Niagara Glen (June 15, 2006)

This past June I was home in Toronto to attend the wedding of my brother Fraserboy and the lovely Carla Cupido. It so happened that my birthday fell while I was home, and since on your birthday you get to do whatever the heck you feel like, I decided to go bouldering at the Glen. Sath was going to join me, but he ended up getting roped into something at work and had to cancel. Luckily, come Wednesday night, Fras had a little tickle in his throat, so he was forced to call in sick to work the next day and we headed to the Glen for some athletic pocket pulling. We started on the uber-classic “No U-turn”, which is given a V1 in the guidebook but is probably closer to V3. Here is a photo of each of us on that problem:

We then did Electric French Fries, another classic V1 on the same boulder, and then moved on to Bizarro World. There I tried a classic V6 called Kung Fu Special or something like that, super fun, no send for me, but Fras hiked up it (this seemed to be a theme throughout the day). We then did a couple of V4s on the Barbie Doll boulder, I can’t remember the exact names, but they were fun. Here are some pictures of us on those ones:

We then moved on, and climbed a problem that Fras had opened called Bulgogi (V5). It was super fun, on the sandstone boulders down by the river. Next we moved on to Brave New World, a V5 that I wanted to try. It is my east coast Viper, it consistently shuts me down every time I get on it, which I have done almost every time I have been home for the last several years. One of these times I will get it, but not this time. We then went down to the sandstone cave and climbed the classic V5s and V4s there, such as Novocaine, which Fras is shown on below:

We also climbed a V5 down there called The Pondering, which is super fun. We then returned to the upper level, and we both climbed a highball V1 which was fun, Fras is shown on it below:

We then started making our way back to the exit, stopping along the way to have a go on Pika (V5), shown below:

Fras also did another V5, I can’t remember the name, it looked super rad, but had a pretty sketchy landing, so I decided to take a pass as it was nearing the end of the day and my strength reserves were running too low. Here is a photo of Fras on it:

We wrapped up the climbing by both climbing Captain Hook, a fun V2 near the Pheonix, and then made a beeline to DQ for some celebratory blizzards. That night I had a BBQ with some friends to celebrate my birthday, and then had more ice cream cake (also from DQ) for dessert, which was awesome. The next day Fras got married, it was a super fun wedding, here is a photo of our family from the wedding. Notice that we are all smiling except Dad, who believes that having too much fun can be detrimental to one’s health.