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Climbing Weekends

by William :: Monday January 23, 2006

As a follow up to my last blog, I’m going to talk about the pinnacle of my climbing experiences so far. One of the requirements of the climbing program is that you have to take one weekend trip to either the Sierra or Joshua Tree National Monument. Because I was having so much fun in the program, I did both.

My first trip was to the Sierra, to the well-known rock climbing area called The Needles. There, we went on a four-pitch climb. What happens with multi-pitch climbs is one person climbs, then another follows up, then the first climbs up, and so on. When you are resting, you are exposed to the elements, hanging off of just a small piece of steel planted in the rock. To some on the trip, this was frightening, but I found it strangely refreshing, being on a near-vertical rock face, and staring out over hundreds of miles of intersting terrain was fabulous.

(Sometimes when I’m studying, I find myself thinking about how great a time I have here.)

My next trip was to Joshua Tree. Ask any climber, and he will have either been to Jtree, or is in the process of planning a trip there. This is for good reason: the climbing at Jtree is absolutly amazing. It was there that I completed my first 5.10, and where I climbed more intersting routes than I ever had before. Those were quite possibly the three most blissful days of my life: climbing, talking with friends, being outdoors. There was little more one could ask for.

These two trips were separated by a week, and that week was probably one of the best this year, because not only could I recollect being outdoors the weekend before, but I could also to look forward to another trip.

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