In lieu of putting up my own trip report - which I am notoriously bad at, here’s a link my friend Indy’s blog where he’s posting the whole thing. Special thanks to Indy for helping me with my first trad lead. It was a wicked easy 5.3 with a 5.6 crux but it was still a headgame. I really dig the trad leading - sheer terror has a way of focusing your attention in an incredible way.
Before I started up, Indy mentioned watching out for “tunnel vision,” where you get so focused on looking for gear placements right in front of your face that you don’t see what’s around you. I completely see what he meant now. It started raining, and halfway up a slabby bit of sandstone, my feet started to slip; I was desperately looking for a gear placement but was so focused on up-down that I completely missed four or five great placements on either side.
More leading this weekend - hopefully by this summer I’ll be in shape to lead some multipitch at Seneca Rocks.
photo by the lovely Claudia.
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