Rain [October 30]

It has been raining for days here in Monroe. I was hoping to get out to Index on Sunday, since the forecast is for sun... but I was reminded it takes 3 days to dry out this time of year in Index. Damn! The weather (and interested parties) petered out for the Smith trip this weekend... but I wasn't giving up that easy. Vantage is going to be nice (10% chance of rain) and dry... and I'm dying to climb. Damien signed on to go with me and Mike (my brother), and Kyle called me and is coming to meet us from Spokane.

The last couple weeks hasn't seen much in the way of good weather. I have however been climbing hard in the climbing gym and seem to be making some decent progress. This week I did my first real V3 problem in 5 tries, then did another one in about 5 tries. I can tell that I have been climbing and training hard. I can't wait to continue what I have started building.

P.S. -- I was just reading my last post about training in the gym... that amount of climbing was killing me. My fingers were becoming injured and sore, it was just way too much for me. I've backed off to 1 day on, 1 day off climbing with Crossfit, 1 day on, 1 full rest day, repeat. This seems to be much more realistic right now for me.

Home [October 19]

I can't believe October is almost over already. It seems with the season changing from summer to fall, my opportunities to find partners and/or dry climbing conditions are becoming less and less. I haven't been climbing outside in over 2 weeks and don't see any dry weather in the next couple weeks around here... hopefully I can get a trip set up.

I have been climbing in the gym a lot. Last week I started consistent gym training; Monday and Tuesday in the climbing gym, Wednesday (rest day) cardio, Thursday, Friday and Saturday in the climbing gym and Sunday rest day. I plan on getting into the gym at least 4 to 5 times a week. Each workout consists of warm-up traverse, 20 min. 1 to 2 hours of general climbing. 15 - 20 minutes of 4x4 circuit. After a month of gym climbing, I will re-evaluate my climbing routine and refine what I am doing, but until them I am continuing to work on general stamina and strength as well as fundamental technique.

Index - GNS [October 4]

Josh and I decided to hit Index for a half-day. He arrived in Monroe chilled to the bone from riding his bike... hit 522 and the temp dropped to about 40. Summer is over. After loading up and getting on the road, we stopped for the best coffee ever at the place just east of Index on HWY 2. I got a dark chocolate mocha with hemp milk, which was the bomb. With super triple shot energy drink in hand, we killed it on the 3 minute aproach... 2.5 minutes on the dot. We took a quick tour of the lower town wall, then scrambled up to the ledge to start GNS.

I led the pitches and everything went fine... it was my third time leading it. There was a guy soloing the route, which was a bit odd. He rambled on by, and then a few minutes later came down-climbing back by. After rapelling the route, we dragged the rope over to a 5.8 crack on the lower level of the slab and burned a few laps on it. We headed out of there with ideas of getting the the Mountaineer's Salmon Bake, but we hit traffic in Gold Bar and that put a stop to that, as the ride home took longer than expected.