On the Rock in February!

We climbed out at the Black Cliffs today and I actually got hot!  Taylor and I introduced Levi to the addictive hobby of climbing.  It's always nice to have a pool of partners.  You never know who will flake out on you.  Levi impressed me immensely with how quick he could pick things up.  He was even climbing in Taylor's approach shoes!

Levi rapidly learning the ropes.

We enjoyed a beautiful day.  It sucks to think of the drones in Boise behind us buzzing along praying for a quick end to Friday.  Sucks to wish your life away!  

Myself and Taylor

Below is a very nice 5.8 that I put up.  It's always hard to get the first lead of the year out of the way.  I love trad!  Once I set up the toprope, Levi flew up the thing.  With a pair of no-shittin' climbing shoes, this dude is going to tear things up!  My body was wondering why we weren't skiing.  This has been a weird year in terms of weather.  We climbed out at the Black Cliffs until December and didn't ski until almost January.  Taylor and I were wondering where the ice season went.  I think we had a total of four times on the ice.  There's always Alpine ice!

Little Boots (5.8)

Below is a bolted 10a that could use a bolt a little lower.  There is a seam that would take very small wires before that first bolt.  It was the most fun climb we did today.  It would be nice if the whole climb was as flowing as the top half. 

(10a)

Yellow Pine Ice (1/31/09).

We took a trip up to Yellow Pine.  The ice is in pretty good shape and the road is in good shape, as well.  The roadside formations are beautiful.

It's hard not to stop and take a picture.  The weather was also great.  It was warming up and was well above freezing.  Once we got on the ice, we had limited time due to a late start and the 4 hour drive.  The drive up there is something else.  Going to Yellow Pine in the summer sucks, but going there via the winter road is a suck of another level.  It would be nice to stay the night and get two days worth of climbing for the drive.

Even though the the drive is miserable, I have already hit up a friend about going back up.  The formation in the picture above is very fat!  It's probably WI2/3.  There are also a couple of WI2's to the climbers left from the fatty.  If you bring up three or four screws, cordelettes and a 50 foot static rope (for the larger trees further back), a toprope can be safely set on the climbs.