Rhoads worked on this all day long and on his 4th ...
Description
Are you planning a trip to Jackson Falls, or maybe to The Red? If so, you could do no better than to climb "The Dog" beforehand.
An overhanging arete unique to the Lake, "The Dog" feels like a sport route. Expect powerful, steep moves instead of the typical thin, crypto-technical moves found on many of DL's 5.12's. If you want to get strong, then look no further than "The Dog." If you want to get uber-strong, then start by doing laps on "The Dog."
To locate "The Dog," first locate The End. Start on The End's starting holds, but traverse right, eventually weaving an "S" path back left to the arete. From here, follow the steep arete to the top.
What, you have reached the top with nary a razor crimp encountered? That, my friend, is the joy of "The Dog."
This was once an arcane Cleveland TR ignored by the masses until Dave G and Rich B breathed life back into it around the middle eighties. As the story goes, Rich came down from firing it and said, "we will simply refer to this one as the Dog F..ker." Ahh, the good ole days of few sensitivities. A very fun line if you don't mind eliminates, and like Jay said, it is a very non-archetypal 12 at the lake.
Bring a black Alien, a blue Alien, a small stopper, and a blue TCU. A crash pad and a belayer who is willing to jump off a boulder/run down the hill to keep your arse off the ground is nice too--this of course requires the black Alien to hold. Regardless, there is a significant amount of hard climbing with groundfall guaranteed should one blow it.
Saturday, Dec 9th. Really a nice day at the Lake; sunny, fairly warm, and not another climbing group anywhere. If it was anywhere other than the Lake, friction probably would have been really good...
By Tom Petraitis From: Evanston, IL May 4, 2009 rating: 5.11d
I was lucky enough to arrive late enough this Saturday morning to see two guys pulling there toprope from The Dog, and they suggested I go for it... plus the rope can be used to climb The End 5.10a/b just as well. They said it had just a few hard moves down low... and "the rest was easy". I found the "hard" moves in the middle of the "S" (the traverse left back to the arete, but I was not heading for the arete). My experience on DL 12s is a sustained level of difficulty, so I turned away from the arete and went right looking for more hard climbing. I think I found holds on Ice (5.13), and that was more than I could handle. So after falling from the Ice holds a good number of times I followed the middle of the "S" traverse over to the arete and finished The Dog pretty easily. On my second attempt I stayed on route and sent it without a hitch. It was fun, but not as hard as I expected for a DL 12.
By Chris treggE Administrator From: Madison, WI May 4, 2009
I'm no expert but if you went right that's Dyslexia right? Not ICE...
By Tom Petraitis From: Evanston, IL May 4, 2009 rating: 5.11d
Chrit treggE, you're correct. I had veered onto Dyslexia 13a/b not Ice (and it felt 13-something hard!). I didn't bother looking at the route listings. Lazy me. Thanks for the clarification! I almost got thru the first crux. I am sure I saw the sequence. I gotta go back and try some more.
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