Tickling the Bricks

(OK, for those not familiar - there is an English/Aussie saying, "You'll have me up the wall and tickling the bricks". It's probably more an English one. It basically is an extension of "you're driving me up the wall", i.e. "you're driving me nuts/crazy").

Lesson in local idiom over.

The whole point of the post title is that during my third week in Santa Cruz, I went indoor rock climbing again with Val.

Well, twice more, actually. Yay!

Here's the Pacific Edge Climbing Gym. It's located on my (coastal) route home, on the east side of town:

I love the sculpture of the girl climbing up the side of the building!

 

On the Tuesday, we went bouldering. This involved climbing a lower wall, looking something like this:

Bouldering, although it looks simpler, is far, far, tougher than belayed/roped climbing on the big 50 ft wall. In fact, many climbers view the latter as more tedious routine training so better to tackle the former.

Firstly, you go bouldering freestyle. No harness, no ropes, no belays. If you fall, you fall onto a soft mat, but you're on your own. That's why the walls aren't too high.

Second, the walls are very convoluted, with concave bits and overhangs. You practically have to be Spiderman to master them, which is why it's all about technique. Much as the guys like to think they can successfully boulder using brawn, brute strength doesn't cut it beyond a certain difficulty level.

Lastly, there are very narrow footholds and handholds. You don't get a running jump to start, and you have to place your feet on the lowest holds - no cheating. This makes even getting on the wall to begin with a rather tricky matter.

Again, the rules are that you adhere to the path marked by the coloured tape under the chewing-gum pieces.

After warming up on a couple of beginner routes, Val put me on the orange route in the left half of the picture below:

And there I stayed for the rest of the night! It took me a while to work out the initial footholds. Next, I got stuck on moving around the corner to the left. Once I finally got that sorted, I got completely dominated by two switch-foot manouveurs to get me onto the next section. After many failed attempts, I got the first switch-foot move, but the second defied me.

As such, I am haunted by visions of this wall and its orange-taped route:

But it was awesome fun, and every time you fail, it just gets more addictive, because you want to master it.


The only trouble is, desire will only get you so far. Even though I'd only climbed less than maybe a metre in height, my hands were scraped from sliding down the wall, and my arms felt like this:





(Allie Brosh, yet again, from the hilarious "Spaghatta Nadle" series in "Hyperbole and a Half" http://hyperboleandahalf.blogspot.com/2010/02/spaghatta-nadle.html).


It was great to return to the 50ft wall on Thursday night, because at least I knew I could make some more constructive progress (although I did return to the boulder wall and have one more try at the @#%$!! orange route. I failed.)


Even though it's easier, I'm still awed by the sheer height of the wall.

(That's Val and friends in the foreground getting ready).


And below is a success picture. I am proud to say that I climbed the route marked in black tape, which included that concave jutting-out bit about a third of the way up. I have to say, that hot pink large piece, marked with a black tape "X" underneath, was my friend. As were the two long diagonal, light brown bits further up:

Rock climbing is hard work, and deserves a Penny Ice Creamery reward. There were Happy Hour prices on ice cream until 11pm, so Mike met us in town and we refuelled.


I love that the flavours are all sourced from local ingredients, and change regularly. I had Yoghurt With Honey-Walnut Jam, and Burnt Caramel. I'd describe it if I could. It was SO good, that you caught the tang of the freshness of the custard just before it hit your mouth. The caramel was like poking your finger in the saucepan - not too rich, and burnt just right.


Ecstasy.


I had a "moment".


Mmmmmmm. Mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm.