Summit of Castleton

Marty and Liem summited Castleton's North Chimney route. It took approximately 5 hours from start to finish and were able to rap in just two double rope rappels.

It's Friday

Okay, Friday's are good if it is a work week, but not if it is the last day of your vacation. Yep, we head home tomorrow, but we have had a great week. Today, Marty and Liem are hiking up Castleton to lead the North Chimney. I've taken ill and have been fighting a head cold/chest cold - coughing, sneezing, can't take deep breaths for a couple of days which really stinks, because it is a well known tower in the climbing community. Oh well, makes for a reason to have to come out here again some day.

I'll update the blog tonight to let you see their summit photo. Hope you all have a great day and coming weekend.

Thanks for reading.

Thursday - Day of Rest

Today we took it easy. The weather is mild here, in the 70's. We visited the northern part of Canyonlands and this is Marty on top of Mesa Arch. We heard about the snow up in Salt Lake City, but we just had some high winds and a little rain as mentioned in the blog earlier.

THanks for reading. One more day and then we have to come home............

SuperCrack

If you haven't read the "Weather" then read it first. The winds were brutal. Anyway, I lead Super Crack and didn't do it clean. I had to take a number of times. My feet were just killing me. Sorry Mike J and Conster.

Also, it began to rain part way up. The rain felt like sleet. It was cold.

Anyway, Marty led Twin Crack (nice lead) and Liem lead an Unnamed 5.10 route. It was tough... Thursday we are taking as a day off and I'm not yet sure about Friday. Tonight's low is in the 40's.

Weather?

Today it was in the 70's supposedly, but with wind speed of 20's with gust in the 50's. It was very cloudy and at points we had some rain in Indian Creek. It was just down right cold. Of course, I left my sweatshirt in the hotel and none of us had jackets. Liem ended up using the rope bag as protection.

This photo is from the Canyon Lands with the Needles in the background.

Four Corners - How far from Moab??

After some climbing at Kane Creek road (nice climbing in the shade before 1pm) we decided to head to the Four Corners. Liem and Marty have not been there. Marty thought it was about an hour away. The waitress said a couple of hours, but in fact it was 3 hours away. Yep, we drove a 6 hour round trip for this photo so you better enjoy it! :)

Fisher Tower Route

Fishers Tower Route - roughly the yellow line. For those who asked! Enjoy!

Marty on top of Stolen Chimney

A great day on the rock. We beat the heat and had some fun. Unfortunately, Marty dropped some gear. Yes, someone other than me (Rodney) dropped gear this time, but don't dispair it is only Monday.

Koodos to Marty for walking the plank and working up this route. Now, it is time for the pool!!

We're not sure about Tuesday due to the weather is going to change, but bring us great temps and weather for the rest of the week. Looking to go to Indian Creek on Wednesday and taking on some crack. Yes - we love crack. So check out www.crackclimbing.com.

Liem - Top of Stolen Chimney - Fisher Tower

Liem on top of Stolen Chimney at Fisher Tower. This was the fourth pitch of the climb. Rodney led pitch one, Liem pitch two and four and Marty pitch 3. We were on the wall around 8:30am to beat the sun. Nice route for sure. I got a bit of vertigo on the 4th pitch and just couldn't do it.

Looks pretty freaking cool. Nice job to both Liem and Marty!

Marty on a route - Potash Road

Marty checking out the the flake to determine where to set a piece. At this point of the day the rock was pretty hot.

End of a good day!

Liem on a route - Potash Road

The lieminator on one of the routes we did on Monday at Potash Road.

Day One - 6/3 - Potash Road

Howdy! We climbed four routes today in the sun. It was great, but man the rock was on fire. We started about 10ish and ended about 1:30 and then went swimming at the pool.

We are not yet sure what we are climbing on Monday. We may do Fisher's Tower, but may do some more warm up routes.

We shall see.

2am / 4am in Moab

We're in Moab. We ran into an hour long traffic jam in Salt Lake City due to a wreck, which really slowed us down. We arrived in Moab about 2am their time / 4am ET. It about 8am Moab time and we're getting ready to go eat and plan out the day. I'll post some photos later. I think we'll do Potash road today.