Shortoff Mountain - Linvillewoodzy | 07 October, 2007 00:49 Started the trip LATE on friday night. Got all packed for a real camping trip (no car camping here! awesome-ish) with all the water/sleeping thingies. We left ATL around 10:45ish. The following was the path we took... I-85->I-26->US 74->US 221->I-40->Exit 90 and follow the guide from there. This took 4 hours, So we're rolling into the gravel parking lot around 3:30. We decided we would do the hike that night, mainly cause we wanted to get on the rock as early as possible the day after. But shit, that hike is real. That hike up the hill all tired with all sorts of gear took us an hour and a hour and a fucking half. So at 5am, we get to the campsite, spend a good 20 minutes trying to figure out were the hell we are going to camp. Not only is it dark, we are also in a wasteland of completely burned forest. The Shortoff area had a serious fire during the summer months and this killed MUCH of the vegetation above the cliff-line and below. So little to say, finding a campsite that won't have trees falling all over you was not easy. But we prevailed, found a little oasis where the trees weren't dead. I setup my hammock and started dicking around with my sleeping bag and it starts drizzing. At this point I'm just pissed, I'm tired sweaty and its 5:45. So I throw on my sleeping back and then slide into my bivy sack to keep dry. I quickly did the sleeping after that even though it was raining a little. We woke up at 9am, so yeah thats not much sleeping and I felt it. We got the breakfast, said "hello" to the other climbers from ATL there and proceeded down the gully descent. Now this is a NO bullshit descent. Its much longer that Tallulah (although less technical) and your running over streams and the GREEN STUFF. Man that green stuff is slippery as hell! I took a good spill on the way down the first time, jacked up my shin in a couple places. We headed over to Construction Job, and started up the 5.8 section. Two pitches later we find ourselves at a belay, but that shit was the wrong belay. Of course we didn't realize that at the time and started heading up what we thought was the right way, which turned into some 5.10hard climbing that was clean, but then turned into 5.8 lichen covered MESS with NO gear. Damn my partner was kinda freaked, but we stuck it out and ran to the top anyway. Or I should say that I followed a rope up the sketchy things, and let someone else take that risk :). After that debacle, I was tired as crap it took us 5 hours to do those 3 pitches. So it was like 3pm, and my partner and I took a long nap until 7pm or so. DINNER TIME! We grabbed some wood, went over to the campsite with the other folks from Atlanta, who were awesome! So many quotable lines.
We made some hotdogs on the fire, threw the cheese on there and some buns. It was delicious! Called it a night. Got up at 7:30 the next morning, and were climbing by 8. We ran up the first pitch of Toxic something, and then the second Pitch of Dopey Duck. Two pitches and about 350 feet. Thats the kinda of climbing I'm talking about. No crazy epics, and just a nice serene walk off the top. That is infact the absolute best part of this cliff. The walk off at the top. I've forgotten what rappelling is, fuck that. I hate rappelling, I just want to walk off everything. Its hard to capture that emotion, but its basically, climbing to actually climb! When your done climbing your DONE, none of that bull crap. Walking at the top is fantastic. Anyway, we got some foods, and waters. It was a nice little break, until noon. We then headed back down the gully trail. We were gonna climb some stuff in the shade, but Maginot Line was in the shade and occupied. So we headed over to Straight and Narrow. And hell yeah was it straight and narrow and some fantastic climbing ALL around. The 5.5 200ft approach was even good. The money pitch was the next one though, and I dominated it, just completely. I had some onlookers from Maginot Line that took some fantastic pictures that I can't wait to see! I read both the cruxes perfectly and just ran through it. The gear felt great, the climbing felt great. I was on cloud nine! My hands are still sweating about how awesome it was. All about the five stars. I'm glad we got the beta about climbing it in two pitches, if you climbed it in three, it would be way less cool. We finished that guy around 3 and headed off. We did the descent hike in 30 minutes though heh. Yay downhill. On 221 we hit the "Legal Grounds" restaurant in Rutherfordton. Bad ass bar/restaurant/pizza shop/coffee shop/local hang-out. I had a Hamburger Steak, all of that protein was fantastic!
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