Death valley

an article on Death Valley in todays sfgate.

climbing wall complete

Finally! I had wanted to put a dead vertical section on the right hand side of the wall (just to cap the structure), but chloe convinced me to try out an idea I had drawn up for a full extra 4 foot section which makes a 30-45 degree angle with the 50 degree overhang. The advantage of this vs. and end cap is more climbing area and a very cool overhanging blunt arete. The disadvantage is that it requires a lot of careful measurements and cutting (for me, at least), so I drew up plans on google sketchup to avoid calculating angles and where to cut the plywood. After getting my next door neighbor tom to put a 30 degree bevel on two 2x6s, measuring everything three times and finally cutting the plywood it came time to get the damn sheet up into the overhang. Tom was sick and unable to assist or lend me his clamps, so I attached it with a rope and Christa and Stephanie's help. The end result was well worth the effort, so now it's route setting time!






The framework is actually kind of cool to play around with behind the wall -- I guess we could use it for storage or something.



a Sketchup file of the wall (without a lot of the framing) can be downloaded here