Tiny glimpse from Jurassic park in Estes Park CO.
This route is from the cover of the guide book. Mike pulled this clean, but I had to start way left after failing the crux down low at the start.
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The Edge of Time (5.9 R) →
Lumpy Ridge →
Our project for Mon thru Fri is Lumpy Ridge.
We’ll head up to the town outside of Estes Park to pick up provisions and to visit the local climbing shop for a guide book and local knowledge. We’ve a campsite a short distance from the ridge. So we can ride our bikes a few miles to access whatever we want to climb.
So far, my visit to colorado has been pretty easy; hotel rooms, and climbing about half the days. But this week is going to be a lot more climbing. Yesterday (blog post/photos not yet up), we climber two single-pitch routes on Cob Rock in Boulder Canyon to get me some time doing jam cracks on granite. Oof! Burly stuff.
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Wind Ridge climb in Eldorado Canyon →
Photos from our ascent of the Wind Ridge (5.6) route on the Wind Tower in Eldorado Canyon.
The canyon is an indescribable mecca of climbing, with classic routes just criss-crossed all over the canyon walls. We selected Wind Ridge because a) I could climb it and b) it was a short three pitches with easy access to water for our ALS ice water challenge.
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Cascade Crag, Boulder Canyon →
This had my name written all over it. (“Craig” means “dweller of the crag”.)
After climbing the first Flatiron, we only got a few hours of nap time. After some shopping, (new climbing shoes!) we heading into Boulder Canyon to climb on some granite in a “sport climbing” setup – meaning the rock had countless rock bolts set making it super easy to setup the fall protection.
Turned out I was so burnt from the previous day, I could only do a couple small sections. On the up side, I got to spend a lot of time belaying Mike while he worked on some project routes.
Getting to the climb involved a short walk down the road, traversing the roaring creek on a tyrolean traverse and a short walk back up the other side. Seriously fun!
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First Flatiron – photo update →
Sunday evening, on a whim, we decided to tackle the first flatiron. (My details on the climb are in my Flatiron #1 post.)
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Red Rocks – photos update →
A gallery of a few photos from my first hike in Colorado. I arrived late in the evening on Saturday, and this was my first exertion to see how the altitude really felt. Great little hike up a couple hundred feet.
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Louisville Colorado →
Almost to Boulder. Spent the night — after some epic delays in Allentown, missed connections, missed standby, and terminal hussle in Chicago — in Louisville Co. Caught up with Mike; dinner, beer, and probabaly the last/only night under a roof. Sorted all my gear out this morning, and Mike’s leaving me the van for today. Couple stops, then off to try a trail hike to see how this “thin air” really works out.
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packed →
33lbs in the backpack (in the sea bag, for airline check luggage), 9lbs in the little pack for carryon.
All of this, comes out of those two little bags. A couple days before I left for Colorado, Mike and I set up a video call to do a gear shake-down. I started with the two packed bags, and then unpacked everything.
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DD-882 →
USS Furse (DD-882/DDR-882) was a Gearing-class destroyer of the United States Navy, named for Lieutenant John H. Furse USN (1886–1907).
My father served aboard as a fire control technician (as in “gun fire”); He operated a radar tracking and guidance system which controlled the targeting of the ships guns. At other times (I believe “special sea and anchor detail” being the correct parlance) he was tasked as a “phone talker” which generally entailed following a half step behind the officer of the deck (i.e., the officer commanding the ship at any given moment) and relaying communications through a microphone and headset he was wearing. (So if the Captain wants to single up all lines, he can simply say, “fo’c’s’le, bridge, single up.” and the ever-present, invisible sailer repeats it into the phones.)
Anyway. Here is a small collection of photos my father took of USS Furse.
Some of my readers are salty dogs, and will wonder how a sailor took photos of his own ship under way. During a Mediterranean cruise, Furse exchanged some sailors with a French destroyer during joint maneuvers.
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KU waterfall traverse →
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