Colorado Crimpin'

20 minutes over the Colorado border and I'm blessed with this surreal view...

Dave crimping hard on Crimpfest [5.12a]. He got the send and Jacquie and I got very close. A fantastic climb!

Jacquie working her way up a wonderful 5.11c. The view of Pikes Peak in the background was pretty wonderful too.

A nice sunset view during the hour long hike back ton camp.

Made a stop in Colorado to climb and camp with Jacquie and a crew of her climbing friends. We explored a crag by the name of Devils Head. So many awesome climbs! With an hour approach from the parking lot, the walls were empty and the views were breathtaking. Definitely a place I'm psyched to go back to soon. 

Devils Head: 5 out of 5 stars.

Packed full of 3 and 4 star climbs, especially in the 5.11 and 5.12 grades. No crowds and great views make it even better. Even if you're not a climber, it's worth a visit for all of the hiking trails in the area.

Saturn vehicle parts: 1 out of 5 stars.

After having recently fixed a coolant leak, I'm now dealing with an acceleration/hesitation issue which is now affecting my gas mileage significantly. Although new spark plugs and air filter helped, the issue is still prevalent. Might be a fuel filter or fuel pump issue. A few cryptic codes from a scanner didn't help much. Just relieved it made it over vail pass without exploding. 

Indiana Dunes

Porter Beach. It was raining, but the rain felt kinda nice.

A dangerously last second decision to take an exit off I80 resulted in me exploring the Indiana Dunes National Lakeshore. Today consisted of way too much driving so I needed somewhere to stretch my legs (and take a bath, as a bonus). Now before I go any further, I've decided that it would be fun to begin reviewing new places of interest. So here we go:

Indiana Dunes State Park: A surprise oasis of landscape diversity in an otherwise boring state. 40 miles of hiking trails loop you around the park, through lush woodland and over the sandy white dunes by the shore. Opportunities for fishing, swimming, running and camping make this a one-of-a-kind stop in mediocre Indiana

Score: 1 out of 5

Sounds like a nice place, but I never actually made it into the park. They wanted to charge me $12 at the entrance. I drove 3 minutes down the road to Porter Beach which was free. Ergo...

Porter Beach: It's got nice sand and wet water and it's totally free

Score: 5 out of 5

Then I made another sketchy last second exit off the highway to check out Tangled Roots Brewery in Ottawa, Illinois. Decent beer but the best part was trading a treehouse can for a bottle of bourbon barrel stout. Oh and he paid for my flight of beer. Treehouse beer is more valuable than money out here if you can find the right people. I should have brought more!

Niagara Falls? Meh

The bridge to Canada!

I so badly wanted to explore that decrepit building on the Canadian side. 

Soooooooooooooo many people... Maybe that's why I loved Utah so much. You can easily get away from people and any sort of human development.

Lots of seagulls. Trying to properly focus and time the shot was fun.

Falls and a rainbow for good measure.

Chose to take 90 West to kick off this adventure. Looking for something to do in order to break up the drive, I decided to check out Niagara Falls since I had never been there. Well just as I had been warned, it's quite commercialized and incredibly touristy. The American side was especially depressing: Construction, mediocre views of the Falls, tickets to access most things and forced exits through gift shops... The Canadian side was a relief: open green spaces, blooming flowers everywhere and a cozy lack of gift shops and crummy restaurants. Of course the Falls themselves were impressive, but I have to admit, I thought they'd be bigger. I'm satisfied with that place for a while! 

Au Revoir... Again

Koti crushing the roof on Simian Swing [5.11c], Farley Ledges. 

Was packing my car when Kobe notified me that a cute fuzzy bear was meandering around the yard. Farewell bear!

The majority of my belongings packed into a few tubs and a few bags. Feels good to be able to narrow down my necessities.

Welp... see ya later New England! Part 2 of the US tour begins today. So glad I was able to see so many of you during my brief visit home. Hopefully the Pacific NorthWest is as beautiful as everyone makes it out to be!

Now that I'll be forced to cook in my car again, I'd like to film another video soon. Challenge me with a new meal to cook and I'll do my best!

Time To Pack!

WNEC meetup at Dave's. Felt good to play stump again!

Family dinner over the fire.

Foil dinners. A classic throwback to boy scouts. 

Look at this delicious and perfectly cooked meal. I wonder if could build a fire in the Saturn and make it a car cooking episode?

Some of Stella's best qualities include: staring, yawning and slipping out of her harness (sans running away).

Rapscallion Brewery in Sturbridge MA. Good beer, an awesome outdoor pavilion and a disc golf course.

A nice Belchertown sunset with some okay friends.

Wrapping up my visit home. Hitting the road again on Thursday to explore some more of this wonderful country. A slightly difficult commitment after so many splendid moments with friends and family. But alas, the mountains are calling and I must go! My mini-retirement must be fulfilled with the proper levels of exploration, danger and debatably bad decisions.

Rumney Rocks And Doggy Dates

Crushing some more rocks in Rumney with Koti.

The view of the valley from the top makes it even more satisfying to finish a climb. 

Puppy play date with Ashley and smug pug Stella. 

"No way bro, I'm too cool for school" -Kobe

Squeezing every possible adventure out of my limited time home. It's exhausting but someone's gotta do it! Leaving in less than a week. At some point I need to figure out my health insurance dilemma, and maybe pack some stuff and see if it will fit in my car without the box on the back.

Jude's Baptism

I wanted to drink some water from the mini-pool, but I don't know how many baby heads have been in there. 

Jude was baptized yesterday! And the rest of us ate, drank and caught up. A productive and successful day indeed.

This Time I'm The Tour Guide

Great day session in Rumney NH with Koti! This is Koti setting up Cereal Killer [5.11c], a fantastic climb. 

Camille, my French tourist has arrived in Boston. Well of course we have to go to Faneuil Hall!

Patrolling the Boston Garden doesn't seem to be a bad job to have...

Camille really wanted to pet a squirrel.

Mount Auburn Cemetery to photograph the sunset. 

 

Dipping our feet and skipping stones in the Quabbin Reservoir. Showing others this beautiful spot helps me gain an appreciation for having such an amazing local gem.

Took Camille to Farley to show her my local crag. She did an awesome job and even trusted me to belay her.

Been running all over the place lately and I don't mind it one bit. Been climbing with Koti a lot. We climb at the exact same grade level and have very similar interests in climbs. I also have been to Boston a couple of times to visit some old time friends. Then I picked up Camille in Boston to hopefully show her that my home state is a cool place to live. I met Camille while traveling through Chile. She happened to be traveling through the United States and was staying in New York with a friend so it worked out perfectly. I showed her Boston, my hometown, some good hikes in the area and even managed to squeeze in some climbing. I learned a lot in return; like how to properly speak French, how to serve a baguette with every meal, and that the drink we refer to as "champagne" is incorrectly labelled, as it doesn't actually come from Champagne, France. Some good to know facts!

Busy Busy!

Finally some okay weather. 

The game where you put the 2nd bottle as far away as possible then stand up without touching the ground. There must be a name for it.

Wayne will always be the arm wrestling champion.

Leg wrestling. New game to me. I didn't do very well.

People sometimes get sleepy.

Super sleepy.

Friends, it's not that I've been slacking and haven't been thinking about you. It's that I haven't had any free time to update the blog or even look at the pictures I've taken! Please accept my sincerest apologies. Making a quick update now before I head out to meet up with former coworkers. This was from last week at Christian and Keira's house. So many people showed up and a lot of fun was had. Lots of games were played and even a few naps were taken. Parties at the Duffmand residence are one of the greatest things I missed while I was on the road and it made me very happy to be back with such great company. K, time to go make some dip, be back soon!

Heyyyyyy Jude

I've already got him reppin' Night Shift Brewery. So proud!

I don't remember the last time I held a baby. It made me anxious. Somebody slap a "Fragile" sticker on him!

Judey Poody and Mama.

Finally met my nephew! Uncle Andrew is going to influence that kid in the best ways. He'll be climbing by 3, quitting his job by 6, and discussing the hop profile of Treehouse's latest IPA by 10. Psyched!

Quincy Quarries

Nice view of Boston from the Quarry. 

Met up with the group that is going canyoneering in Zion in June. We needed to go over the various repelling techniques and make sure we're all comfortable with the process. It was my first time at Quincy Quarries and I have to admit that I have no desire to actually go climbing there. Fun to look at, not fun to climb. We then grabbed some grub and headed to Night Shift Brewery in Boston for some tasty brews. I then met up with some other friends at Bukowski's to catch up on life.