Mazama - Prime Rib of Goat

June 2008

This weekend marked the second time for me going on the annual climbing club camping trip, and this time it was at Mazama. Having failed to complete prime rib of goat on our first time out this way, we (Evan, Annelisa, and myself) decided to give it another go. This time we had a bigger support team (we were joined by Michelle, Jackie, and Barbara). Having 6 people, we split into three teams:

Myself and Jackie

Evan and Annelisa

Michelle and Barbara

Jackie had just completed the lead climbing class, so this was a good chance for her to put her newfound lead skills to the test. Her and I were the first team to start out, and she jumped at the chance to lead the first pitch. After making it to the top, we worked out our communication system with walkies(the noise from the waterfall was pretty loud for the first couple of pitches), and I followed up. I took the next lead, and to my pleasant suprise, Jackie was cool with flip flopping leads all day. This was her first time doing any roped climbing outdoors, and fresh from the lead class, but she climbed like a seasoned pro. fortunately the noise from the waterfall subsided after the fourth pitch, as not much after that I dropped my radio and two pitches after the she dropped hers. Both were recovered, and still look pretty good.

We powered through most of the pitches, only taking a break after pitch 7 because we couldn't figure out where to go. We radioed Michelle, who gave us the route info, and we found the next pitch. We got the to top of the last pitch around 2PM, and hung out for about an hour until the rest of our teams made it up. We then started the very long process of rappelling. I think we must have done about 15-16 rappels with 6 climbers going down each rope. Having three ropes sped things up a little bit, but it still took quite a while to get down.

Back at the cars we decided to make a quick stop to wash our hands, and got back to camp around 8:30. Beers, food, and stories from the day were shared around the fire. It was a great day climbing with a super cool group of people.