Here and There Along the Way

The last five days I have spent driving out from Seattle to Wyoming. Right now I am sitting in the Thermopolis library getting one last little dose of the interweb before heading out for a month in the Big Horn basin. My Dad and I drove to the Coloumbia River Gorge, where we visited my grandmother for a day, before heading southeast to Reynolds Creek, outside of Boise, Idaho. This is a pretty cool little local spot with volcanic basalt on the right side of the road and granite on the left. The rock is the most similar to Bishop that I have ever seen in terms of the features it produces but not as good of quality. I tried Cataylis (V10), but could not put it together before my skin fell apart. I do not think I have ever tried to crimp so hard. The next day, we went to Castle Rocks to checkout the roof that Warpath is on. It took a little bit of searching but we found the boulder and I have to say I was extremely impressed. Big props to Jamie Emerson for the directions. The rock is amazing quality and the most wild roof features I have seen outside of Hueco. I tried to flash The Smell (V8) but fell a move from the end on the slab topout. After figuring the balancy footwork, I was able to top it out from the start. I tried Out of Africa (V10), but was not overly inspired by it and moved onto Jared's Roof. I have to say this is probably the best roof climb I have ever tried. I did all the moves but the very first and I plan on returning as soon as possible. Part way through the session, two sport climbers showed up and curious as they were asked about the roof and the problems on it. When I told them Warpath was one of the hardest problems in the country, they immediatly responed "Oh, Chris Sharma?" To my respone of James Litz, they just gave me black looks. It was now Sunday evening and I dropped my Dad off at the airpot before driving into Grand Teton National Park. I knew there had to be bouldering and after talking with some rangers got pointed in the right direction. It turned out that the place I went had been climbed at a fair amount and chalk was on many of the boulders. The place had a very similar feeling to Lower Chaos with rock that was equally ghetto in the holds it made but a little more chossy. I climbed a lot of moderates and did what appeared to be a first ascent. The climb had a landing similar to the Gobot and the obvious holds were covered in lichen, something none of the other clibms I did had. I thought it was 5 or 6ish but did not name it. I also stumbled accross a very nice big roof with an awesome moderate on slopers and jugs right up the center of it. After missing the pad on a hard looking line out the underbelly of the same roof, I decided to spend the afternoon hiking. I headed up Cascade Canyon, which is on the north side of the Grand Teton. For the first bit of the hike there were a lot of people but then it thinned out. I saw a number or Elk, Marmot, and a scruffy looking Moose. I did spot a few boulders, including one five star looking line on rock as good as the Immaculate Turd. The landings were not great and I had not brought any foam but I climbed one really cool boulder on opposing sidepulls and underclings that felt V4ish. Many pictures were taken along the way but they will have to wait until I return to Seattle at the end of August. Until then, have a good one out there.