Well that was a great hike, when do we begin work?

Thursday, July 2

Well, I’m afraid the weeks are becoming a little less eventful. Though I guess that’s good for you, because now you wont have so suffer through yet another long entry.
Sunday, I went climbing with Garett at the December wall, which did not remind me of winter at all. We were in the intense sun all day, with no shade what so ever. I will always remember this wall, because it is where I made my first lead fall, on a 10d slab, the total drop was only about 6-8 feet. Wasn’t as bad as I thought it would be, and I kept going, but mentally shut down later in the route on a section that was supposedly easier, but it was definitely not. Some how leaning backward on a terrible hand hold with almost no feet (and those that I had were horrible), 5 feet about my last clip in, was just not appealing to me. I had to bail and Garett gave a go at it himself, but he fell twice at the spot I froze. Luckily, a man did it on top rope and retrieved Garett’s bail bineer.
On our hike down from the cliff, we had a little excitement-Garrett almost ran into a rattlesnake. Don’t worry, he didn’t get bit, but the snake was not at all happy. Then on our drive down to Lyons to grab ice cream (well earned if you as me, and boy, after being in the searing sun all day, nothing like a milkshake to cool down the body temperature) we saw some young big horned sheep on the side of the road.
Monday, I left with Ryan and Matt for a three-day work trip. We drove to the west side and hiked in on the East Inlet Trail. The next three days involved some fill work, fixing up tent pads and removing a few fallen trees, but also a lot of down time. Without being able to use a chainsaw the work on the campsites that we can do, is limited. So we went and hiked up to the 5th lake and added another dip to our list at about 11,000 ft. I swear it was colder than the ocean on May day. My feet were in excruciating pain the instant they hit the water. Yes, I know, we’re just asking for hypothermia. Luckily the sun dried us out quick.
Wednesday, a little while after I got out of work, I went bouldering with Sam. Who in the world rated their boulder problems? Their v3 feels like a v5 just about anywhere else you go. And so it goes with just about every problem here when it comes to rock climbing, at least that’s how I feel about it.
Today, after feeding the llamas, I headed with Christina and Luke to Jim Detterline’s house to do some climbing at the Iron clads again. I have to say the ride in a lot faster and less nerve racking with Jim’s truck than Christina’s little Honda. We did a few climbing routes there then early afternoon we headed home because Jim had a meeting, but we had some exciting plans for the evening, so we would meet up. I worked on this entry and some cleaning. I was watching the weather as I did so, for something was rolling in from the west. I was getting rather worried-a thunderstorm would put a damper on our plans.
As promised Jim arrived at my house at 5:15, as well as Christina and Luke. The storm finally arrived as well. I was expecting the whole thing to be off, which was rather a disappointing thought because this was our last chance to do this adventure. Then again, I didn’t want to get struck by lightning. Well Jim came in and was like, you ready to go? I said yes, very surprised, and kind of worried. He said great, we just have a change of plans. They opened up Old Fall River 15 minutes ago, even though they weren’t supposed to open it up until tomorrow. So we wont be able to do our 25 mile down hill bike ride on the old dirt road. But we’re gonna go by the Balpate to this other dirt road, and it’s shorter but less exposed. Then after our ride, we can go eat at the Balpate (nice restaurant that just has a good salad bar, dessert and the largest key collection in the world (who’s keeping track?).
And so we went to pick up the mountain bikes and the slow moving/easily distracted Venezuelans, and a couple of Jim’s friends. Jim was able to get a mountain bike for each of us for free for the evening (I wish I had such good networking connections). We all crammed into three cars, drove to the Balpate, and then dropped one car off at the bottum of the 5ish mile hill. And then we were off. For a short run, it was fun. We briefly went on a trail with lots of rocks and pin point turns that made the going a lot more technical. It was a blast though. We finished off our evening with a delicious dinner at the Balpate restaurant and a walk through a room that hold the largest key collection in the world.