The waiter here delivered the most inconceivably amazing dessert descriptions in the history of culinary overindulgence. Pears, Tiramisu, Cheesecake… somewhere on the upper east side of Manhattan. yowza! (Coversation and company was *nearly* as good. ;)
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It’s not an ending… it’s a new beginning.
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Various photos of a few of the routes we worked on day three, in the Upper Gorge. This area is “trad[itional]” climbing. In many areas, hangers are bolted into the rock for clipping in safety gear. In this area, you have to bring your own hardware which you temporarily insert into the nooks and crannies of the rock.
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Great bit of play at the end of day one.
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Where’s the Puffin today? …en route to Govenor’s Island for first full day of Art of Retreat.
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It’s hard to convey the sheer scale of the rock faces in Red River Gorge. These photos are from the walk into the Middle Gorge. About 20 minutes of steep hiking, and suddenly these ~200 feet tall rock faces appear overhead through the trees.
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“Oceans destroy cities!” Also in the hallway, “Your butt looks good in that outfit.” Why thank you! :)
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Guggenheim. Just a quick peek in the lobby :)
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A b-e-a-utiful day in THE city!
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On our first day in Red River Gorge, we drove to a nearby “roadside crag”. After a brief walk in, we encountered this magnificent block covered in 10a+ routes.
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As I mentioned earlier, the first flight left before dawn provided an extended (because flying westward) pre-dawn and sunrise show. When I fly, I always try to look for optical phenomenon and this flight was the most spectacular I have ever seen.
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We only had a few days to catch a glimpse of Paris… I suspect we will return some day.
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What do you at 1am when you’re on the way to the airport for a 6am flight?? …got off the highway at the airport exit and BAM!!
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Once we had our top rope up, we spent the rest of our daylight here. Staright up, dihedral with a 5.8 finger jam crack. Paste your feet on the right and bury your hands… four attempts, but I couldn’t quite pull this one off.
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Straight up the middle of this. Blank and mossy until you get to this unique feature mid-face.
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Then we moved a bit left on that same wall. This was crazy hard to make the first move to get up onto the wall.
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This wall was just a few degrees from vertical. Standing on tiny features like edge of a nickel. The upper lip is about 200 feet, and roofed out at least forty feet. Route started with this sheer, wet, mossy wall with a fist-jam crack (insert entire hand, make fist so it can’t come out and the walk up the wall :) Spent all day climbing all over this wall, and then one other route.
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Rained all night and all morning… finally cleared up and now this terrible drive thru some lousy national forest or something… #whereAreTheRocks !
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