The Horne Lake Season Begins

     I was sitting in my living room at 3pm on a Friday half heartedly going through a homework problem. My bags were in the car. The food was packed and I was itching to hit the road. "Okay fuck it" I muttered, and called Dorian. "I've changed my mind. I want to leave now." Dorian laughed, "you know I have an open schedule... I'll see you soon. Dorian Munro. The man who both is and isn't, about everything. An educated man, recently graduating from Uvic with an engineering degree. Educated, sure, but constantly coming up with some hot take that has everyone looking at him 

Tea in the van

The crag, as viewed from the beach

incredulously. He'll then proceed to meticulously defend his point in such a manner that leaves you wondering that he may actually be right. He's also a one backpack kind of man. I appreciate this about him a great deal. So when I showed up to pick him up, aside from his small food bag, everything just goes in one 45L Deuter backpack. If it doesn't fit, he doesn't need it. He told me his recent 6 week Europe trip was entirely out of that one backpack. Admirable.

    After our recent group trip to Squamish, which I unfortunately believe I have missed the blog post writing window for, requiring extensive packing to fit five people, however many crash pads tents, etc. into the minivan, packing for the two of us to go to Horne lake for the weekend was refreshing to say the least. Chuckling about how easy it was to organize the weekend, we drove up island in 20 degree sunny weather mid march on a Friday afternoon. I mean come on... it didn't get much better than that. This weekend was also a nice opportunity to test out the new van build. Maybe a little blog post is required to give it a review after a month of living in it this summer.

Horne Stars

  Our optimism about the warm weather was somewhat foolish, as we had a chilly first night in the van, but the sun was out on Saturday and it warmed quickly as we hiked up to the crag. The amphitheatre was somewhat seepy so we quested up to Boss wall. Just before we arrived at Boss was there is a beautiful crag called the Supervisor Wall. It looked fairly dry and we were told about a 5.10+ route up the arete of the crag. It's called the Supervisor, and it was an excellent pitch with a mix of overhanging jugs and technical face climbing on the chert bands higher up. Dorian opted to rest. We then headed down to the amphitheatre, to try one of the only dry routes: Velvet Elvis. A tricky 5.12a with a powerful overhanging boulder problem at the bottom and then a technical layback in the roof. Dorian worked the moves on the route, and having climbed on it a bunch before I was happy to climb it on my second go that day. After woking the route some more, Dorian decided to leave it for the day, but I'm confident he will return and complete it. Later, I tried one of the only other dry routes; Horne Stars. It's a really cool line that climbs the outer corner of the cave. The climbing is less like the roof crawling found in the ampitheatre, but more of a moderate overhanging style. I prefer this style of climbing, so I hope to return to try this route in the future. We made Mac and chilli for dinner, my favourite camping meal.

Dorian at the base of "The Supervisor"

Packed up for the day

    While at Supervisor wall, we read of a route called "Creature of the Mist". It's a five pitches rated 5.11d starting off of a 5.11a at the supervisor wall. We decided to try it on Sunday. I was hoping to onsight the route, but I had no idea how hard it would really be. Unfortunately I did not onsight the route, falling on the 11d pitch and the 11b pitch as well! While they were both a bit wet and quite dirty, I must say the 5.11b pitch may be a little stiff for the grade and I might suggest upgrading it to 11c once I climb it free. That said, there are so many factors that make things feel hard on a multi pitch, and when you add in some wet holds, the dirt, and the heat from the sun that day I think it distorts the difficulty a little bit as well. All in all the route is beautiful, and deserves a blog post of its own, once I free it hopefully. I'd recommend it to anyone looking for a challenge. We rappelled the route which absolutely requires a 70m rope. The rappels must be back clipped, and the rappel into Boss wall should be taken with care. Due to the overhang, you must swing in and out of the wall before snatching some chains in order to get to an anchor. 

Looking above Century Wall

    I'm looking forward to another weekend up at Horne soon. Hopefully to return to Horne Stars and to Creature of the mist. I think that's all for now!