Darko and I left Boulder on Friday morning and drove over the Rockies through a little snow. On the way we saw several Big Horn Sheep along the side of the highway. We decided to stop by a bouldering area called Big Bend on the way into Moab along the Colorado River.
We bouldered there for a few hours until sunset. I don't know if it takes a while to get used to the rock there (fine grain sandstone) or if the grades are just really really stiff. I suspect the later.
After the sun went down we headed in to Moab for some supplies before continuing down to Indian Creek.
Darko and I found a spot to camp and hit the hay. The next day we got up to cold cloudy weather. Neither of us was feeling very gung ho so we just went for a walk to the bathroom, and once we were there we decided to head up to nearby cliff to check out the climbs and see if it would be too cold to climb up there in the shade.
It was actually quite nice so we made our way back to the campsite and scoped out a climb in the guide book that would not require us to drive out of the campground (the road was a little rough). We headed up to climb a tower on a nearby ridge, but when we got up there Darko was feeling kind of crappy and there was a party already on the climb. They suggested we try the route on the next tower over. We took their advice and headed over. Since Darko wasn't doing to well I took the lead. It was supposed to be pretty hard and it was. The route was a balancy arete climb that lead of the left edge tower in this photo.
I almost got it without falling, but I always struggle with arete climbs and this was also my first time on Wingate sandstone. I wasn't sure which footholds would hold my weight in certain positions. I got pretty close to making the moves, but it is hard to tell what the holds around the corner of the arete look like when you can't lean around to look without falling. Enh. In any case, I made it to the top without too much trouble and it was very cool to be on the summit of a tower.
After that climb, Darko was still not feeling awesome so we called it a day and headed back to the camp for a beer.
The sun managed to find a way through the clouds around sunset and Indian Creek was just beautiful.
The on Sunday Darko felt even worse, in fact he threw up on the walk to the toilet. I suggested that we just head out to Joe's Valley (about 2:45 away) and do some bouldering since it was supposed to rain in IC for the next day and a half anyway. Bouldering wouldn't put any pressure on D to climb hard or belay. So we headed out to Moab and then on to Joe's Valley.
We managed to get here just in time to look at the boulders before it started snowing. We ate a little lunch in the car before driving down to town to find a place to sit out the snow. But on the way down the canyon the snow thinned out and even stopped completely. We decided to head to another section of Joe's Valley. And oh my lord was it sick. Really nice rock and so much of it perched up on the shoulder of a flat topped mountain. Darko managed to climb a few fun problems including a one-move-wonder v4 and a super classic v3. I managed to send a v5 and a v6 during the few hours we spent up there. It did snow on us a little but it was mostly just flurries and the rack stayed pretty dry.
We did eventually retire down to the town of Castle Dale where we got a hotel room for the night. And it came with free wireless! Sweet.
So today we'll head back up to Joe's Valley and climb until our finger tips can't take it anymore. Hopefully there will be some sweet sends before we have to give up. The weather looks super prime and I might even be able to get some go photos too. After we finish up today we'll be heading back to Indian Creek for the rest of the week.
Driving Update:
Boulder to IC to Joe's Valley:
Driving Time - 10:00
Distance - 632
Total:
Driving Time - 56:20
Distance - 3620
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