Morning view at the Rock Ranch.


Today was the first day climbing at the tanks, and thanks to some friends made along the way, we got to go in with a guided tour of certain areas of the park you can only access with a guide. Thanks again Jackie!
While waiting in line at the front gate to the park, I recognized a van with British Columbia plates, and upon further investigation found not one familiar face, but three! Israel, Tim, and Moses. Otherwise known as the 'Crushers of Squamish'. Three more faces you might be seeing a bit more of over the next few months. With the yearly migration of climbers going south in the winter and north for the summer, it's almost impossible to go somewhere without seeing someone you met in some remote part of the world doing the exact same thing, climbing.

Now I give you today on the East Mountain and the East Mountain Spur.



Ended up that 2 friends of mine from Squamish, Jackie Sequeira and Cody Cox, Happen to be down in Hueco for 2 weeks climbing with some of their buddies from Austin, two of which stomped David and I's asses in foosball last night in the barn at the Rock Ranch.Lucky for us, Jackie happens to be a guide at Hueco Tanks, and managed to get us access to the 'guided tours only' sections of the park with the rest of their buddies on a day where we probably wouldn't have even been able to get in at all due to the fact that we didn't have any reservations, and the first come first served availabilities were gone long before we arrived. Headed out for a quick warm-up in the east mountain, followed by a long and equally as enjoyable session on the classic 'Moonshine roof', which has some of the most amazing features I've seen on a rock! Huge, easy and fun moves to this large prow feature running the entire length of the roof that you pretty much bear hug until you decide you're ready to try and top out. Every movement feels even better than the last, so just pick a problem and go, there's no way you won't enjoy it!

After that, we trekked down to the east mountain spur and put in a good, serious session on another of the many Hueco classics, The Egg. this line has got one of the most ridiculous, yet fun start's I've ever encountered. Jam your right knee into a hole that it shouldn't fit in, then use that and two horrible undercling slopers to pull your bodyweight off the ground. If that's not enough for ya, the first move is to fire with your right hand about 4 feet out and up from where you're hanging from, with one knee and one hand, on the bottom of this bulbous chunk of rock. Then comes the tension. Lots and lots of tension while you traverse on non existent slopers with an ever-slipping toe hook only to come to the crux of the problem, hand/heal match and move into a shoulder wrenching series of gastons and laybacks, only to pop off because you're too tired from a full day of bouldering at Hueco Tanks. That's how it goes though! If ya can't get strong at Hueco, ya might wanna take up ping-pong, which is also conveniently offered in the barn at the Hueco Rock Ranch!

All in all, it was a pretty good first day at the Tanks! I'm excited, at least. I leave you now with the sun setting behind the east mountain. Not a bad day at all!

Christmas came and Christmas went, now the only thing left to do is post pictures of the little tikes and start doing crunches in hopes of shedding a few of the pounds I managed to acquire over the brief stay with an obsessive cook.









And here's a few shots from a hidden problem at Little Rock City in Chattanooga.





Now, here at 12:35 am on December 28th, we set off on the next leg of our journey. 1291 miles to go before we reach our New Years destination, Hueco Tanks in El Paso Texas. Olé!

Mr Tyler Willcutt a mere fraction of a second after missing the hold on Godfather. Hold your breath buddy, the grounds coming quick!

Two days of cold weather, one a great deal colder (and further north) than the other...

There's no place like Horse Pens for the holidays...







And here's Daniel and I laying down Odd Job! Well, our combined efforts would've led to a top out... Nothing worse than popping off the top over and over, only to have to walk away without the send simply because you're fingertips are bleeding. I'd like to thank Daniel for the shots of me, Thanks Daniel!

Today was a good day at the citadel! Sendfest 09 with a high of 48! David and Josh sent Earl the Squirrel (hard), Naize impressed us all when he laid down the snail (hard) on his flash attempt, I managed to get 2 entirely new and equally as hard problems, and then Josh made it to the finishing jugs on big papa (very hard) only to be too pumped out from a full day of bouldering to finish! Next time, Josh. Next time. Point of the post- Very good day today! Now it's back to chattanooga for some well earned showers, then more rocktown!


Josh- Earl the Squirrel


Naize-The Snail (flashed)


Josh-Big Papa

Even this guy had a great day, eating bread and peanut butter and all that good stuff!

A good number of miles have been covered over the past few days. On Thursday, we left Asheville for Chattanooga, left Chattanooga for Rocktown, Georgia on Friday, Now we just left Rocktown for The Citadel in Fort Payne, Alabama, only to return to Rocktown tomorrow evening, then head back to Chattanooga a few days after that! The lack of order at this point doesn't really make too much sense, but at least the blog's seeing all sorts of cameo's! I now give you Chrissy in Chatty and her amazing dancing hoops!







Now from yesterday and today, including a snowy morning session at Rocktown with Joseph, Shelton and Slidell











Just realized I didn't get any 'good shots' of Shelton or Joseph, and I have a hard time posting bad shots, so the photo of Slidell will just have to represent all of them. Now, it's time for the evening festivities, then climbing tomorrow with another moothead celebrity. What's that? Who is it, you say? I guess you'll just have to wait and find out!

Today we explored the boulder field out on the east side of the Bald. I'd like to thank the Asheville crew for the guidance and the pad coverage, Thanks guys! Probably would have never even found half of the lines you guys put us on today, and I can truly say that they were some of the best problems i've seen yet!













Thanks again guys! Hope to see ya out there again real soon!

Here's a few from today. Ended up taking quite a few more abstract shots than normal ones. Gotta be a little creative at some point or another.

Today, being Thanksgiving, we decided to give thanks to Rumbling Bald, and what better way to do that than by climbing all over it's gorgeous granite spires and slabs! David was the most thankful of all today, proven by providing a blood offering! By showing this extreme devotion, David is now eligible for the Thanksgiving Award, which will consist of one hot shower at the facility of his choice, one apple fritter from Starbucks, and a bandaid, not one of the boring ones, but a designer leopard print bandaid. Tastefully tacky. Good luck David! Our winner will be announced at midnight.







Now, off to the pre-awards party with some of our new friends in Aheville...

The town of Chimney Rock, just outside of Asheville, is a gorgeous place with just about anything you could ask for, except a coffee shop and cheap camping. Due to that fact, we are camping in 'stealth mode' as not to draw attention and hanging out at the Ingles deli to charge up electronics and do important Internet business, such as download free movies and see what everybody's doing on facebook.



The lack of any 'legal' place to set up shop and call home for the month hasn't detoured us away from the primary goal of bouldering as hard as we can, as much as we can. We've been hitting up The Bald as much as possible, taking in all the sights and putting up chalk where there was none. We're not letting the 'homelessness' affect us in any way, shape or form. When we need to eat, we simply go into town and set up the stove on the picnic tables. Sure, the tourist look at us funny for cooking on a gas stove in the park beside a diner, but when all's said and done, we're the one's who are actually getting out there, off the beaten path, and seeing the things that they wouldn't even know existed had we not gone out there, taken pictures and sold them to the brochure company! VIVA LA DIRTBAGS!!!

Ran into some familiar faces from Squamish and Hueco here in Kentucky on Thursday. Ended up having another Bulldog session with them, and it looks like both our crews are pretty much headed in the same direction, so these faces might be popping up on this page from time to time.



Over the past few weeks at The Red, we've started to develop a routine to climbing hard on the weekdays, and resting up on Saturday and Sunday, when the gorge is packed full of the weekend warriors. To pass the time today, we headed up into the east gorge to check out Sky Bridge, Half Moon and Chimney Rock. Here's some shots of each, minus Half Moon. Gonna start the day tomorrow with some sunrise shots of that, and those'll be much better than any I got today.







And here's one of the many nightly activities... punching the fire. Next trick, juggling coals...