Travel Journal... Joshua Tree, California

Joshua Tree, California is one of my favorite places; not only for the rock climbing, but also for the desert beauty.  I haven't been there in three years... one year I was pregnant, last year the Kid was just beginning to walk and it would have been a challenge, and this year we just don't have the extra money for a road trip.
But, I try to write about our climbing trips so I remember some of the little details.  When I go back and read my journal, I realize how much I would have forgotten if I hadn't written it down...

February 11, 2007
8:58pm local time
Joshua Tree, Ca
Safari Motor Inn, room 105


Ahhhhh yes - returned to JT yesterday.  As I said in my last entry, we booked this trip during our last trip here.  We walked out to Slashface yesterday when we got into the park.  It is is pretty crazy highball, and we only had one pad.  John got on it, but it was dicey with only one pad.  The walk to the boulder was at least 20 minutes off the geology road, which would have been a long walk back if one of us had a busted up ankle.  I chickened out and didn't get on it.... I'll save that one for when we have like four pads.


We walked out to Ionic Strength today.  


When we started out for it, I asked John how far it was... 'like 20 minutes'.  We found it two hours later.  I was a little pissy because I didn't bring much water or food, and I was hungry and ended up getting really thirsty.  I got really pissy when I saw the climb.  I knew the grade, 5.12a, when we started out, but what I didn't know was that there aren't other more moderate climbs nearby.  I am not a 5.12 climber; yeah, I'll get on them and work it, but I had never finished a 12.  


Ionic Strength is a very intimidating climb.  Very Intimidating.  You climb the arete and the face is just blank from the ground, and then it gets vertical.  It isn't even an easy climb to start;  you have to walk out over this void with hands on one rock and feet on the other.  Throw up a heal and pull over a lip, then you start the climb.  Climb the arete, and the 'holds' (really potato chips) run out just as the climbs gets vertical.  Sh*t!


John turns to me, and tells me that I need to climb it first, since he may not be able to do it twice (like if he went first, then me, then him to clean the anchor, and the anchor situation was a whole other thing.)  So I climbed it, not clean by any means, parts were in good style, parts were total cockroach style, and I finished it.  The hardest climb I ever finished.  


Tired.  More tomorrow.

              

Getting Back to Climbing, Week 4

I made it to the gym on Wednesday evening with the family, and Friday just with the Kid.  No hang board this week!  My plan is to do one week on the hang board and one week off (uh so this week coming up I will have to get on it).  On Wednesday, I sent the long traverse that my husband set a few weeks ago.  Got it first burn, and thought "why were the final moves so hard last week?".  I even went upstairs to the weight machines Wednesday night, which is always a good thing.  It seems as though I always run out of time by the end of my session... gone are the days when I could go the gym for 4-5 hours without a care.  The Kid has fun at the gym for about two hours, and then he is shot.
By Friday, I still felt sore from Wednesday night, and that is the way it should be as far as I am concerned.  Friday didn't boast any new sends - but it is plastic, so who cares anyway.  It is only a measure of improvement.

It is mid-February, one of the times during the year that John and I would road trip to Joshua Tree for some desert climbing.

Although we have planned to return the past two years, it just hasn't worked out for us.  Last year the Kid was just learning to walk, and it would have been too much trying to contain him on the plane, and then keep him away from all of the sharp things found in the desert.  The first time I went to J.T. I realized that everything in the desert was sharp... except for coyotes.  This year, a trip would stress us financially.  Being a single income family adjusts priorities, and our top priority is for me to continue to stay home and raise the Kid.   Perhaps I will post some of my travel journal entries from our last trips.

On the bright side... unlike plastic gym problems... real rock boulder problems will still be there, whether I return this year or next.  Gunsmoke will still be waiting for me.  So will Slashfash and Fist Full of Walnuts.