Photo Bombing Dog

Sadie and her baby turtle endearingly named "Nicole" (After her mother, so they could be twins)

This weekend was a blast! I always forget how exhausted little kids can make me, but I still love the little buggers. My sister and her family were able to come down for the weekend and have a few adventures. My nephew is an avid fisherboy who seems to have the endurance of a migrating goose when he is fishing. In the past he has had a difficult time catching fish, but this weekend we really wanted to help him catch a nice fish. And catch a nice fish we did indeed. And we caught a few turtles too!

A nice trout that Carson caught!

Another nice trout

Jake photo bombing Carson and his turtle

My first fish...that we got in the boat anyways

Kenzie had her arm out like this the whole hike, so I followed suit

 We were able to take a quick jaunt up the mountain after our fishing expedition. It was a great time on the mountain. The baby carrier somehow ended up on my back and then a baby landed in it...good thing she isn't very big. She absolutely loved the hike. I'm sure I would love a hike that I was being carried too.

The group minus my dad

Got Nemesis?

The Snake River Flowing Eloquently

Years and years ago when I was in my early beginnings of high school, okay it wasn’t really that long ago, I found a place that a piece of my heart still remains. It is nothing too spectacular. In fact, it’s not even worth going to see, in my opinion, unless you are so out of things to do that you are spackle watching (similar to cloud watching). It’s a very small bulge of granite squeezed between the Snake River and a highway. Why, you may ask, does a piece of my heart reside there? No, it’s not because I fell in love there. In reality, it’s almost the exact opposite. It’s all because of two things named “Hand Over Hand” and “Rotten Crack.” This was my first 5.11 route that I ever led and my first lead climb ever, respectively.

The day that my friend Daniel taught me to lead climb is a day that I will not soon forget. I will spare you the boring details and skip straight to the good parts. The route I was attempting to lead was a 5.10a with one very committing crux. As I made my way up the first section of the face my heart raced and my palms became soaked. I had climbed this on top rope before, but this was different, if I fell on lead the consequences were much more noticeable. I made the first clip and chalked my hands. I made the second clip, more chalk. I’m now too far up to worry about decking (hitting the ground) if I take a fall. I commit and throw big for the crux and am well on my way to finishing the route clean, and using all my chalk. I reach the final clip and panic. In my head I’m basically in tears and screaming like a little girl. When I spoke, though, I attempted to conceal my concerned mind, “Daniel, I don’t think I can do this.” I don’t remember what he said after I told him that, but I do remember that it left my pride no choice but to finish the route.  My first lead climb was now under my belt. It’s been years since that first time and I’ve had climbed hundreds of routes on lead, but each time I go back to Rotten Crack I run through that entire scene in my mind. That’s piece #1.

This is Granite Point from the parking lot looking West

Piece #2 resides on Hand Over Hand. It took me months of falling and climbing to final reach the top of this route. During one of my attempts I took a nasty fall from the final clip and fell about 20ft and bounced off an adjacent wall resulting in a minor injury and scared silly. Needless to say, once I finished the route I didn’t have much of a desire to return. While there yesterday with a friend I had a desire to climb my “nemesis” despite being very afraid of it. I’ve climbed more difficult routes in my life, but we all have our “difficult” routes. It’s like the problem child in the family, you don’t want to deal with it, but you still love it.  When we reached the wall it felt like the route was speaking to me, inviting me back for a dual. I accepted the challenge with a bit of a smirk, ‘bring it on’ I thought to myself. I sailed through the first ¾ of the route and when I reached the clip where I had taken a nasty whipper I paused. This was no longer a strength or technique route for me, it was all mental. I ran through the scenario of my previous fall and switched my feet in order to prevent a repeat fall. As I pulled my way through the mantle it felt very familiar, this was my nemesis afterall. The final move requires more balance than 12 house cats combined, good thing I had the balance of 13 that day. I finished the climb and the oh so familiar rush of adrenaline coursed through my veins making it complete. I don’t see myself returning to climbing this route ever again, some things are better left in the past. It will, however, always remain as one of my historic personal battles that I can refer to for learning in later time.

Another Adventure. Another Sunset.

Snakes On A Pla...Bike??

I ride bikes a lot. Riding bikes comes with many risks such as; the lady who almost ran me over last week, bees flying down your jersey, rocks to the face, weird tan lines, dogs chasing you, moose chasing you, other cyclists, broken glass, disabling cramps, examples of how gravity works, and a broke pocket book (I've experienced all of these). You would think that after a while you run out of new scenarios while riding a bicycle, but this is not true. Each ride is unique. Each time you ride a hill you are the only cyclist that will ever get to experience that ride. There will never be another one that is the same. Now imagine that for thousands of miles, mind blowing right? Well I had another one of those mind blowing experiences this past week that I have to share with the world.

It was a hot Tuesday afternoon, I had just got off work and was beginning my 6.2 mile commute back home. I hadn’t made it more than ¼ of a mile from my work place when I spotted a two foot snake on the road. He happened to be in the path of my trajectory. I was tired and not wanting to accommodate for a mere snake in my way so I veered slightly to the right thinking he would stop his risky slither across the boiling tar and gravel. As I approached the snake at a speed of about 20mph I realized he wasn’t going to stop and I quickly brake checked and attempted to veer further right. As I did that, the snake had his own idea of how to evade me. What follows is a dialogue of what was likely going through my head and the snake's head:

Snake: Stupid cyclist going so fast and won’t even move over.

Me: It's so hot. I'm hungry. Oh hey, a snake in the road, he'll stop.

Snake: I’m not stopping, this asphalt is scalding my scales. I see a hole in those wheels, I can make it.

Me: He’s not stopping. Is he going to try and go…

Snake: Here goes nothing!

Me: Aaaaaaah Nasty!!! 

Essentially, this two foot snake attempted to nutmeg me via the spokes of my bicycle. This ended very badly for him and very messy/sticky for me. As he stuck his nose in my spokes he was sucked into my wheel like a spinning vortex. He quickly went around and around and around. Each time, he became a little shorter. Each time he went around I became a little less clean. I slammed my brakes as hard as I could without making myself endo and came to a halting stop. I attempted to pick as many pieces of snake off of me and my bike and continued my ride home. Like I said, each ride is unique and no other rider will ever experience that ride. I mean seriously, that’s not even possible, that snake got shredded. Lesson learned: Wildlife typically wins in a dual. 

This isn't me of course, but I thought it was pretty wild and fitting for the topic at hand.

Bouncy House Fun

This week I had the privilege and blessing to spend some time with my sister's family. I was able to watch my niece play a soccer game or rather, run with the other kids playing soccer. She had fun and she was glad we were all there to watch, so that's all that matters in the end. After that we were able to watch my nephew play baseball. He is quite the baseball player. I need to get his autograph before it's too late...

May is a busy birthday month for my sister because there are three of them who were born in the first week or two of May, the two foster babies as well as my sister's daughter. My sister throws the best birthday parties of anyone I know, for real. How many people make trains for a birthday cake? Not many. And how many people get a bouncy house at their birthday party?

I have attempted four times to get a picture of my niece and the bouncy house to load with zero luck. So this will have to suffice for now. It's basically the same thing.

An Elegant Finger Shredding Dance

I have been climbing for a few years at this point in my life and I am still figuring out why I like to do it. Aside from being outside and getting extraordinary views there is something else that has drawn me to continue the sport. Each time I go, I discover one more piece to the puzzle of why I feel so drawn to vertical faces sparsely covered with handholds. This past weekend I was able to begin a summer project, and boy was it only a beginning. For those unfamiliar with the term 'project' in relation to rock climbing, let me explain. Basically, this is how it goes, you find a route that seems significantly beyond your abilities and try and climb it, a lot. Some projects take a matter of a few tries while others may take many many tries, accompanied by multiple falls. Long story short, it's a good way to push yourself to climb harder. Now, back to this weekend. I got on a route that I had watched a friend of mine climb back when I was in high school and thought, "that looks really hard." It has been in the back of my mind ever since I saw him climb it, almost taunting me at times. I knew at some point I would have to settle my mind and conquer this route. While climbing at the gym last week I felt that I was strong enough that I could take on the project. So the first chance I had to jump on it was this weekend and I jumped on it. It is a relatively short route at about 45 feet, but it is a 45 foot section of rock not soon to be forgotten.

The route goes straight up and past the little bush growing out of the horizontal crack

As I began the climb I tried to focus on the task at hand and bring all my strength to my finger tips. The holds on this route consist of nothing larger than about the width of a dime, and they are slopped negatively making them downright awful to hold onto. Halfway through the route I began to experience extreme fatigue and doubt. I was having an internal battle over whether or not I would even be able to get to the top, regardless of the fact that it wouldn't be clean (Clean: no falls). At that moment I found one of the puzzle pieces. I dug deep and realized that my body was capable of getting there, it was my mind that was limiting my body. It only saw the smooth face, not the sequence of holds leading the way to the top. I took a few deep breathes and continued climbing only to fall again and again and again. I began to believe my mind. My body, however, refused to believe that I couldn't make it. As I continued my struggle it was as if the rock was an old friend that I was becoming reacquainted with, each move began to feel natural despite being physically demanding and painful. This old friend was leading me through an intricate dance up the face, each move demanded all of my strength and focus. As I grunted my way through the crux of the climb I continued my battle to the top and had a sense of accomplishment rush through my veins. That was the end of my day, but the beginning of my summer project. This project won't be over until I climb it without a single fall, but I can say that I look forward to being further reacquainted to my old friend. For now, I'm going to take a week off from climbing due to finals and the fact that my finger tips are destroyed. My calluses were mostly torn off and some of my finger tips are a bit bruised.

On the rock face that day I realized that we often try to go our own way in life, but that doesn't work. At the crux of the climb I kept going left when in reality I needed to move right. I simply wasn't trusting the route to lead me to the top. I suppose with substantially more effort I could have eventually gone left, but in the end right is the way that was meant to be traveled. You might say that they both led to the top so what's the big deal? Well, maybe there isn't a big deal, but why make things more difficult than they need to be?