Rock Party 2024: Trad Climbing
Rock Party is a climbing trip hosted by the Varsity Outdoor Club (VOC) where for a weekend, climbing enthusiasts from around Vancouver head up to Squamish to climb. There are 5 different levels, called Rock 1 through 5 respectively, each focusing on different climbing skills.
A summary stolen from the wiki page describes the topics learned in each Rock level:
- Rock 1: top-roping: Learn to put on a harness, belay and climb rock.
- Rock 2: anchor building: Learn to build different type of anchors for the purpose of top roping. Learn how to rappel.
- Rock 3: sport climbing: Learn to clip bolts, lead belay, how not to back-clip or z-clip, etc…
- Rock 4: trad climbing: Learn how to place a variety of protection, build trad anchors, etc…
- Rock 5: introduction to multipitch climbing: Learn how to use rope systems, build tree anchors, belay from the top of the climb, switch leads, etc.
Typically, the first day is instructional, and after a party in the evening, followed by camping overnight, the second day people head out in groups to practice the skills they learned. This was my first Rock Party, and I learned Rock 4: Trad Climbing.
It was a ton of fun, I learned a lot, and I would recommend it to anyone (not just students!) who would like to try something new in climbing, because it is hands down the best value you will get!
Takeaways from the trip:
- Trad climbing is a lot safer than I expected
- I first thought that trad was pretty scary, sketchy, and unsafe, but after learning appropriate techniques, I understand how and why it is quite safe!
- Trad climbing is nearly synonymous with crack climbing
- It makes sense intuitively if you know how cams work (see images below), but regardless, a crack is the perfect place to put your gear, so cracks make the vast majority of trad climbing
- Teaching with an ascender/descender is fantastic
- Our instructors rigged the ropes in such a way, that we climbed and placed gear in the rock, they were on a parallel line giving live feedback which made learning much more engaging
- Trad gear is expensive
- A reasonable amount of gear to trad climb is 2 cam racks (see images below), a rack of nuts, and likely some additional gear relating to anchors or alpine quickdraws. This will take you into the range of ~ $2000+ on top of the regular gear required to climb
- Crack climbing is hard
- Okay, maybe this isn’t quite true, but since I haven’t practiced much I find it much harder relative to the normal climbing I do
- Climbing with friends is fun, even if it is scary (same takeaway as from the Sir Donald trip)
Pictures from the trip:
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Word of the trip: Bomber
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