Crow Hill, MA

I picked up Benoit and Rob around 9 am, and we headed up Route 2 toward Leominster. This was going to be the first time any of us had climbed at Crow Hill. Upon arrival, we noted that much of the right-side faces were soaked and nasty, so we were forced to move left onto the Fisherman's Wall, which was overhanging and looked (with good reason) to be strenuous.

With my trusty copy of Boston Rocks, we settled on a left-slanting crack rated at 5.8 to start the day. I believed that Rob should start the lead, because 1) he had the most experience in crack climbing, and 2) he had the most experience. Rob reluctantly agreed, but decided to warm up on the excellent bouldering wall to the far left. Once ready, he set up to climb on his 9 mm double rope. Since the route was relatively short, he could still use double rope technique with his one rope, doubled.

It was immediately apparent as Rob led off that this was not an easy 5.8 climb. It was significantly overhung, and the holds, while large, were seriously rounded. He managed to place three or four pieces, but was too pumped and had to lower. I decided to give it a go, tied in, and got a couple feet off the ground before realizing that this crack involved jamming. So far, I had absolutely no experience jamming on real rock, and my brief initiation to the painful art at the gym had not endeared me to the technique. I must have been doing it wrong, because it hurt like hell and didn't even feel secure. So, I bailed. Problem was, the crack headed up the face at about a 45-degree slant to the left, and Rob had gear in almost to the halfway point. Thus, a pendulum was unavoidable. I fell three times in a row, each time tracing a graceful arc that nearly intersected the ground, causing me to ungracefully hop, skip and tumble my way to a stop.

Having had enough of that, I looked for a direct line up to Rob's last piece of pro. The book said it was 5.9 face climbing, so I worked and dogged my way up the deceptively difficult and pumpy route on sickening slopers. Finally reaching the crack, I rested a bit and looked for a good slot. Seeing one that looked decent, I grabbed a #8 Hex and stuck it in a placement that Rob later said was "bolluxed," or something like that, due to the fact that it wouldn't hold an outward pull. It held my weight for a good shakeout, at least. I managed to place two more pieces before reaching the belay, which was an eight-foot-wide ledge.

I glanced around, looking for the familiar two-bolt belay anchor. Nothing. The only thing I could find was a ratty old rusted piton ten feet away. Well, I had the gear-time to set up my first no-bolt belay station. In the one useable crack, I slotted two bomber nuts and a solid Friend. Equalizing two pieces is simple, but I didn't have enough runners to get the third one tight. Oh, well, it would have worked as a backup; you make do with what you have. I made a mental note to bring more slings next time.

Benoit was tied in and chomping at the bit, so I called down, "On belay," and proceeded to catch him on about fifteen consecutive falls. He was having the same trouble I had on the greasy crack, and didn't even manage to clean the first Hex. Rob gave it another go, and huffed and puffed his way up, succeeding this time.

By this time I had been sitting at the belay in shorts for over half an hour, and since it was starting to get cold I asked if Benoit could bring up my sweats (he planned to meet us at the top anyway). Rob was leading through on a nice 5.5 dihedral when I saw Benoit poking his head around the side of my ledge. He had managed to climb up an easier way from the side, but couldn't quite reach the ledge because of a large bulge. I was a bit worried about him falling off, partly because I had been in a similar situation a few weeks before at Monument Mountain in Western Mass. When I heard Benoit say he was stuck, couldn't downclimb, and was going to try to climb up, I quickly yelled for him to stay put, that we would be finished in a couple minutes, and would drop him a rope. I would have given anything for a rope to help me out back at Monument Mountain. Luckily, Benoit did not ignore my advice, and I was able to finish the route, set up a belay with Rob above him, and bring him to safety.

After a lunch of bread, cheese, and gorp, Benoit and I scrambled up to the top of the cliff to set up a long toprope. The view from the top of Crow Hill is really quite beautiful, with glistening lakes and deep green forests stretching across the hills toward Wachusett Mountain, which still had some left-over manmade snow on its slopes. From cliffside, looking down is dizzying, and I could only do it by lying down and peeking over. The height was a little more than 25 meters, which wouldn't seem all that high except for the overhang. We tied two ropes together and anchored off of two trees, and, after checking and triple-checking everything, I rappelled into thin air. The biner was so hot afterward that I burned myself on a freshly skinned part of my hand. Ouch!

With a huge toprope now set up, I started climbing, belayed by Rob. Because of the overhang, I was worried that I wouldn't be able to get back to the rock if I peeled. The crack I was climbing was rated 5.8, but it wasn't nearly so bad as the first one, and I stayed on the wall for the most part. I even did a few hand and fist jams, which were remarkably unpainful. The middle and upper sections of the route were a regular slime-fest, with water dripping from above and green and brown muck underfoot. I tried to get through the otherwise easy climbing without getting too much slime on my shoes. Ultimately, I couldn't finish the route because of its deplorable condition, but vowed to return when it's drier. I did come off a couple times up there, though, and had some exciting pendulums of 25 or 30 feet.
After I lowered, Rob repeated the route, and on his way down traversed right to see if he could reach a beautiful belay anchor, complete with chains, that was halfway up the face on a nice ledge. He was able to get there with some tenuous downclimbing while looking at a monstrous pendulum, and threaded the rope through the anchor to set up a toprope for some 5.9 face variations below. These proved to be quite a lot of fun, and I did three different routes on the face, all involving climbing over an initial bulge, then carefully working my way up on little rounded nubbins.

All told, a good day of climbing was had by all, and my ancient car even made it all the way home without moaning, groaning, or otherwise giving us any trouble.