Leavenworth June 6-7: J-Y Crag

Sometimes a climb is a novel — a multipitch climb with headlamps at the start and headlamps at the end or a long weekend snow slog with 10,000 ft in elevation gain. But sometimes you get short stories, where plot, conflict, and theme are packed into 30 meters and it’s all over in a few minutes. On a single pitch cragging weekend, I hope for some good stories, and often end up with quite a few among some forgettable ones.

This weekend was Rockfest in Leavenworth, put on by Feathered Friends, so there was quite a bit of hanging out and catching up with climbing friends and acquaintances, and not a lot of climbing. But we did get a chance to spend a few hours at J-Y Crag. I got one lead, on Janetors [sic] of Justice, which I greatly enjoyed (despite some inconvenient unsolicited advice). To completely strain the literary metaphor, leading has more tension, conflict, and uncertainty about the outcome so it’s usually more memorable and enjoyable for me than toproping, so of course that one is my favorite of the weekend (and we forgot the stick clip, so I even got to lead it from the ground).

• J-Y Crag, Janetors of Justice, 5.8+ trad, lead: Opens with a 2 bolt slab, ends with a crack, quite a bit of variety in the middle. I won’t ruin the plot for you…
• J-Y Crag, Ragweed, 5.9 trad, follow: another crack + bolts thing
• J-Y Crag, Armed Forces, 5.10b trad, TR and follow: I actually found the key holds in the top slab section this time, makes it seem easier. Maybe next time I’ll lead it?
• J-Y Crag, Six Digits in the Hole, 5.10c, TR: Slipped off a blank slab, pendulumed over to Ragweed and had to finish on the top half of Armed Forces. J-Y is a good place for TR pendulums since the whole right side is on one anchor