The expiration of Daylight Savings typically marks when we begin our Hueco rampaging. Even though we’re on Arizona Time (and thus don’t observe Daylight Savings) we are well aware of it’s yearly cycle since it steals an hour from us when we head to Hueco during the warmer months. We have a funny story about this. Our first season at Hueco back in the spring of 2004 we were clueless as to when Daylight Savings started. We had forgotten about it completely, cause well, it didn’t affect us in AZ. And this was back in the day when we didn’t carry our silly cell phones around with us wherever we went (which are now our helpful reminders). Out on North Mountain one late afternoon, we let the hours tick by and stayed in the Martini Roof right up until park closing time, 6pm. Our mistake was that it was 6pm Tucson-time, meaning it was 7PM EL PASO-TIME!!! Needless to say we got a stern talking to the next morning by the park rangers. In our naivety we even argued about it! And then some Tucson friends arrived later that morning and clued us in that the time switch had happened. Whoops. One lets a mistake like that happen only once. haha.
So here we are. The season is ON! Hueco season obsessions commence!!!
Kicking the season off with a new climb. Denizen, v5
Notice the pool shoes on the kids feet. I guess it was our excitement in our first trip back that made us forget one crucial piece of gear: the kids’ street shoes!! We literally had nothing for their feet. $9.99 pool shoes at Target was all I could stomach to spend to get us out of that pickle. For them it was a treat of course. Grrrr.
Paul on a repeat of the four-star Jingus Bells, v5
Precarious pad stacking to work the upper moves of Two Days with Gene, v11. Don’t try this at home kids.
Paul’s birthday! A homemade, not burnt “van pizza”
Is that a tornado I see over the campground bathroom? Hmmmm.
This cracks me up. Rather than putting their climbing shoes on and actually climbing with us, the kids much prefer to “play” climbing. Using bungee cords (that we use to lash pads together so we can carry more than one), they rig up and yell climbing commands at one another, “on belay!” “up slack!” “off belay!”, while scaling some random piece of rock. And yes there is a beautiful rainbow in the background. Is this not a climber mama’s most perfect portrayal of happiness?! 🙂
Up high on West Mountain. Should we stay…
or should we go?
Stay! So Paul can bang out Natural Disaster, v10. Which he did.
Looking for animal tracks in the mud
Back to camp
The kids “cooking up” a “five course meal” in their “ovens”
Paul’s Hueco season obsession: Crown of Aragorn, v13
As for me, I’m posting these photos of me on The Bathtub, v9 because i think they’re rad..or perhaps I’m just secretly diggin’ my green pants. Anyway, I SO WANT to report that this is my Hueco season obsession. But I need one more day on it to suss out the moves a little more before I can decide if it’s possible. It’s very burly. And very long. Two things I’m usually not good at.
The good news is that I had tried this climb back in the spring and couldn’t do the moves you see me doing here in these two photos. Yeah summer training. 🙂 More later… I hope!
Many of you on here know of, or at least have heard me mention our good friends John and Mandy. Well, John has embarked upon a self-transformation of sorts, and is documenting it via vlog (aka video blog, aka video diary). His goal is to vlog daily and so far he’s 7 for 7. I share this with you not just in hopes that you will tune-in and thus indirectly support his quest, but because I think his videos are pretty darn good. His second job after all (behind his full-time gig of stay-at-home-dad of four kids) is videographer. Perhaps you will find these as entertaining and moving as I do. 🙂
A couple weekends ago our dear friend Linda married a pretty special guy, Ty. They are without a doubt a perfect match. We’re so excited for them!
Silas testing his strength against Ty in an arm wresting match the evening before the big day
Show time! Boys in their fancy duds
At the ceremony site with good buddy Havoc
Havoc and Silas were given the honors of ring bearers. Silas took this responsibility VERY seriously (as you can see by how tightly clutched he has Ty’s ring! haha)
The rocks of Cochise Stronghold in the backdrop
Wedding guests
The bride with her dad
Tying the knot
Breathtakingly gorgeous spot for a marriage!
And now, party time in Bisbee! We helped with setup and shot this photo earlier in the day. We neglected to pull out the camera when the party was actually happening. A good sign of a GREAT party!
And our cozy accommodations in the San Ramon hotel. Linda and Ty were married on Halloween weekend, the wildest weekend in Bisbee…so we’re told. So after the reception we continued to stay up until all hours of the night, watching Halloween movie marathons on TV and people in wild costumes go by from our corner-street perch. Silas kept vigil of the good costumes from the bed by the window.
“Oh my goodness! Come quick! There’s a group of goblins out there now!! I’m not even kidding!!!!”
And we can’t possibly be involved in a Linda-and-Ty adventure without climbing a few rocks. A quick stop at Cochise on the way home. 🙂
We made a quick jaunt up Mt. Lemmon last weekend to climb some local boulders. First the River Boulder for Paul and then the Matterhorn Boulder for me. No pics of Matterhorn, sorry!
Paul on Odin’s Revenge, v10 at the River Boulder
We can’t climb here without the kids getting completely soaked
Notice the dark red sneakers…normally a lighter shade. Wet perhaps?
We had another birthday recently. Is it just me or are the birthdays ticking by at a faster and faster rate??!!!!
Silas is now 7. SEVEN! And for his 7th birthday he wanted to go to Joshua Tree and do 7 climbs (no doubt the idea coming to him from Linda’s 35 route attempt on her 35th birthday back in February). The trip was a success…well, wait a sec…I’m not going to sugar-coat it here people. The presents did travel well without being peeked at or destroyed, the cake assembled beautifully and tasted delicious, and the seven climbs were ticked. The not-so-fun parts were it being INCREDIBLY windy all day Saturday (not just breezy or even gusty, but that super annoying dusty desert wind that blows crashpads and small children away and hair into your mouth and dirt into your eyes and grains of sand into your ear canals such that you just want to yell at the wind! Or your kids. THAT kind of wind!), and burned pizza. No, really burned. Really, really, really burned pizza. Pizza that we had been looking forward to feasting our dusty wind-blown faces into after a long, tiring, angry at mother nature kind of day…cooked over the campfire in our sweet little dutch oven. The birthday feast! Burned. And then add to that two kids that were amped up a notch higher than usual, exacerbating the frustration of the whole day. Not one of our best days out climbing for sure.
At the end of that fine day, with wild kids finally asleep in their sleeping bags and Paul and I sitting outside the van, looking at the big beautiful full moon with cups of wine in hand (cause as all desert climbers know, the blasted wind of course stops when it’s now too dark to climb), Paul says to me “April, this is why parents don’t do this.” (referring to the day’s drama). We sat quietly and pondered that thought a moment. And then broke into hysterical laughter.
It’s October and all Joshua Tree camping is full. Standard protocol: BLM land outside the park.
But then we snag an open campsite the next morning! Score! (Note, this is the calm before the storm, literally about 5 minutes prior to the wind just suddenly kicking up and then remaining at full-throttle for the entire day)
Climb #1
Little brother follows
Ivan has declared that he’s only doing 4 climbs today. Hmmm, wonder why? haha
Forgot to snap a pic of climb #2, so onto climb #3. Yes, we’re getting as much mileage as we can out of this boulder since it’s the only one in all of Joshua Tree with actual holds on it.
Climb #4. Yeah slab climbing.
And climb #5, which is a proper guidebook-documented V0 boulder problem. Nice Silas!
Calling it quits early for the day and moving on to dinner and birthday party celebration. The pizza baking in the dutch oven.
Dinner…which was essentially just salad. Take a gander of the burned hot mess on the corner of the table
Cake! Time to turn this party around!
…and then mother nature digs a little deeper and blows the candles out! Grrr. Completely unfazed, he goes ahead and makes a wish (the cake is a solar system, by the way)
Silas opening Ivan’s card
Homemade with love
A very exciting gift. The biggest magnifying glass ever! Thank you grandma and papa!
We give up on the wind and head indoors. This is the big gift – Paul’s rock collection he had as a child (well, half of it that is. The other half will be saved for another small boy later)
I love these photos
Their socks are completely knocked off right now
The next morning: a movie on the computer paired with the favorite gifts of last night – the rock collection and a book on gems and minerals. Silas is SOOOO into rocks right now.
Building the psyche that this day will be a little more fun. This is the day of Silas’ actual birth so how can it not be!
Looking good….
A fun little find on the approach
Tying in
On belay
Little brother waiting patiently for his turn
Climb on!
Climb #6, done!
View from the summit
Ivan’s turn
The rest positions these kids find on their climbs cracks me up
Ivan summits!
And finally, the big climb #7. We offered up the option of Silas doing the previous climb twice to finish out the 7, but he wouldn’t have it. He wanted to do the big one, “the one parents do.”
Go for it buddy. …it’s only a 5.10a 😉
A little tug from dad through the crux…
…and…
…he’s got it in the bag!
Belle Campground, where we camped, in the background
Send!!
I love this photo too – the climax of the trip. Paul and I often refer to what we’ve dubbed the “misery-to-joy ratio” for moments such as this. When hauling the whole family around to do what we do, a high degree of misery must sometimes be endured. But all it takes is that one moment of pure joy to make the whole experience worth it. This is exactly one of those moments. What a perfect birthday.
We’ve made a few trips up to Flag this late summer/early fall to kick off our winter bouldering season. Feeling strong! Woohoo!
Paul on a quick tick of Luke Cockstalker, v10
Ivan on a first ascent (and despite the concerned look on his face, I can assure you he is having fun. Immediately after this was snapped he got in trouble for impatiently trying it again without a spotter)
Silas’ own variation of Bat Roof
Michael on Carnivore, v8
“the race”
Raquel styling The Hermit, v5
Me on The Hermit, v5, which I came back and sent next trip, first try.
The kids using ‘rock walkie-talkies’
Paul on The Egyptian, v11
Send!
Ivan sitting a time-out, not at all contemplating the massive amount of dirt on his hands. Gross!
Paul working out the moves of his next victim, Chandler Dub All-Stars, v9
