Sunset Park Trip Report

After the very shortly announced exchange of our May and June trip because of the bad weather forecast in Kentucky we went to Sunset Park on Saturday morning. Seven of us started at Cumberland Mall and met Trisha directly on top of the wall (luckily we got the 3 left parking spaces). The weather looked worse when we headed north but luckily it turned out a wonderful day until 4pm in the afternoon when a thunderstorm came in.

 

We climbed the whole day at the North wall. Denmark has lead Thin Pockets (5.8) and set up the neighbor route Ghost Dancers (5.8) as top rope. Both routes has been rated at a very early time and turned out to be tricky and challenging.

 

Tom led the Fat Crack (5.8) which started at pulling a roof and ended at a ledge after 40 feet.

Frank went a little bit further down and led R.J. Gold (5.9). It is a thin finger crack that gives way to a wider crack beside a pinnacle. Especially at the top a slopy route with tiny holds and a lot of balance requirements.

 

I would like to thank all of you who have set up the routes and especially broke them down in record speed when the weather came in late in the afternoon. Even if we only set up 4 routes it was a very good climbing day in an area of Sunset Park that nobody has known before.

 

Regardless of the weather we headed all together to Foster Falls to the CLIMBING FILM FESTIVAL of the SCC. A small crowed enjoyed the climbing movies in the Pavilion. Very impressive has been the two last movies about Beth and Tommy Cawdell's last 2 projects. The couple who are one of the best climbers in the world also answered our questions very personal and charming.

 

I would like to apologize for the shortly announced change in our schedule. Some of you would like to go to Sunset Park in June and now won't have the chance to go into that climbing area at all this year. To avoid that in the future I will introduce in our June meeting an alternative date for each fall trip and also publish them in our trip calendar on our website.