Every year, I half-expect to find that my previous year was my last good year of climbing. The last year where I climbed reasonably hard things, or visited new areas, or became a better climber. Fortunately, this year wasn't that year! I did a lot of interesting things, a few projects, and worked away at my new guidebook. Here are some of the new things that pushed me forward in 2021!
(1)
Progress on the new Frank Slide guidebook! The guidebook marches forward, though I put it on hiatus for a few months while I worked to finish some home renovations (somewhat ironically, in that a new workspace for myself is included in the renovation). The guide will have approximately 2800 problems from V0- to V13, and will be the first complete guide published for the area. There are a number of mini-guides and websites that provide a lot of information, but about half of the problems that can be climbed in Frank Slide aren't available anywhere online. So here's to hoping that I manage to get the guidebook finished sometime soon!
(2) 150(ish) First Ascents! As I traveled through the Slide taking photos and making notes, I inevitably came across boulders that were new to me, and lines that seemingly hadn't been touched. I'd record them all (both projects and completed lines are going in the new book), and if I could find the time I'd come back, clean them up, and try to do them. Sometimes I'd fail, but often I'd manage to scrape my way up them. Week after week, they added up. I had a blast finding all these lines, and I'm honored to have had the chance to do them first. Most of them were easy, but some were fairly hard(ish), like the funky and fantastic A Horse Walks Into A Bar (hard V6), in the Interpretive Center sector.
(3) Worn-out Knees... Not everything came up roses this year, unfortunately. Months of trudging through the Slide with cameras and bouldering props finally pushed my woebegone knees over the edge of the cliff. My right knee now has a painful click, which is patellar-femoral syndrome (or somesuch). It's slowly improving (over three months), but may never be quite what it once was. It doesn't actually affect my climbing or walking much, but does make stairs a pain.
(4) Roped (?!?) Climbing! I had fun this year doing something I haven't done in MANY years, namely tie into a rope and climb some sport routes. Even more fun was the fact that the routes I did were FAs at a new crag in the Crowsnest Pass. The rock is fairly chossy, but when you're beggared for sport routes, you don't have the luxury of being choosy. Three new routes, 5.9 to .10c.
(5) Nothing Too Hard... While I climbed a fair bit, my year was essentially dedicated to working on the guidebook. Still, I managed to get up some fun lines, including FA of a line I've wanted to do for years, Rat Palace (V6), and a cool line with a great heel-toe lock that I called Jaws 2 (V6). I also flashed the highballish Bent Backwards (V4ish), which was nice.
(6) New Sandstone Blocs! I also spent some time working on a new sandstone bouldering zone. It's not huge, but is consistently quite steep. The Summer House will generate a lot of hard problems, for those willing to invest time in scrubbing lichen and prying loose blocks.
So here's to 2022! Hopefully, another year with more projects, more travelling, and more new boulders!
