Now if you are going to win any battle you have to do one thing. You have to make the mind run the body. Never let the body tell the mind what to do. The body will always give up. It is always tired morning, noon, and night. But the body is never tired if the mind is not tired. When you were younger the mind could make you dance all night, and the body was never tired… You’ve always got to make the mind take over and keep going.
~ George S. Patton, Jr.
slip:4a75.
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.
ɕ
…so little time. We’re currently campimg in Rocky Mountain Nationel Park, and climbing in/around Estes Park. Yesterday was some practice sport climbing — mostly Captain Suffer (aka Mike) yellin at me. Then today (tuesday) we climbed all over Jurrasic Park; more sport climbing, but really pushing my grade. Photos coming!
ɕ
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.
ɕ
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.
ɕ
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!
ɕ
Sunday evening, on a whim, we decided to tackle the first flatiron. (My details on the climb are in my Flatiron #1 post.)
ɕ
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.
ɕ
Tuesday night Mike got nominated for the ALS ice water challenge. So we decided to try it with, well, extra challenge:
Nobody can give you freedom. Nobody can give you equality or justice or anything. If you’re a man, you take it.
~ Malcolm X
slip:4a192.