if anyone is interested in joining me, or has suggestions, comments, ideas, let me know.
I'm guiding in the Adirondacks most of the summer, so any, or all weekends are good for me, let me know if you want to give it a try.
Ian

Hey Ian. I may not be the ideal partner, being that I'm only 15 and not a very expeienced leader, but this sounds like something that I would totally be up for. I'm free the whole summer, actually I was planning to do Roger's Rock on my birthday, July 29. Let me know if I'm a candidate. I live in Fairfield County CT, but I have a grandmother and 4 aunts/ uncles and about 15 cousins who all live in Ti, so I can go up there and stay for a night or two if I have to. This is something I'd totally love to do.

-Brenden

Ian, i'm interested--especially since I lost my mentor! :) WHen is black fly season and what do you consider a "moderate" climber?

Lisa

I'd take either of you... I'm game for climbing in the Daks at any time...
don't worry about age Llama (Brenden) I take the younger staff members from my camp climbing all the time... they carry all the heavy stuff, I buy the ice cream at Stewarts, works out nicely.
Lisa, moderate? I have no idea what it means, so let me explain myself... I lead 5.6s at the Gunks (though this early in the season, I ain't feeling like I could) follow 9s, top rope 10s. All the climbs in the Daks I mentioned I have led, except the King's Wall. Poke-O scared the shit out of me... really long runouts on exposed slab climbing, but the rest (Chapel,Roger's, and Moxham, are fun)
If you're interested, write me at iannewcast@aol.com
and we'll discuss details, right now I'm not sure, but it looks like I'll be in the Daks for the whole summer again if my plans go right.
Black Fly season, when they're really bad, is usually about the last two weeks of May and first two weeks of June. And I'm sure you'll find thousands of people to disagree with this statement.

Hey all, I have received a few emails on this post, so it seems like there is some interest. One person emailed me with elbo@(don't want to print his address on the internet).com
Whomever you are, my computer says "Elbo" is not a known member at your address. If you have another email, let me know.

As for everyone else... I've gotten your emails saved, I'll keep in touch, Brenden, Lisa, and everybody... it should be cool, I don't want to let anyone down, so if I have to do this for every weekend this summer straight, I can think of worse ways to spend my summers. :):) Right now I'm working 6-7 days a week, but I hope to see some of you at the Gunks soon, I'm mostly up there on sundays. :):)
Ian

Hey Lisa, my computer has a personal vendetta against you. I can't reply to your emails, nor can I copy and paste your address. I keep getting, member not known at gateway.net.
????
Anyway, I'm definitely going to do this thing a couple of times this summer, more than once it seems, probably won't make it before July, but you never know. I'm just going to keep in touch with everyone between now and then, and hopefully meet some people at the Gunks in the meantime. So keep climbing, and get used to long runouts, cuz that's all they have at Poke-O-Moonshine and the Emperor Wall. :)
Talk to you soon,
Ian
If you have another email address, write me at iannewcast@aol.com

Hey Ian, how about one from the other end of the age scale? I'm a senior citizen from Florida (but I get to the Gunks about 10 times a year). I'm also a "regular" at Seneca, and NRG but have never made it to the Dax.

A big factor is scheduling. June is mostly taken up except the weekend of 17th (I need to be in Watkins Glen on the 19th). Most of July is free - but not July 4th weekend. August is also good.

Don't the flies respond to repellents?


Pete Grant

Any age, any gender, any orientation, no bolt climbing weenies, looking for boldness on scary ass runouts... :):)
I may be able to take a weekend in June, but most likely will need to wait until July.
The repellent does work well on flies in the Adirondacks. As soon as they smell it, they swarm too you. There is some stuff that works, like 100% DDT. It's also illegal and melts your skin. :)

Hmmm, scary-ass runouts? I've done a number of routes on lead at Stone Mtn, NC. I was scared. They were run out. Idunno if that qualifies as "scary-ass".

Pete Grant

Cool, I'll let you lead the crux pitch on Catharsis at Poke-O. Not that hard, but man is it a long way between pieces of pro....
:)

Hey Ian,

If you lead the way in the proper use of various psychoactive drugs, I'll be happy to lead scary runout ptiches up to nine and well protected pitches of ten.

Kent

Will there be a pie eating contest at the Noonmark Dinner
afterwards? If so, I will gladly lead any runout pitches.

Kent, I'm hoping that you're not the same Kent that sits over there, across from my office.
One of the great things about psychoactives is the do it your self discovery approach, :) Ask Ken Kesey, Timothy Leary, and William S. Borroughs for more info on that.
Pie eating contest at NoonMark? Hmmmm... I'll finally have a good excuse for not bringing one back to my Mom. :)

My recommendation for drug of choice when doing long slab climbs: absinthe (I tried some this past New Years Eve!)