Hueco Video and Photos

Winter in Hueco

And suddenly we're starting the third week of the semester...

The first weeks always fly by, and this semester they came after a jam packed winter break. After my last exam I flew back to Houston for two nights, then it was off to London and Wales for two weeks before a brief return to central Texas after New Years. Back in Houston I felt like I was finally catching my breath from the end of the semester rush, but then I was off to El Paso for a week in my favorite bouldering area, Hueco Tanks.

Busy is good though, and I flew into El Paso ready for a climbing trip. I got picked up from the airport by three Cal Climbing friends who had driven from Berkeley via Red Rocks. We got groceries then headed straight to the Hueco Rock Ranch, an American Alpine Club campsite opposite the Hueco Tanks State Park. Evan and Ana hadn't been to Hueco before, so I was excitedly telling them about what problems we should get on while Nick and I recounted how good the climbing is.

They weren't disappointed. After making our way to the park the next morning we watched the mandatory educational video before warming up at the Small Potatoes area. It's always fun returning somewhere with new people because they'll inevitably be attracted to different lines than you. So despite warming at that area more times than I can count I got on new problems that after climbing I couldn't believe I hadn't done before. Everyone else was equally psyched, and we moved onto the New Meadow area.

Ana, Nick, and Evan on Lobster Claw

Then it was time for one of my all time favorites, and certainly my favorite at the grade, Lobster Claw V5. You climb up and slightly left through slopers and pinches before making a big move out right to an open hand crimp. You have to hit it precisely and hold your body into the wall, before walking your feet across and reaching up past your right hand to an intermediate edge and finally the lip of the boulder. From there the top out is casual. The movement is so fun, and climbing the light colored slopey rock at the start before crossing the crimpy band of iron-red rock makes for a Hueco classic.

The next few days didn't include any new sends, but I was perfectly content repeating my favorites from previous trips. I did try a project left over from from the month I spent in Hueco on my gap year, Left Martini, but as expected didn't feel like I had a chance of doing it in a few days. Next winter though! However, while Evan worked his project for the trip, Adjust Your Attitude V8, Ana and I began working a nearby V10 called Governator. I did all the moves in a session, but only barely, and it took another session of refinements for me to work out that the easiest way for me to get to the top was simply to skip the moves and dyno. Even then, Ana and I were both having trouble holding a tricky left toe hook early on the problem.

Then on the last day of the trip everything came together. I had been talking about how it was first-try-Friday the entire approach and, despite being adamant it was going to take multiple attempts, Ana crushed Governator first try of the day. She made it look casual, as usual, and so the pressure was on for me. The nerves I had starting dissipated once I pulled on and everything seemed so much easier than the day before. I climbed to the final move without cutting my feet and stuck the crux dyno to finish it.

That would have been an awesome end to the trip, but the clock had barely hit noon and we had another afternoon in Hueco. We made our way to the Martini Cave to meet up with Evan, who was working Baby Martini V6. I decided to try Martini Hot Box V9 and to my surprise stuck the crux move first try. A few attempts and a little bit of rest later and I had sent. From there we headed over to Sign of the Cross area (unfortunately Evan didn't send Baby Martini, but he made awesome progress), and Ana began working Choir Boys V9.

I had semi-seriously said flashing Choir Boys was my goal for trip on the way from the airport, and was promptly ridiculed for setting myself a goal I would only have one chance to succeed at. As it turned out, after milking Ana and the other climbers there for all the beta possible I fell bumping to the lip of the boulder on my flash attempt. So close! Ana and I both finished it a few tries later, at which point all four of us were absolutely shattered. We headed out and started the drive to Berkeley.

But before we left Choir Boys we ended up bumping into a few people I had climbed a lot with two years ago, my friends Jesse and Matt among them. They were both there on extended trips, something I'm planning on doing again next winter. Hueco is interesting because people who haven't been there have irrational fears about not getting into the park and having a terrible trip, while the people who have been there make every effort to go every winter. That's not to say the access restrictions aren't annoying, and having to watch the video every trip because you inevitably forget your video card is just silly (Y NO DATABASE HUECO?). But to be honest, and Jason Kehl expressed a similar opinion to Rock and Ice recently, I don't really mind the restrictions that much. Despite spending weeks and weeks there I'm not even close to climbing all the stuff I want to do on North Mountain (the only area you can go to without a guide), and as long as you're not there during the peak season (the weeks around Christmas) you'll have no problem getting onto North everyday you want to. In fact, maybe I should stop telling people how not bad it is, because the fact most people are afraid of the restrictions is the only reason I can think of that stops it from being packed. Well, maybe proximity to El Paso has something to do with it too, but even then I can't help being surprised more people aren't there. Despite my surprise I, like Kehl, am just glad Hueco doesn't get as packed as Bishop.

Anyway, enough about access because Hueco was awesome as always, and would still be awesome if it was quieter or a little busier. Since next winter I'll have an extra long break I'm going to make sure to spend at least a month there. It's too good to pass up!

Thanksgiving in Bishop - Photos

2014: the Year this Blog Died

It's December 1st and I'm writing the second blog post of 2014. An injury last winter that didn't heal up completely until this fall, a dearth of outdoor climbing, and my interest in other things all got in the way of climbing in 2014. I went on trips but never felt very strong, and never felt the desire to write about climbing on this blog.

However, enjoying a great Thanksgiving Bishop trip with Cal Climbing and sending my first double digit boulder problem since my gap year while we were there (yes, it's been over 18 months) has rejuvenated my psych. It's a little early for New Year's resolutions but I'm gonna go out on a limb and say I'll keep this blog up over winter and spring through the rest of 2015. In 2014 this blog died, but 2015 will mark its resurrection!

Now, less about blogging and more about climbing. I had tried Beefcake V10 on two previous trips, but despite doing all the moves in a few attempts the send eluded me until the day before Thanksgiving. You start matched on underclings at the bottom of a large boulder suspended a few feet off the ground in the Ice Caves area. A lack of sunlight keeps the rock cool but also means you need headlamps or flashlights to see the problem. You climb out through varied holds, going from a two finger pocket to a crimp-undercling combo, then finally to a sloper and two crux bump moves to a jug. I fell past the crux on the final section twice, but on my fifth attempt of the day I sent the problem! It was day one of Thanksgiving in Bishop and I had already sent my project, leaving me ecstatic and ready to do whatever for the rest of the trip.

But, since we were hanging out in the Ice Caves a little longer I started working Beefy Gecko, a V11 that climbs most of Beefcake before turning right after the jug and climbing a second difficult and physical crux. I tried the moves but was far too tired to stick the crux that day. Two days later my friend Ana, who is an absolute crusher, wanted to go back and try Beefcake some more. She had made huge progress on the day I sent, and was coming tantalizingly close to finishing the problem. I was meant to be taking a rest day but we all know how hard that is, and after being somewhat unsure of how strong I was feeling I hopped on the final sequence of Beefy Gecko and did it smoothly first try.

Ana sticking the sloper move

I was psyched, to say the least. Then I got to watch Ana send Beefcake, her first V10 (congrats!), and I was even more motivated. On all three of my attempts from the start I climbed to the final crux, and on my second attempt felt so close to sending before slipping off. Ultimately I left empty handed, but Beefy Gecko would have been the icing on the cake anyway and I was happy to have shown myself I can climb V11 again by coming so close 3rd day on.

That evening a ridiculous number of us piled into one of Bishop's hot springs, which are literally as hot as bathwater (the difference being that the water is opaque even before a lot of dirty climbers clamber in). As with every other evening alcohol was involved, and the session slowly degenerated into a shoulder massage circle as people left. Yes, climbers are weird, and yes, they really like shoulder massages. That day sums up my trip though. Going out, trying hard with friends, then relaxing in the desert as only a group of people who have sweat, climbed, and mostly failed together can!

Sachi Amma sending Realization

It's awesome how much attention Realization still gets over a decade after its first ascent. The thing looks so hard! This great video of Sachi Amma sending it really shows off the climbing. Simple shots and simple edits often make for the best climbing videos.

Before the climbing starts Sachi shares his thought on climbing and visiting new areas. "I just feel good when you go to new area, slowly you feel that that is your place." Home is a weird concept in a world where everyone seems to be moving, and visiting a climbing area, learning the nuances of the rock and surroundings, and projecting something is certainly one way to find one's place.

Nice send Sachi!

Patagonia saves me from Black Friday

I've been meaning to update this blog for a while, now that I've stopped traveling and am settled in at Berkeley. I thought I'd write a trip report from some weekend excursion to Yosemite or Bishop, but between arriving here and getting injured six weeks ago I only made it outside once this semester. The idea of posting here kept getting pushed back, especially as I've been flirting with the idea of starting an economics blog. But, thanks to Patagonia I have something to write about.

Ironically, one of my most vivid memories from India is walking into a Mumbai Starbucks on December 16th and hearing Christmas carols. I was transported to the West: suddenly realizing it was Christmas time. I had been so focused on the experiences of India and immediateness of friendships and life there that I hadn't thought about the biggest celebration of the year. I sat down with my latte beaming, looking forward to flying to London the next day and spending Christmas with family and friends.

Of course, you can't forget about Christmas in the States. Commercials started weeks ago, and stores were putting displays up as soon as Halloween ended (mind you it's not much better in the UK). Now that Black Friday has passed the season is in full swing, and with it the whoring of what was once a pagan celebration into an excuse for gluttony and greed, decidedly un-Christian values.

Sitting in that Starbucks, the first in India, I missed the Christmas season. Now, living it again, I'm not so sure. It's not that I'm not looking forward to the day; after a too-brief visit to Houston this weekend I'm excited to spend quality time with my loving family. It's just that the defining parts of our lives are experiences, relationships, and the stories that those combine to create, not the gifts we receive or the luxury we buy. In a country where despite being the richest in the world we only just managed to get everyone healthcare (and even now its patchy); where since the Great Recession the top 1% have captured 95% of income gains despite only having less than half of the losses during the fall; where we are needlessly squandering the potentials of millions because of an inadequate education system and ridiculous tuition fees, we are failing to give everyone the opportunity to live these defining moments and enjoy those special relationships.

So, why does our society give a crap about sales this weekend?! I guess it's retail therapy; you may not get your slice of the pie but on Black Friday at least you can have a sweet. Pessimism aside, consumerism really does make me think negatively about American society, and my role as someone who very often buys into it.

And that brings me to this Patagonia film. Watching it tonight reminded me that so many other people realize the shallowness of much of our society, and they aren't buying into it. In the midst of Black Friday and the run-up to Christmas it helps to be reminded of that. The half-hour it took to watch was time well spent, and I'm sure anyone who watches it will get something out of it, even if it's not the same thing. Enjoy.

Aside from being occasionally sickened by some aspects of our society, I'm really enjoying being in Berkeley. The change of pace from last year is a good thing, and I'm looking forwards to focusing more on what I'm interesting in after I finish my general education requirements this year. It's awesome to be in a place producing research like this paper, which was written by a Berkeley professor of economics, Emmanuel Saez, and is the source of that statistics I quoted above. It's worth a look even for non-economists, and the fact that I have the opportunity to interact with people who are doing research like that makes me excited to be here. The one thing that would make Berkeley better would be my injured finger healing, but it's good to focus on other things too.

I'll continue to post here very infrequently, and only when I have something worth writing about.

P.S.  I originally posted this after Black Friday 2013 but ended up taking it down after a day.  I reread it today (Feb. 27th, 2014) and after an edit decided to repost it.

Smith Rock, Oregon

The longer this trip goes on the worse I get at blogging regularly!  So, to update what I've been up to in the last three weeks: after three weeks of climbing in Yosemite I had exhausted the camping options there and left for Lake Tahoe (the park gets so many visitors you're limited to 7 nights of camping during peak season, we avoided this by changing campsites and spending a few nights camping outside the park).  To be honest though, I was ready to leave the Valley.  It was getting warmer and warmer, and while I didn't think it was possible, even more packed with tourists.  Tahoe on the other hand was relatively quiet and much cooler.  My friend Matt, whom I originally met in Hueco in February then climbed with for most of March in Utah, was there staying with his friend Dan so I joined the two of them and enjoyed four days of new boulders and good conditions.  

The climbing in Tahoe is so dispersed and spread out that it's easy to find a new area and as a result most of boulderers there end up cleaning boulders and doing first ascents of new climbs (cleaning involves brushing off moss and pulling off loose rock that would fall off when climbed on anyway).  I haven't been involved in the development process before so it was cool to be a part of it and do some first ascents of a couple of easy problems myself.  The picture above is me on an FA of one of those easy problems we cleaned.  Below is a gif of me breaking part of the starthold on a relatively new problem somewhere else in Tahoe.  Rock isn't always solid, and usually the newer a problem is the more likely parts of it are to break.  It's always annoying when you fall off because of something outside of your control, but it's part of climbing, and in the end you just have to accept it.

From Tahoe I drove up to where I am now, Smith Rock, Oregon.  I've been to Smith once before 3 summers ago for a climbing summer camp after sophomore year.  I remembered how good the climbing is, but I totally forgot about the beautiful scenery.  The cliff bands of volcanic rock are ringed by a small river that winds through the valley it has created.  When you're climbing you can't see out of the river valley so your world is limited to the river, the cliffs, and the beautiful trees and wildlife that surround you.  Here's an instagramed shot I took my first day here.

I'm heading back to Houston on Tuesday for a week so I probably won't blog again until I get to Squamish, British Columbia, at the beginning of June.  Till then, bye!

Bishop and Yosemite National Park

Three weeks later and I'm finally getting round to writing a new post!  I'm in Yosemite now where I've been bouldering, hiking, and doing a little roped climbing.  I drove here from Berkeley where I was visiting Cal and sorting out some stuff for university next year, and before that I was bouldering in Bishop where because of a sore tendon I wasn't actually doing much climbing.  However, even without the climbing Bishop is a great town.  Nestled in one of the largest valleys in the US between the Sierra Nevada and White Mountains; Bishop is visitor friendly and has the best coffee I've had since I started this trip.  So good that I stocked up while I was there and am still drinking it.

As great as Bishop was, it can't compete with Yosemite in terms of views.  I took the picture below from Turtleback Dome, a granite bulge at the western end of Yosemite Valley.  You can see the almost 3000ft El Capitan on the left, and Half Dome between El Cap and myself.  The whole valley is surrounded by huge granite walls with waterfalls cascading down them into the forested valley floor.

The camping is great here too.  Most of climbers stay at Camp 4, which for a long time was the center of american climbing.  People were first doing ascents of the big walls in the valley back in the 50s and 60s equipped with hemp ropes, hammers, and pitons.  Into the 70s and 80s Camp 4 remained the place to be, and was the base for hundreds of now famous ascents.  So as well as being a nice, forested, and very social campsite, Camp 4 has a rich climbing history.

A Red Rocks Update and Some Joe's Photos

Last weekend I attended the Red Rock Rendezvous; which was an awesome place to learn some trad climbing skills and meet a ton of climbers.  Trad (short for traditional) climbing means you place your own gear (typically little pieces of metal called nuts that you jam into cracks, or cams which are spring loaded devices that expand when pulled down in the event of a fall) as you climb higher, securing yourself with a rope running through all your gear placements.  It's a completely different game from bouldering or even sport climbing; requiring knowledge of all your gear, anchor making, and a good head.  In places like Yosemite National Park (which I will be very close to at Berkeley next year) most of the climbs are trad, so if I don't start to pick up some knowledge I'll be cutting myself short climbing wise!

Two English climbers I met at the Rendezvous took me up a multi-pitch yesterday.  A multi-pitch is a climb that is too long to climb in one stretch; the rope wouldn't reach from the bottom to the top.  So the leader climbs up to a good spot to build an anchor (ideally some sort of ledge), then the other climber in the party climb up to where the leader is while the leader belays them.  Then someone else takes the lead and climbs up to another anchor, and you just repeat this cycle until you get you to the top.  It takes a lot longer (it took the three of us three hours to climb about 350ft), but the vertical distance you cover and the views from the top make it worth it.  It's pretty awesome to be able to see a crack or corner feature on a 350ft peak, then work your way up to the top by exploiting that weakness in the rock.

Today I'll be repaying the Brits for taking me up a multi-pitch by taking them bouldering.  I don't have any trad gear, and they don't have any crash pads, so it works out perfectly.  It's been nice to do some roped climbing while I've been here, but now I'm psyched to do some bouldering again.  Thus, tomorrow I'm driving to Bishop in Central California, one of the world's best bouldering spots.

The two photos I'v posted are from my friends Niko and Katie over at themorningfresh.com.  They were both taken my last couple of days in Joe's Valley.  The first climb is a V10 called Beyond Life that after 4 sessions on I almost finished but ended up leaving Joe's without doing it.  That's the longest I've spent on a single climb and because of that I think it would have been the hardest climb I'd've ever done.  I'll have to go back to Joe's one day when I'm a little better to finish it!  The picture below is from Playmate of the Year V9.  It's a classic, mostly because of the holds which are awesome slopey bulges (hence the name).  It was the end of the day and I was fatigued from a morning trying Beyond Life so the final and very hard compression moves felt so desperate!  I was yelling on the move in the photo, something some climbers do when they're climbing at their limit.  It's probably mostly psychological, but I swear yelling tightens up your core that little extra bit you need to send.  Clicking on the pictures will enlarge them.  Thanks for reading!

Joe's Valley Video

I'll be leaving Joe's tomorrow to drive to Red Rocks and attend the Red Rock Rendezvous but before I leave here is the finished Joe's Valley bouldering video I've been working on:

It's not much, eight climbs and four climbers.  Unfortunately I realized too late I wanted more footage of other climbers, so this past week has been a scramble to film the people I've been climbing with.  It's hard to get footage of us boulderers though, because we spend the vast majority of our time falling instead of sending!  I still think it came out pretty decent though.

Last Week in Joe's

Here is my beautiful abode.  Newly cleaned this past week and already sandy and dirty!  The dust here seems to get everywhere, especially because my crash pads go over my bed after being in the dirt and mud.  But having the shelf and the bed is a huge improvement on how I started the trip, just sleeping on my pads with everything stacked next to me.

It's warmed up here now.  It's been in the 60s or low 70s everyday which is actually a little too hot too be ideal.  The holds don't feel as sticky as they did in the cold but the climbing is still going well.  I've been getting closer and closer on Beyond Life, possibly the best V10 I've ever seen.  I'm also close on Feels Like Grit V8, which is an awesome and very hard slab.  I've probably pulled on it more than 50 times but it's so technical and the feet are so small that tiny movements or losses of balance cause you to fall.  Hopefully next time I go to both those climbs I'll do them; well at least I should.

I'll be leaving Joe's sometime this week to head to Red Rocks in Nevada for the Red Rocks Rendezvous; an annual climbing festival.  Before I leave here though I'll upload the video of all the climbing I've done here.  Till then, bye!

Joe's Update

It is absolutely frigid here at the moment.  The high today was less than 40°F, and at night it's been going below 20°F!  I woke up this morning to semi-frozen milk and water, and when I looked out my windows from my sleeping bag I noticed ice crystals on the inside of my car.  While getting up in the morning has been a little miserable we've still been climbing, because while it's not comfortable the friction is great.  When it's this cold there's no moisture on your hands and shoes, and with the sandstone here having the course texture it does you just seem to stick to the rock.  Once we warm up by our morning fire, get some hot food and coffee, and wait for noon so its gets a little less freezing we go out and climb.

With the help of these great climbing conditions yesterday I managed to send a V10 in one session.  Called Finger Hut it climbs through four very small holds after which it's big holds to the top.  I'm going to try and get some photos/video of it tomorrow so my next post will contain those.  I'm also going to include a photo of my car setup (as per the suggestion of my Dad), as that's where I've been sleeping in my makeshift plywood bed with my plywood and 2x4 shelf next to it.  While it's still cold it's much better than a tent!

Some Joe's Photos

Being in Joe's Valley at the moment feels a little like a Hueco Tanks reunion.  Every single one of the 9 other people I'm camping with I met in Hueco, even if only briefly.  My first morning here my friend Jesse and I ran into two guys from Pennsylvania who we climbed with in Hueco, Lee and Eric.  They joined us at our campsite and the day before yesterday I went out and climbed with them.  Here are some shots of Lee on a climb called Planet of the Apes.  It's an awesome V7 thats climbs a blocky feature for the right hand with crimps for the left.  I have some video of myself climbing it but I'm going to save it and edit it together with a couple of other climbs.

And here is Lee on anther V7, this one called Water Painting.  It involves lots of weird foot movement, toe hook and heel hooks on big ledges and flakes.  At some point I'll post the video I have of myself on this one too.

Other than those two 7s I've climbed some 5s and a V9 called No Substance that I got third try.  I was so close to flashing it (getting the climb first try)!  It starts on a huge hold then traverses the sloping edge of the bolder.  I climbed to the hardest move my first try smoothly and well before just coming short on a big jump move.  Second try I made a silly mistake before I got to where I fell before, and then on my third attempt I sent.  Now I've gotten two V9s within three attempts I think in the near future I may be able to flash one.  Well hopefully at least, I may be speaking too soon.

Joe's Valley Utah

Eleven hours of driving later and I'm now in Joe's Valley, Utah.  I made the drive day before yesterday, and after camping in the Manti-La Sal National Forest went climbing yesterday.  Today I woke up and there were huge gusts of wind blowing snow through the valley so I went into town, and here I am enjoying the free internet at the Food Ranch where I bought my groceries.

The rock here is a really cool, dark and dense sandstone.  It's featured with cracks, ledges, and occasionally pockets.  The walls of the valley are covered in boulders and pine trees, and there's still snow on the ground on the north facing sides.  It's a nice change from the deserts of Joshua Tree and Hueco Tanks.  On the climbing side of things I did one of the best V6s ever today.  Called Wheels of Fire it climbs a few big moves between ledges before a precise move to a left hand pocket which you pull up on to reach a crack.  From there you move to lip of the boulder.  It climbs so well; the foot holds are just where you want them and the hand holds are comfortable but textured.  I also did a V8, and many easier climbs yesterday.

While I don't have any pictures from here yet here are a few I took in J Tree.  I never got round to taking any climbing shots but these are still worth posting.

And here's a shot of the sunset my last night in California.

I'll post some Joe's Valley pictures sometime this week, till then bye!

Joshua Tree, California

After driving to SoCal Wednesday afternoon and Thursday morning (I stopped for a night in Tucson), I camped for a night in Joshua Tree National Park before spending the weekend with my good friend Cameron.  It was a great weekend, and it was nice to sleep in a room on a mattress for a few nights! Cameron goes to Chapman university in the outskirts of LA so we went into the city on Saturday and spent the rest of the weekend hanging out with his friends on campus.

Now I'm back in J Tree.  Today I spent the morning and early afternoon bouldering on my own, just trying to do as many easy climbs as possible.  The area has a huge amount of climbing history, and was one of the places people pioneered morning climbing starting in the 60s.  But, most of the climbing here is roped traditional climbing, so I probably won't spend more than a week here before heading to Joe's Valley in Utah.

I'll post another update in a couple of days before I leave.  Till then, bye!

Leaving Hueco

It's starting to warm up here in El Paso (not good for climbing), so I'm heading to Joshua Tree National Park in Southern California tomorrow.  But my time here ended awesomely!  I did my first V11 yesterday, a climb called Dark Age.  It's one of the more famous V11s in Hueco and climbs through an overhang onto a corner, and from there you climb right into a tall V6 (the V6 is well known too; it's called See Spot Run and is a very high classic).  After my first session working Dark Age I was falling at the beginning of the V6, because after climbing the eleven I was so tired and out of breath the V6 moves felt almost impossible.

Then I went back yesterday and after falling at the same point a few times I broke through; only to fall when I placed my foot in the wrong place close to the top.  Disappointed and starting to feel tired I knew I only had a couple of attempts left with full strength, which I need to climb something so hard.  I rested for a quarter of an hour, then psyched myself up to try again.  As I started climbing my arms felt fatigued and I realized that this would be my last solid attempt.  Thinking that I pulled through the hardest moves and found myself half way up the V6.  Feeling tired and quite high (my feet were about 10 feet off the ground and I was only half way up), I took a couple of breaths then pressed on through were I had fallen before and topped out the boulder.

It's an awesome feeling to climb something really hard for yourself, and especially on a climb of this grade where I wasn't expecting to be do able to do all the moves in isolation, never mind climb it from start to finish.  It was good way to end my time in Hueco, and it coincided perfectly with my departure and the start of warmer weather.  I'm spending today in El Paso doing chores getting ready to go, before after a morning of climbing tomorrow I'll head to SoCal.

Thanks for reading!

Another V10 and a Failed Attempt at the Hueco 101

So yesterday I finished Loaded with Power, a V10 here in Hueco.  It's now the hardest climb I've done, and it took me 3 sessions over a couple of weeks to get it.  The first day I tried it I worked out the all the moves up to the final 3 handholds, discovering that for me that would be the hardest part.  The second time I went to the problem I fell about 7-8 times on the same move, the last move before the lip of the boulder and the end of the climb.  To do the move you have to put your toe in one side of a large shallow pocket and your knee against the other side; called a knee-bar in climbing jargon, you're basically jamming your leg into a hole.  I had a huge cut on my knee from my leg popping out of the same position over and over again, and the fact I was wearing thin, stretchy climbing trousers probably wasn't helping.  A little bit discouraged and needing time for my knee to heal anyway I didn't try it again for over a week.

Then, this time wearing jeans, I went back to it yesterday and first try of the day finished it.  I was expecting to have to spend a session wearing through the climb so I was excited to suddenly send it unexpectedly.  Here are some shots of the climb (you can click to enlarge them).  The middle is my favorite because of the look of utter concentration of my face, and in the last you can see the knee bar I previously kept falling out of.

After that success yesterday, I was psyched to try the Hueco 101 today.  The Hueco 101 is a challenge to climb 101 boulder problems in one day, all of them graded V2 (very easy) or lower.  You do the climbs in a specific and efficient order ending with Ghetto Simulator, a really long, famous, and classic V2 (the idea being that at that point you're so tired from the other 100 that the length of the problem will stop you from doing it).  In the end, after doing less than 30 climbs by 1pm, we realized we had started too late and moved to inefficiently to possibly complete the challenge so we went straight to the final climb and did Ghetto Simulator.  

After doing that, we hiked up to the highest point of the mountain where nestled in a gorge is the amazing climb Bloodline.  Following two water runnels up an otherwise unclimbable face Bloodline gets it's name from the veinous and unique shape of the runnels.  It's a very technical climb as you have to balance on small footholds while relying on friction between your hands and the rock to keep yourself on.  Rather than incut holds, you palm the sides of the runnels to move up.  Until you get to the top that is, where there are huge holds I'm hanging from in the picture below.

And finally, here is a picture of Zach, one of the guys I've been climbing with, giving all he's got on a V9.

More Hueco

Last week I did what is probably the coolest boulder I've finished.  The climb is called Dirty Martini on the Rocks and starts on two small opposing ledges with high feet.  After a delicate left hand move to an even smaller hold you sink down for a second before exploding to a good left hand hold.  The crux is stopping yourself from swinging off after this as your feet rip backwards off the wall.  The attempt I did the climb my right hand pops off the first hold before I have a chance to establich control, but luckily I managed to stay on and finish the boulder.

Here is the video.  Luckily I was there with quite a few people and since they all had cameras there's a bunch of angles.

The New Zealanders I was climbing with when I first arrived have all left now, so I've been climbing with a couple of Americans (one of them a Berkeley grad), and a Canadian.  The Canadian, Jesse, works two weeks on two weeks off so spends half of his time in his van climbing.  He's going to be in Utah the same time I'm planning on being there in late March.  On top of that he'll be spending all summer at his local crag, Squamish, British Columbia, somewhere I hope I'll make it too during June.  He'll show me around both areas!

The campsite I'm staying hosted the Hueco Rock Rodeo last weekend.  The rock rodeo is an annual climbing festival and competition held in Hueco, and so over the weekend the area flooded with climbers (some of them sponsored professionals) who were here for the competition and the festivities. There were a ton of climbing brands sponsoring the event, donating prizes, showing their gear off at their boothes and giving away a ton of free stuff (I finished the weekend with three new hats, two new t-shirts, a pair of shorts and a ton of koozies; all of them were free).  New Belgium Brewery (makers of Fat Tire) also sponsored the event so the parties that went on Friday, Saturday and even Sunday night got pretty lively.

Hueco Week Two

I've done tons of climbing in the past week.  Some hard stuff and a lot of easier stuff (higher numbers after the V mean harder climbs).  I've done the classic Hueco problems King Cobra V6, which is super hard for the grade because the climbing is so good that everyone does it and the holds have been smoothed and caked in chalk; Lobster Claw V5, which climbs a really uniquely featured and overhung corner; Nobody Gets Out of Here Alive V2, a cool roof climb with huge holds (hence the low grade); and I'm super close to climbing the classic V10 Fully Loaded, I just keep falling at the last move!

The pictures below are of the hardest move of a V9 I did today.  I almost did it first try, which would have made it the hardest climb I've ever done first attempt, but I came an inch short on the move below.  I got it second try though, so I'm still pretty psyched about that.  I've climbed V10 but I haven't actually done a V9 before, so this was my first.  And I'm representing Wales with my Llanelli Scarlets jersey.

And this last picture is of one of the Kiwis I've been climbing with working a V6 called Short Order Cook.  It's a cool problem just above one of the car parks so it has a nice view of the surrounding desert.