Cooper, Elmo, and myself went up to St. George over Thanksgiving weekend.  Specifically, our time was spent in Moe’s Valley, a small, local bouldering area.  Despite the obvious issues with the area, which include excessive amounts of chipping and gluing, the climbing is fun, the rock is friendly, and when the stone is good, its REALLY good.  

Thanksgiving dinner consisted of a desperate attempt to include some of the usual staples, as long as they could be cooked on a camp stove.  A late night run to the Walmart in Hurricane ended up with us getting some instant stuffing, instant mashed potatoes, Au Gratin, and a pecan pie (out of pumpkin pie FAIL walmart!).  The mashed potatoes and stuffing ended up in burritos, which turned out to be surprisingly good.  The pie was acceptable.  Elmo decided he wanted pizza, and managed to obtain one from Little Caesar’s, despite it being closed.

Climbing-wise, it was a mostly successful trip.  Cooper worked his way through the more classic moderates, with fast ascents of both Lindner Roof, The Swan, Device Ignitor Right, and several other roofs.  

Elmo onsighted a rad refrigerator bloc, and would have pulled off a flash of a sick roof, but DABBED. SO INVALID.  However, he did all the moves on his primary project, Show of Hands, in a quick session.

 I put together both Gription and Dead Rabbit very quickly, climbing each in just a few goes from the bottom.  Gription has a reputation as being the single best boulder in Moe’s, with very high quality rock.  This is well deserved, as it’s a nearly perfect line.  Obvious start, interesting, complex movements, to a slightly heady topout over a flat landing.  I pulled off a couple repeats of Show of Hands, which was interesting simply to see the progress I’ve made since this time last year.

Video will be posted separately…

Been back in Flag for about a week now, climbing with the usual suspects.  Its hot here, and doesn’t appear to be getting any cooler anytime soon.  So night sessions are the name of the game until the temps drop about 20 degrees…  I went out to BVB Roof last Sunday, and Priest Draw on Thursday.  Tyler cruised his project, “Our God is Neither” with what is becoming his characteristic ease.  Friday we returned to the Draw, and went to work on Black Hole, one of the only crimp lines in the area.  I dispatched the line after a few attempts, while Tyler worked out all but the first move.  Its nice to find some success, after a pretty dismal Summer of flailing on virtually every climb I got on.  

I’ve been back in Colorado for over a month now, and the Alpine Season is in full swing.  Conditions at Wolverineland have been prime, and nearly all of the classics have melted out.  Every session I’ve managed to do at least one or two new moderates, and all of them have been fantastic.  Of note are Beggars and Doers, Vaporizer, Endgame, Red Herring, and War of the Insects.  At some point I’ll get some video together of these, and hopefully other problems.