New and Experienced Climbers over 50 #43

Daniel Shivelywrote:

I’m on the 2, great fun problem. Green wall center is a favorite too, a Bachar Classic. 

Yeah those tall boulders are cool!

Haven’t tried Magnetic North so don’t know. My projecting days have been replaced by familiar circuits. I’m wayyyy to addicted to road cycling and mountain days now and my legs are heavy and my arms are weak. So it goes. 

I'm in the prep phase for obsessing on cycling. I have a decent road bike that Ill use more once I've completely trashed my knees running and my elbows, shoulders and pulleys climbing! 

I hope to stay with bouldering at least until my 15 year old goes to college or as long as she enjoys it. It's some of the happiest times I have:

Recorded my 16th successful summit of Monkey Face last Friday.

Then led my first 10 outdoors at Smith on Saturday. mountainproject.com/route/1…  Not a clean send, but the first 10 I have ever attempted to lead outdoors so feels like something. Hard to switch from leader must not fall mode on blocky 5.6 trad into the headspace of overhung sport.

2026 climbing season is starting well for this 57 year old.

Daniel Shivelywrote:

That looks like some beautiful terrain! I bet those sporty gravel bikes are perfect and nimble for that single track. 

Have you ridden Tuolumne bike only day? It’s a real treat being in there with no auto traffic. Should be coming up in the next few weeks. It’s usually the day before the pass officially opens. 

Never knew about it. Sounds like a great time to ride up Tioga Pass.

Near Big Sur.   

Looks like everybody is out having fun and it’s not even summer vacation yet.  I got a week off by myself and have taken some real care to fit in everything I’ve been missing.  I hope I can do this more often.

First thing I took myself to Il Fornaio for a great Italian meal.

I had a great long lunch with my daughter Erin always spent hours catching up on everything. That’s the biggest blessing of the week.

I had my heart set on visiting Nvidia so I may just 3 1/2 hour drive to the Bay Area before realizing they probably won’t let me in. Not only could I not go in but I wasn’t even supposed to walk the perimeter of these magnificent starship buildings.  Incredible minds and incredible science just ooze from places like this.

How I made a few phone calls I would have known that Google, Intel and Apple are just a few miles from each other and I’ll have open campuses and visiting areas so next time.

I took a long hike by the American River this morning. This was my home and still feels like it.

My favorite swimming hole… I was so grateful that the water was too cold because I didn’t bring a suit and I would’ve felt cheated. But I just sat by the water for a couple of hours and enjoyed this wonderful place. California poppies and lupine are growing everywhere.

We don’t really have nurseries in the desert. At least nothing top notch like Eisley’s, which is a master class in nurseries. I told Tony I was going to buy some of everything and stuff it in the way back even if I never plant it. I’ll be back tomorrow to actually make good on that promise. 

I watched the fourth and final episode of the dark wizard about Dean Potter and felt so much better about the whole series. Who is Dean Fidelman? I like him a lot.

I paid $5.49 gallon today, and felt like I was getting a helluva deal.

This is fecking ridiculous.

As I was driving to Bishop yesterday, the passes sign was showing 120 OPEN!

It was the best of times; it was the worst of times:

It was a beautiful day climbing but I seem to have a low grade virus of some kind. I was lightheaded and slightly feverish and weak as a kitten. Vertical was quite manageable as that’s all technique but as soon as I got on anything steep I was trembling all over. Since I train steep at the gym I have a pretty good idea of what I can climb outside and I was way off. Despite feeling poorly, we managed 7 routes, which was a good day  

But the horror

Was

TICKS!

I pulled one off that was crawling up my upper arm, pulled one crawling up my pant leg, and then on the drive out removed one that was crawling on the back of my neck! WTF! This is a personal record.

https://youtube.com/shorts/fyaVzEk6XxE?si=yNgwd1Gea5nQ3HW0

We did some hiking today. About 5 miles milling around. The Castle Rock state park part of City of Rocks. Super nice! Climbed a dinky bit yesterday, I think I managed to struggle up 15-20 feet, lol! Not climbing for more than a year, then spending almost half a year on restricted calories....yeah, gotta try harder to actually haul my sorry ass into the gym. Like you, Lori, I'm optimistic I still have a shot at, well, better than this. Or, like you said, just give up. But shit, then I'd be a normal specimen of old ladydom in 'Murica, and that's just a big no thank you, lol!

Helen

Oh, and pulled a tick off my friend's neck here, too. Still just crawling, thank god. Not an extraction.

Been enjoying this planet setting each night, out my "bedroom" window. Aka the rear window of the Honda CRV. 

Looks like a great meal Lori!

Today I went for a walk after ‘working from home’. I’m SO unmotivated to work in light of world affairs and my age. Finances are hard due to ‘you know who’ fucking up world affairs (also, pay for your own fucking ballroom ya kunt) but I’m much better off than many.

My guess is this post may not last and be taken down due to the poor spelling.

https://youtu.be/SE6zB929xz8?si=aCRgPqeAlhAfyOPr

Our KKKountry is definitely on a downward spiral, we left too many children behind. 

The real question is does our downward spiral spin the opposite way down under?

apogeewrote:

I paid $5.49 gallon today, and felt like I was getting a helluva deal.

This is fecking ridiculous.

But the orange one was on TV yesterday and said gas prices are way down so clearly you are mistaken.

Circle K had gas sales yesterday,  I saw a half mile traffic jam at one station,  folks idling for an hour to save a few bucks... 4.59 is the average here and going up daily.  Go figure,  the sale price was 4.20 and there was a dispensary next-door 

Accroche toi (sit)
Rocher de Potala, Fontainebleau 

$8.89/gallon today in France. (1.995€/litre)

The worst I saw driving to WV and back from VT was $6.17 for diesel . Diesel seems to have leveled out a $5.99 here in VT this week...  Cold and gray. Got the woodstove running. 

I’m looking at climbing options closer to home. That’s fine. I don’t need to travel to find recreation. Weaning off of fossil fuels is a good idea. 

Todd Berlierwrote:

I'm in the prep phase for obsessing on cycling. I have a decent road bike that Ill use more once I've completely trashed my knees running and my elbows, shoulders and pulleys climbing! 

I hope to stay with bouldering at least until my 15 year old goes to college or as long as she enjoys it. It's some of the happiest times I have:

That’s an incredible boulder.  Enjoy it all!

Just returned from a road trip to Kernville. Saw diesel at $7.89. Prolly a lot of diesel vans that aren’t road tripping much these days.

The guy who greenlit this war has no idea how to get out of it, and the agreements that are floating back and forth in negotiations right now are devoid of the pivotal issues: opening Hormuz, and ending Iran’s nuclear ambitions. Nonetheless, it will certainly be touted as a ‘victory’, and many millions will believe it, hook, line & sinker.

It is astonishing to consider the cognitive dissonance at play in the minds of many millions of voters who continue to support the ‘architect’ of this chaos.

apogeewrote:

Just returned from a road trip to Kernville. Saw diesel at $7.89. Prolly a lot of diesel vans that aren’t road tripping much these days.

The guy who greenlit this war has no idea how to get out of it, and the agreements that are floating back and forth in negotiations right now are devoid of the pivotal issues: opening Hormuz, and ending Iran’s nuclear ambitions. Nonetheless, it will certainly be touted as a ‘victory’, and many millions will believe it, hook, line & sinker.

It is astonishing to consider the cognitive dissonance at play in the minds of many millions of voters who continue to support the ‘architect’ of this chaos.

I don't think it's cognitive dissonance. Trump lies about almost everything but he's been consistent about racism, bigotry and grievance. Sure there were/are some low info people who voted for him because they thought he would be good on inflation or the economy and he's losing them but the core base cares about other things.

apogeewrote:

Just returned from a road trip to Kernville. Saw diesel at $7.89. Prolly a lot of diesel vans that aren’t road tripping much these days.

Word! 

Paid $7.49 when I filled up the TADMOBL a couple days ago. This time of year, the wife Mo and I usually take a month-long road trip to bucket list destinations like last year's trip to the Canadian Rockies and BC. This year with diesel prices what they are, Thanks Donnie, we've decided to make short trips closer to home. 

Daniel Shivelywrote:

That’s an incredible boulder.  Enjoy it all!

The climbing on the northern California coast is fantastic. The views are stunning. Rock quality not so much (more friable and sandy then red rocks). No crowds and short approaches.

I feel like I do a good job of being present and cherishing my time with my family.

This video is me doing a traverse into the problem my daughters doing and almost losing my phone to a wave!

Edit: the key beta for sandstone coastal climbing is to brush the holds (soft boars hair!) first, especially the top out holds. It's unsettling to be pumped 15 feet above the pads and sandy holds for a mantle.