Went up a big rock yesterday with Conor. The day ended up being much colder than we anticipated due to a constant 40mph (or so) wind.
I discovered that a camera of mine I thought was broken works as long as I don’t use the zoom.
Warning: the following captions contain some climbing jargon that can be hard to decipher if you aren’t familiar with climbing-specific vocabulary.
2 days of beautiful people, beautiful weather, beautiful climbing, and beautiful scenery.
I met up with my man Busy S. in Moab and we road bikes out Potlatch road and drove down to the creek that evening. The next day we road to the Needles of Canyonlands surrounded by warmth and sunshine. Unfortunately, I didn’t take any pictures.
Busy left to go back to Denver and for the next 3 days we climbed at Cat Wall, Donnelley Canyon, and 1st Meat Wall.
Find sharp things to bash stuff with because it is time for some ice climbing. Big ups to Cole Lawrence for enabling me to participate in this activity for the first time ever.
Climbing in Bass Creek Canyon for the first time ever. Closer to Missoula than Kootenai!
Yesterday Conor, Tess, Steve and I went out to Kootenai Canyon. I was proud of myself for getting to the top of Venus deMilo, at 5.11d my hardest route attempted on lead ever.
Also, on Saturday I did my first rope solo in Lolo with Conor. Rope-soloing means you are using a rope to protect your falls but no one is belaying you. I think I might be a fan.
The quality of the rock was excellent. We traded leads and moved quickly as retreating if the weather got bad would be rather difficult.
We set our alarms for 4:30am but I was awake before then. We made breakfast in the dark and set out to find the base of the route. About halfway there it was light enough to not need headlamps anymore. Our plan was to do the Beyer East Face I, and we were at the base of the climb before 7am.
I spent the last couple days climbing the Grande Teton with my friend Conor. It was beautiful and humbling. Before you climb you hike 7 miles, gaining around 5000 ft of elevation.
You wake up in the morning hundreds of feet above the valley floor. Your day will consist of climbing. Your decision making energy is entirely directed towards climbing. For a brief period of time it is a simpler existence that reminds me of a main reason why I enjoy bike touring so much. Your objectives are clear.
Finally the weather cleared and we headed out with our German friends Simon and Lawrence, to climb Washington Column.
I got to lead a pitch of 5.10 to skip a bit of a line that had formed at the second pitch. Definitely felt adventurous. I also did my first ever pitch of aid climbing in a pretty epic setting.
It was awesome to be climbing with Cole, who has quite a bit more big wall experience and the patience to teach the rest of us goobers.
The next day was cold, cloudy, and raining again. After a lazy morning we went out to practice aid climbing. Aid climbing involves carrying ladders made out of webbing to stand on and allows you to get up sections that would be almost impossible to free climb.
Our plan was to climb the south face of Washington Column as soon as the weather improved, which requires aiding.
On the 3rd day in the Valley Floor I had met up with my friend Cole and we climbed Royal Arches with Cole’s friend Pete and Pete’s Dad. Royal Arches is 15 or so pitches of wandering easy climbing (5.7). We did a variation that took us up a pitch of 5.9 and easy 5.10. Probably the tallest route I had ever been on
