Beacon Rock

On Friday night I climbed Beacon Rock in the Gorge with my friend Ben. It was a 6 pitch climb, with the last being a 200 foot scramble. We went up 3 pitches and then I lowered Ben back down to the ground on another route so he could top rope that (a 5.11).

After Ben's climb we continued up, now it was in the dark. We used headlamps and it was pretty damn cool. Ben lead the whole way and I just cleaned on the way up. It was a little funky at parts when it was completely dark and you had to move your headlamp around to figure out the foot holds.

We made it to the walkway around 9:30 and after organizing a bit we hiked back down to the parking lot. I went to get the car (and beer) while Ben got his bag from the backside of the rock. When Ben got back there was a Ranger there and he came over and talked to us as apparently the park and parking lot were closed. And he didn't seem to appreciate us having a celebratory beer in the close lot. He didn't hassle us too much and we took off for the safe shore of Oregon.

I put up some pictures if you click on the next picture.

Swifts In Portland

Aimee and I watched the swifts fly around Chapman School in NW Sunday night. If you get a chance it's worth hanging out with all the people and the birds before they go South for the winter.

Waiting for the birds	They're starting to round up (Mt. St. Helens smoking in the background)
More swifts	Funnel of swifts
Swifts being attacked by a falcon	Shooting into the smokestack

Smith Rock

This weekend all of us went out to Smith Rock to celebrate Kate and Sandra's birthday with some rock climbing. Friday night was some beer drinking and fire starting until 2am. On Saturday after a breakfast of bacon, coffee, bagels, pancakes and warm beer, we headed over into the park.

Brynne, May and I went to Wherever I May Roam, a 5 pitch climb. Brynne lead the pitches, I went send and May came up after me. On the bottom I broke a hold which funked up my zen. The first 3 pitches were ok, on the second I had issues and fell a few times (once cos a fart made me laugh and fall off).

I was following up the 3rd pitch and was having some issues with it when a guy above us started to throw his ropes down right on top of us to rappel. He was talking to Brynne, who was belaying me and I was freaking out so I yelled at her "Hey, tell those fuckers to not rappel onto us!" The guy was like 30 feet above and yelled back"Did you just call us fuckers?!?" I told him yea but to ignore it. Brynne thought it was funny. They rappeled down after I got up to the anchors and then Brynne had to help them untangle their rope so I figure we were even. He was busy yelling at his girlfriend about something anyway.

The next 2 pitches were lots of fun and made up for the first 3. On top we had great views and saw our other climbing buddies over near Asterisk Pass. We did a single rope rappel, then a 60 foot double rope rappel cos the ropes didn't touch the ground. Then we did one last one. I couldn't see if the rope touched the deck or not but when I went about 100 feet down I could see it was a few feet above the ground, so we went for it. My weight stretched the rope enough to touch.

We were all done and took off after getting some snack food and met up with everyone else in the parking lot. After telling everyone of our epic climb and the yelling we went to the 7th Street pub in Redmond.

We had a good time drinking and eating before heading back to the grasslands camping area. Where we stood around a fire and jabbered over beer.

After a frosty night we got up early and headed back out to Smith so May could do her first lead - which she kicked ass on. We talked to the guys next to us and they had heard about my yelling at the dude on Saturday. So the word got out.

We did a few easy climbs and May and I called it a day and bailed to go home and sit in hot tubs.

Here are pictures from Saturday(ish) and Sunday(ish)

Molly's Wedding

Last weekend I went out to the Adirondacks for Molly and Paul's wedding. I flew into Syracuse and got a rental car. They were going to give me a Neon but it was out so I got a Dodge Dakota instead, which worried me a bit cos gas was $3.50 a gallon. But I pre-paid for a tank at $2.80 so it was all good. And it was a V8, so that's fun.

I rolled up to Old Forge and found my camping spot a little ways down the road from the wedding. I wasn't necessarily being cheap, I thought it'd be fun to camp out in the woods and stuff. But it was damn cold at night. That night I met up with Molly and her friends and drank some beer. And that's good.

The next day some of us went for a hike up a - I think it was called - mountain. It was pretty and a neat hike. Afterwords there was a BBQ where we hung out and ate and drank beer again. There's a theme here.

It started raining hard around 9 and some ladies (Heidi and Erika [the 3rd one there]) were nice enough to offer their floor for me to sleep on. Erika got extra candles because I was going to be in the room and their might be odors. Hard to argue with that.

The next day was wedding day and it was pretty laid back. I hung around and had donuts with Erika and Heidi and read by the lake shore. The wedding itself was very nice and it was quickly off to the reception. With beer.

The rest of the day was spent hanging out and talking with people. That night there was dancing where I made a fool of myself trying to remember to Lindy Hop. I guess I'm going back to take some classes before I go out again. I think I even hurt my hip.

I have some pictures from the weekend here and here.