Little Time-Out For Kelly...

I have been slacking recently on posting because, sadly, I haven't been out climbing in a while... I'm on a forced break from climbing (first school, then moving, then health reasons) and I'm already starting to go a little crazy. I'm going to make more of an effort to update this blog, to help keep me sane, as browsing the dozens of other interesting climbing blogs out there makes me wonder "why am I not there, doing that?"

Joel Campbell's "Yawning Rock"

Cortney and I recently moved into a small house in the Northgate neighborhood of Seattle. The house is great, with plenty of room (for us) and nice amenities - it even has a fireplace. However, the best part of the house so far has been the huge pine tree in the front yard.

Joel and I used a ladder and fun passive-pro lead climbing to rig a fixed line about 60 feet up. Since then, we've installed two hammocks about 50 feet up. It's really nice to get out of school and literally just "go climb a tree." Tree climbing shares many characteristics of rock climbing: It is climbing (of some sort), it is an interaction with nature, it involves playing with roped-climbing gear, it gives me a slight fear of heights, and the view is better on top - from the hammocks, you can get a view of the Olympics, the Cascades, and even the skyscrapers downtown. Good times.

Camp Serene + Beach Boulder

I made it outside this past weekend with Cortney, Drew Schick, and some of his friends from Ellensburg. We started at the Camp Serene boulder, warming up and playing on the tall, clean lines on the back. Cortney was really close on the center line, coming within inches from snagging the lip several times, and taking some big falls in the process.

At the Beach Boulder later in the day, we enjoyed the scenery and played on J-High, with Drew sending the problem for the first time, and me being unable to repeat it. Go figure. It was fun to play around in the rocks at the river's edge, and to just be outside on a sunny, not-too-cold March day. Later in the afternoon, the rest of the guys went off to the Five Star Boulder, and Cortney and I explored and looked at some projects. While we didn't find anything special, it was very refreshing to trudge around in the woods on a rock-hunting mission. Hopefully we'll be able to climb again before too long - I've got a lot coming up in the next couple weeks. Here are the pics:

Eric on the Camp Serene Boulder The Beach Boulder Drew below J-High Kyakers passing the Beach Boulder Kyle O'Meara's problem Built To Last, across the Skykomish from the Beach Boulder Hamburgler and another problem Mt. Index