Rocklands III - Yearning For Rock

After three days with my head down the mist finally started to clear on Friday morning. I still had this swollen gland in my neck from the lurgy, it kind of felt like a golf ball and when i turned my head to the right you could see it sticking out. Still i was desperate just to move about on rock and so wrapped up and headed to the Roadside boulders.


It was great to be out again and the warm up probs felt special, its amazing how much you appreciate climbing when you are forced to stop. After 30 mins or so of plodding i decided to give Caroline a go. Now this, along with the Cedar Spine are my two "must do's" that i've found so far. Caroline is a 35 degree overhanging wall that climbs a crack and pinches in opposition. The rock is patina patterned sandstone and it looks gorgeous. Now pinches are not my strong point and this thing is 7c/+ so its going to take a bit of work but i made some good links Friday to feel this is on soon, so will be back.


Yesterday the slow crawl back to feeling human again continued so we headed back to the Sassies for a short session. The Beetle made it the whole way up there without getting stuck in sand once - result! I also got up Pinotage from the high start, that is 7b/+. Now the issue is, i did plan to do the sit to this problem, it was really the one problem i had on my list pre-arrival that i had heard was classic, super etc, etc. However, in my view, the stand is classic, super etc, etc and the sit involves some nasty heel hooking on chossy rock into sharp crimpers that then get you into the stand. Pre-arrival of course i thought that the climb was just a sit start line and didn't know about the funky stand, now i've done that motivation to link from the sit has diminished somewhat. We will see but right now this is right down the list. (Photo of the stand above)


Rest day today, golf ball in neck more like a small marble now. Next week it's on....