Vertigo on Cannon

Summary
OwnerMITOC Gallery Administrator
Creation Date2006-11-25 19:30:36 UTC-0500
DescriptionWoody Hoburg

Darren Verploegen

November 25, 2006

Vertigo - Cannon - 5.9 A0 (one pendulum)

It was Thanksgiving weekend, and with no classes, we were in the unusual position of being rested. The planning meeting the night before:

"What time should we leave?"

"Does 6AM sound too offensive?"

"Nah"

"OK let's leave at 5."

We attempt to bring the correct clothing but Woody overestimates. He is a giant onion of layers; oops. 30 degrees when we start, 50 when the sun hits. The plan is either Moby Grape (5.8) or Vertigo (5.9). With no excuse not to do something hard, we head up Vertigo.

The first pitch is 5.5, but from the second on it is solid sustained 5.9. On the second pitch a pendulum is necessry to reach a hidden corner; Woody runs it out above but the pendulum for Darren is still committing. Luckily Darren likes this sort of endeavor.

Pitch three is a beautiful finger crack. Beautiful if you like looking at cracks, that is; but climbing it appears to require skill, something we forgot in the car. Luckily for Woody, who is not skilled in thin seam footwork, he finds an even smaller seam on the right wall and manages to stem up to a roof. The guide book describes a "hard pull" and is correct.

Pitch four is fun and has the added benefit of being protectable for its second half.

Pitch five is the most horrendous, abominable, despicable, offensive, disgusting, unprotectable, man-eating offwidth I've ever seen. It's called the half moon crack. There's a variation that goes around it, but that doesn't seem very sporting. The guide book instructs us:

"Pitch 5 (80 feet, 5.9 R): Grunt up the curving Half Moon Crack (it is traditional to whine near the top) to a good ledge. Even a #5 Camalot will not fit in this nasty crack. Many people choose to rappel the route from here."

Well, that's encouraging. Woody heads up to scope it out and maybe take the variation around it. He gets in the last piece he is going to have for awhile, and peers into the 8" crack. He starts up and it feels easy. Unfortunately it only gets harder as you go, with the crux pullout right at the end. Woody follows the guidebook's advice and begins to whine, which seems to help. Thankful to sink the blue camalot above the offwidth, Woody declares that pitch done and never to be climbed by him again unless with some form of pro - a 2x4?

We take a short break because that was the last of the hard pitches, and then head up four pitches of notoriously loose Cannon 5.2. It seems we've neglected to take the secret cutoff to the right, so this last section is long for us, but we get it done and are back to the car before the sun sets at 4:30.