4am is early. Even if you know you're going to do something you love doing after a half-hour drive to pick up two crash pads that Johnny Thank-You-G left at Stone Gardens and gas-up stop and a hike through a raging creek, inevitably soaking one foot, 4am is early.
Even if during your drive there the sun pokes you in your Achilles' heel - your eyes - to keep you awake and sometimes sifts through mass quantities of cirrus, cumulus and a few contrails - which means dry air: a good sign for climbing! - you know that 4am is early.
Even if your favorite band's CD is in the player blasting for half the drive and your hands are half on the steering wheel, half going through the motions of the problem you're about to hop on, and you're thinking about how excited you are to climb, when you realize that it's almost the case that your hands are the ones most excited about climbing, not you; even when you know that your hardest climb lies just a few feet in front of you, and you have enough time to climb it; even when there are no ORV's buzzing around but only oriole-wannabes gossiping about how they've had the idea for years pertaining to digital cameras that know your geographical position and can wirelessly submit photos to your storage device,
4am is early.
But you know what? Returning to R.B. is worth it. My P.R. is R.B., or as referred to before this post, Ross Bongo. Even though I didn't top it out, I consider myself to have climbed it because the reason that I didn't top it out was this: by the time I got to the slabby-er topout and entered the point of no-easy-return, I looked down and saw that if I slipped on this uncleaned, mossy top, the three crash pads were not beneath me any longer! They had only protected the V10 part of the climb. So it is that I left without getting on top of the Five-Star Boulder via R.B. but rather via the reverse walk-off instead. But if I want to, I can complete the "V0+ topout" as KellyHowesSheridan puts it, on Saturday when I return to the Five-Star Boulder with Sam Johnson and Gabe Cisneros... If I want! Again, leaving at 5am! Didn't I learn?
Boy am I tired! But alas. For me, there is nothing more calming and simultaneously invigorating as a hard send.
More to come, certainly,
-Your calm and invigorated Landescaper, N8
Return to R.B.
Posted by Unknown at 8:28 PM
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1 comments:
Como what? V10? I didn't know you were climbing that hard, I'm pushing V5, and that is generous. So what does that mean in sport climbing, that your climbing like 5.20? If so, I cannot garauntee that you will have a ton-of-fun (1 metric ton of good times roughly equal to 2,000 lbs. of american fun, its better cause our number is bigger!) cause there isn't anything in that crazy range around here son. Either way, I'll find some fun tid-bits for us to dangle our digits on, promise. Just wanted to chime in with some curvaceous crony wise-cracks and offer up some alluring alliteration with this evening-epitaph. Not that the evening is dead or deceased, quite the contrary, its just getting started. Hope all's well. Safe traels friend.
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