Very excited to be brewing a chocolate rye stout. Put together the ingredient list myself based upon a similar recipe I found online. I hope it comes out good! We'll see in about 7 weeks.
It snowed almost the entire day while I was brewing. That's totally unacceptable.
Been a bit quiet out here, eh? My apologies. Spent the last 5 days in Boston trying to play catch-up. Saw lots of great people, drank plenty of great beer, and got a little rowdy.
Backyard skate ramps...
Jake's bar was getting rid of some old, water-damaged goods. This included 5 bottles of grain alcohol. Far more fun and healthy to make fire with it, rather than drinking it.
With a full kitchen I've decided that I want to try and ferment everything. I've started with yogurt (with fresh raspberries from the garden) and kombucha. I don't even know if I like kombucha, but it intrigues me. Next up: a coffee rye stout and sourdough bread.
Not only are my friends all still working, but they're all renovating too. Helped out a tiny bit with Christian and Keira on their siding and then Mike and Liza with their new home. Manual labor in exchange for food is right up my alley!
Rumney is starting to get a bit cold! Woke up to frost on the windshield on Saturday.
Matt, Koti and I had a great Saturday session climbing hard stuff and losing skin.
But, not without first stopping in Madison to see Jenna. T'was great catching up and taking in some Wisconsin culture before it gets blisteringly cold there.
The goal was to surprise people once I got home. First stop was my Dad's annual Spike It For Life volleyball tournament which raises money for breast cancer care. The whole family was there and successfully surprised them all.
Then surprised some friends at one of their awesome camping trips at the Northfield cabin.
And since then, I've basically been climbing nonstop while the weather in New England is perfect for climbing up rocks and coming back down.
Here's Koti on the very heady (but awesomely fun and exposed) climb Jolt [5.10] at Rumney. The foliage is unreal right now.
I also went to Great Barrington with Tim and Steve. I very unexpectedly sent my first outdoor V7 boulder and Steve was awesome enough to capture it on film! Boy does it feel good to be back home for a bit.
My buddy Aaron invited a bunch of people to go camping and climbing near his family's property in South Platte, CO. The climbing was awesome and the entire area is super beautiful.
Nice foggy morning.
Camping is always made better with a bunch of sparklers.
The next day we spent some time exploring the rocks on Aaron's property and establishing new routes. I put up my first ever first ascent. It was a really cool crack that we thought felt like 5.10b and I called it "Up From Here".
