AMAZING EXPERIENCES

Climbing Major Multi-pitch in Mexico

My goal this year was to do some of the incredibly long multi-pitch climbs at Potrero Chico in Mexico and I'm proud to say that I accomplished my goal. It is very unusual to find long multi-pitch sport routes but PC is chocked full of them. The beauty of doing multi-pitch sport is that you only have to carry a small rack of quick draws and anchors as opposed to a heavy trad rack. This helps you move a lot faster and you can do a lot more pitches.

On this trip, I got to do 2 major multi-pitch climbs. First I did Estrellita with Sarah. This is 12 pitches and we cruised up it pretty quickly. We decided to rap down the other side and brought up a second rope so we could get down in fewer raps. In retrospect, while it was nice to get down quickly after so much climbing, I wouldn't have taken the second rope. It was a hassle for the follower to deal with it and was just extra weight.

The other climb I did was Yankee Clipper with Kirsten. It's a 15 pitch climb but we only did 11 pitches before we ran out of light. We were fine with that because the last couple of pitches we did were a bit taxing and we were ready to be done. Luckily, Karl and Alex were climbing Space Boyz right beside us all day and were waiting for us at the bottom along with some of our other friends. Even better, some friends back at La Posada had cooked up an amazing fajita meal for us. Being a rock star is really cool sometimes.

All said, I really enjoyed the multi-pitch experience. Both climbs were fantastic with a lot of mellow pitches that could be linked together and a couple of more challenging pitches thrown in to keep things interesting (and scary). I did notice on both climbs that it was difficult for me to rappel after climbing so much. It was hard to stay focused and maintain the necessary concentration. It's something I'll have to remember for the next time.

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