Sugarloaf:  11/14/98  with Joel

Joel and I had a nice day of climbing at Sugarloaf, first in
some nice sun, and later moving more quickly in the shade.

1. Bollee Gold 5.10c
We had heard this had been retrobolted and was no longer runout.
It turns out that the main bolt which was added was the first one,
makes the initial hard moves off a pedestal safe.  These initial
moves are quite hard, and apparently were much easier during
the first ascent; some flakes broke later.  So the retrobolting
seems to be quite a reasonable action.  It took us a little
scouting to decide to approach via the left side of the boulders
at the base.
 p1: Joel led.  The hardest moves are at the start of the pitch,
although from below it looks blank, and amazing that it goes
at 5.10.  After going nearly straight up past some bolts, he
clipped the belay chain for the 5.12 arch to the right, and
then traversed about straight left.  After another hard move
to reach the left arete, he polished off a few knobby arete
moves to a hanging belay.
 p2: I led, mainly to just save some time, so we wouldn't have
to swap at the hanging belay.  I didn't get a good look at
the topo, but it looked lower angle and we thought it was supposed
to be about 5.9.  After many moderate slab moves, I came to
a thinner section, with my feet above the last bolt.  After 4
tries of all the alternatives, I found a plan with some high crimps
on the right to get my foot onto a good hold, and breezed up
the easier remainder of the pitch.  Eventually we concluded this
was a 5.10a section, but not 5.10c as given in the older guidebook;
we thought the first pitch had harder moves (and was more sustained).
 p3: Joel led this, to the south summit, past a few moderate
runouts.  We rappelled the west face, ogling the "Ghost in the
Machine" route, which looks wild and rarely done.  The rappel
was interesting, as we had to swing in under a roof to
reach some anchors.

2. The Fracture 5.10d .  Joel flashed this classic thin crack
in a nice effort.
We had to wait awhile for a party which was having trouble on it,
but we were entertained by watching 2 climbers higher up
attempt to pinkpoint Grand Illusion 5.13c.  This is an A-frame
shaped roof with a 1" crack that goes in at a bad angle.
One guy had rested midway, and had just clipped a cam at the lip,
when he flew off, and so did the cam; we went about 25' into space!
The other guy trying it was Doug Englekirk, who had redpointed
it earlier in the year.  It was interesting to see them work
the stems in the lower part, and also at the lip.  But I doubt
I'll ever get high enough to be able to use that beta!

3. Taurus 5.11b toprope.  I barely made it up the lower crux
section (pin scars/finger pockets), and then I was careful to
take a long rest before the upper undercling.  Years ago,
I toproped this with Bob Palais and got desperatedly pumped
on this 5.10 upper section, but this time it was reasonable.
Joel had only 1 fall in the lower crux, mainly because it was
getting dark and hard to find the footholds; he cruised the
undercling nicely.

We headed down the trail in the dark, following some locals,
and drove back to Berkeley.

Normally a trip report ends at this point, and it had been
a great day of climbing.  But unfortunately, I made a mistake
when making a left turn in Berkeley, and failed to see an
oncoming car.  The impact smashed in the passenger door, but
fortunately, Joel was not hurt, and the other driver only
seemed to have a sore neck.  As the left rear door had already
been mangled by a bear in October, my "climbing vehicle"
is not very water resistant or streamlined anymore....