New River Gorge (West Virginia)

The first National Park of our trip: New River Gorge!
What a beautiful place.
We stayed for 5 nights and went bouldering every single day. The area is very diverse, some crags are in dense forest, while others are right in the riverbed, some approaches are merely a few minutes, while others cost us more than an hour just to get to a single boulder that we wanted to try.
Overall it was great and quite adventurous. When I asked the Ann Arbor crew about bears in the area, they said we wouldn't see any and it would be way more likely that we step on a snake while looking out for bears! Well...it turns out they were right. On our last day, we went to the Meadow Top Area, a beautiful boulder field just next to a cliff with dense rhododendron forest. It was early in the day and no hikers or other climbers had been around yet. We fought through the thicket, when I suddenly heard a scream from Birte. "Snake! Snake! You almost stepped on it!" I froze, then I slowly turned around. I still couldn't see it. Birte had stepped a few meters back. The snake seemed to have frozen as well, so I walked a few steps away. Now there was a snake between Birte and me, blocking the way. It was a Copperhead, which is easily recognizable by its copper-colored head. Luckily I missed it by centimeters. Maybe I even touched it slightly. But we were lucky. It was already half grown. The more dangerous ones are the babies, as they cannot yet control how much venom to use when biting. This one did not bite, but froze instead, which is their way of hiding and trusting their camouflage (which is really really good...I just couldn't see it, even when I knew it was there!). Well...we survived! Birte made a detour to get back on the trail. We continued to the boulder "Egyptian Root Canal" (V5) and Birte climbed it!

There is so much to say about this place, but I try to cut it short.
Fayetteville, the small town in the National Park, is really cute with lots of outdoor and antiques shops, cafes and restaurants everywhere. It has a very nice and outdoorsy vibe. Most of the people here either climb or kayak.
The campgrounds were all free of charge and we met very nice people everywhere. At one campground an African-American family with a huge old RV (like in the movie Little Miss Sunshine) stayed next to us. They were really funny. On the morning of my birthday (unbeknownst to them), the father sang gospel songs at the morning campfire and used a hammer against the stonewall around the campfire as percussion. That was really beautiful to hear. It reminded me of the convicts' chain gang songs in old western movies.

My favorite boulder was Pizza Slice (V8). A perfect line along the arete of a 45° overhanging triangle bloc in the middle of the river! We were lucky to get there on Thursday, as we learned the next day from a kayaker. From the end of September to the end of November, the dam is opened from Friday to Saturday to reduce the water level of Lake Summersville. The line would not have been climbable a day later! Perfect timing!Read more