Black Mtn, yet again!

Past Saturday was yet another trip to Black Mtn. Just a day trip, a posse of a crew headed up Black Mtn:

Myself
Johnnie aka "The Purdy Lady"
Dan aka "The Man"
Jenny aka "Johnnie's Roommate"
Patrick aka "The Prettiest One Here"
Noel aka "You Don't Need Feet to Climb" aka "Shut up Noel!"

We also managed to meet up with two other climbers who we met through a mutual friend - Laura and her brother Alan. The South Dakotan siblings. (I'm on a roll with the nicknames today)

After nearly running Laura and Alan off the dirt road to Black Mtn (their first time there, long and boring story as to how that happened), we go to Boulder Basin. Showed them the usual boulder for "warm ups" of an overhanging flake, a thin overhanging seam and Courier Flight. It was the traditional "welcome to black mtn, leave your ego at the door and prepare to get spanked".

Next, we headed to the Pink Crack area. Johnnie's decided that this will be her project for the summer, and she's been making definite progress with the two times we've gone so far. I'm glad to see that she's more comfortable with the height as she gets on this thing. As for me, I decided I wanted to try 4 wheel drive sans key crystal. Yes, you read it right - if you've climbed this problem before, you know there was a critical feldspar crystal in the slab. Well, it's gone - fortunately I mangaged to do this problem. And in case you're wondering, it's no harder or easier... just takes a little more mental focus.

Second half of the day was spent up near the Visor. This is where I decided to actively attempt to climb something at my limit. I've decided that the easy variation on Can Opener would be perfect. Of course, being the retard that I am, I foolishly decided to try this problem again with shorts. After a few attempts, I regained my intelligence and put on the long pants that I brought, along with taping my knee for one of the moves - of course, by this time it was too late for me to give it a good go, despite having made progress. Oh well - I think it's better to try it later once the skin on my knee fully recovers. Can Opener. Good name for this problem...

Hiking up the hill, we next visited a roof crack problem from the previous weekend. Once again, I forgot the tape gloves and gave it a good go. For additional machismo, I decided not to use a shirt, thereby fully proving to the world my incredible stupidity. My entire body, my arm especially, looks like it got gnawed on by a hungry doberman named Butch. But, I made progress on this problem too!

I do love making progress on problems that are at my limit - both of these are great for that. :) I can't wait till I come back from Japan in a couple of weeks (and the weddings... *sigh*). Looks like no climbing for me for a month. Hopefully I'll remember the sequences of movements for these things.

Dinner was a 4 x 4 protein style with fries and drink. Nummy.