Day 13

Another rest day brings too much coffee and not enough rest. We got lucky because it is cloudy for the first time since we have arrived and it was sprinkling, which apparently is a very big deal around here.
I have been posting a lot of my pictures on www.flickr.com
You need to have a yahoo account to see them. My flickr name is Umphrey and my e-mail is umnprey57@yahoo.com so you can do a search for me and see all of the fun and exciting pictures.

Day 11
On Tuesday we all woke up to the beautiful Texas sun and made our usual oatmeal and coffee breakfeast. We packed up our sandy, dirty climbing stuff and headed to the warm up boulders. Warming up is always so much work. Everyone is breathing heavy and ignoring all of the sore muscles that tell us we probably should be resting instead of climbing. Even if your muscles are ok then the skin on your hands is another issue. I think I am the only person that hasn't bled yet. I have some nice bruises to make up for that though.
Erik, Adam, Danielle and I hoofed it over to the Mushroom Roof, V8, which I finally completed after three days of work. It was nice to finally get that done. Adam is putting in his work on the classic problems called Left El Murray and Center El Murray, V6. They are very hard. Erik quickly became intrigued by Crap Arete Especial, which is somewhat of a party trick.
Danielle and I packed up and walked over to her project Wicicala Cave, V5. It has really neat moves on it. After that we met up with the boys at Choir Boys, V9, and watched Nic thrash himself on it until he was too tired to move.
The day ended with Danielle running the store in the barn as usual, which means she was really playing foozeball with me and drinking a Blue Moon. In the barn I bargained my way to a brand new Dragonfly backpacking stove for $30, which is worth about $100. I ran back to Jim's van to play with it and show Brian and got stuck listening to disturbing boy conversations inspired by Brian's never ending imagination.

Day 12
I will never get sick of the sunshine waking me up every morning with the birds chirping in the desert bushes. However, I am sick of all the sand! It gets everywhere and makes your whole body feel disgustingly dry. Also, my hands are so dirty that I wash them and they don't look any different than they did before i washed them. It's awesome.
Wednesday proved to be another success for me. I sent Baby Martini, V6. I wasn't expecting to do so, but I was climbing on it and I got really close to the end and just decided to give it my all and finish it. It is my favorite climb thus far. I love roof climbing. Roof climbing on jugs with all these crazy toe and heel hooks is just plain fun.
Nic, Erik and I decided to do a little accidental spelunking while looking for a climbing area. We crawled into the very back of this cave with a hole in it, went through the hole which opened up into this very narrow corridor, and then we had to climb up through another hole through another slot where the earth then gave birth to us. We found the area, but decided not to climb after all that. Jim and Brian continue to work on their projects in the Martini Cave. They are SO STRONG.
Later we met up with them at a problem called Barefoot on Sacred Ground where we encountered the hilarious Dave Graham. All of the boys were working on it, and Jim did this huge move to a hueco to finish up the problem, and his hand slipped out of the jug and he flew backword and down about 15ft and landed in a tree/bush. He was ok, but it was scary to watch. Afterwards he stood with his hand on his heart and said, "that was a little beyond my comfort level." Then Jamie Emerson was quick to tell him that we went too high to finish the problem, and the problem ends on the lower jug. Good to know.
Nic sent Stegasaur, V8, and did the classic V2 called Nobody Here Gets Out Alive. Dan rested and chatted video cameras with Mike Call.

At the moment we are sitting at a coffee shop and someone has talked the owner into playing a climbing video (Best of the West) on their big screen t.v. Yes we are about 20 miles from where the movie was filmed but hey, it's still inspiring to watch.

Tomorrow i will work on Babyface, V7 and hopefully do it.