MAS Anchor-building seminar, day 1

The drive up to Bear Valley on Friday was uneventful - took about 3.5 or maybe 4 hours, no real traffic except the obligatory slowdown by Tracy. Good weather. We checked into the Bear Valley Lodge and explored a little - not much TO explore, really - pretty much the entirety of "downtown" Bear Valley is in the warren of corridors in the lodge. Shabby general store. Chic cafe. Hotel restaurants. After relocating us because our toilet wouldn't flush (might as well get this out of the way: the Bear Valley Lodge pretty much sucks), we had dinner at the hotel restaurant, where I had the most unique "veggie burger" of my life - essentially a deep-fried patty of mashed potatoes in a bun. Yeah. The diet for this weekend is so shot.

Anyway, on to the real subject. The next morning we went across the street to the MAS offices where we met our instructor for the weekend, Brandon, as well as the other couple in the seminar, Rich and Jenny (also Bay Area residents who climb at Touchstone). We set off for abuot a 30-minute hike to Box Canyon, and then up on top of Box Canyon, where Brandon settled down to teach us some anchorin'. There was much scrambling and rock-hopping to get up on top of the canyon walls, which really pushed Rebecca's safety boundaries, but she was a trooper.

We went over anchoring on natural features (ie, trees, boulders etc), and Brandon showed us how to build a quad with a master point and secure it when bolts are unavailable. Then he had us go around and scope out potential anchor spots and even build anchors on them, which was very helpful. We then went over bolts and how to evaluate and use them, using a climb called "Pulp Friction" (which we unfortunately didn't get to climb) as our example. Then Brandon set up ropes on two long (60') slab climbs (a 5.7 and a 5.8), and we descended back down into the canyon to climb.

The climbs were a lot of fun - fairly straightforward, a bit challenging but not threatening, easy on the arms since they were so slabby, and good for practicing smear and edging technique on raw granite. It's definitely an adjustment to climb on real rock, where the routes aren't taped out and the "rules" are much more vaguely-defined. Brandon kept reminding us to get our hips out to increase the friction on the soles of our feet, while our instincts kept telling us to hug the wall (which just sends your feet flying). Rebecca and I climbed both routes without TOO much difficulty (I had an easier time of it since my height allowed me to cruise past the cruxes), and we were both struck with how little you need to actually climb on granite slab - tiny tiny little finger holds feel immensely satisfying, and your feet hardly need any excuse to stick to the rock. I think Rebecca found her new favorite type of climb.

We had dinner that night at the chi-chi cafe, which was really pricey but REALLY good, and polished off a full bottle of wine between us, which we hardly ever do anymore. It was a good day.