This is the first night that I slept all the way through. I jumped out of bed so excited to climb finally we are here, I have been dreaming of this place since last year when I saw the article in 'climbing mag' that Cedar had written about the NorthFace team. I am happy to report this place is fucking huge, endless in every direction. Really the only problem with this place is that it is so big access can take hours of hiking but it is worth every step.
Right off the bat we meet this American guy Tom, that Jenn and Nick had met earlier in their travels while in Asia. He takes us up to the top of the pass to Rocklands proper. This area hosts most of the problems that I have seen pictures of including 'Nutsa' 8a+ this amazing over hanging bulge. This place is stacked with amazing problems of every grade. The great part about rocklands is that you can climb any grade all day long. I warm up slaying problems left and right so happy like a kid in a candy shop. I don't know how many times the words this is amazing roll off my tongue, but it never gets old. Because of the endless boulders only the three star problems have been choked up there is no need to climb anything but. Down the way a few meters I stumble apon the ultra classic 'Roof on fire' I have seen many shots of Lisa and Fred Nicole on this problem. I am so psyched to try this thing. Its just as good as it looks in the videos and climbs even better then I could of imagine on incut crimpers completely upside down.
The Next day we go to the boulders near the campground. Its the weekend and I am excited to see many other boulders. Good because there is no guide book for rocklands just a few spotty topos that people of jumbled together. I few minutes later I am sprayed down with beta and can hardly remember any of them. Ok I'll try this 7b 'Poison Dwarf' that a few others are trying. I get the flash. We wander through the boulders to another 7b called Minky this thing is amazing. completely horizontal on big sloping edges absolutely beautiful. Its nice have a possie of boulders one for the gym of mats and two for the increase in beta. One of the French kids jumps on and flashes. "How did you do that" we all say because this thing is super beta intensive including knee bars and weird sequence toe hooks. I saw a video he said. Still I am impressed many goes later I finally send. Man that thing was super hard for me.
We head up to another area called arch valley. Very apropriate because the problems climb through and around the many arches that snake through the land scape like a sea serpent. Speaking of snakes I hope I never see any. By this time after completing many of the problems here my fingers are red and very sore its time to be done. I need some rest and I need to grow some skin.
Its Bills Last day so we head for Capetown. This is a good chance to get food and rest But I can't wait to be back.
Our cottage is very nice and huge there are six beds in the whole place and plenty of room for us to not get cabin feaver in the next seven weeks.
I've got my eye on many hard problems and Hopefully I will send an 8a during this trip that is the goal.

We are all one happy family

Well to ease our troubles tristen and his friends cooked us a wonderful dinner and we all sat swapping climbing stories. Still wondering what is happening to nick but a little more hopeful then before. Aparently nick is in Botswana and is in the hosptiality of high ranking members of the country, residing on president rd. Nick is being escorted around in style between bars and safaries. Nick texts Tristen that he has arriving at 3 o'clock the following day and that everything is alright. We are enjoying ourselves aswell. We know we have to get Bill at the airport the next morning early, so we hit the hay exausted but optimistic about tomorrow. Luckily Bill is waiting for us happily eating fruit at a nice eatery. SO we have a day to kill. We head down the cape early so far all we have seen of South Africa is bustling modern city, houseing projects, third world bungalos made of corigated metal sheets. THis is crazy I have never seens such a place. Happy to get out of the urban areas we head south along the ocean scurting table mountain. Huge sand stone cliffs line the ocean where massive waves break along the pristine shore. Passing small fishing towns we make our way south. Changing the radio constantly cause the music here sucks. But we are happy no music could change that. We arive in Simons town a touristy town that hosts a colony of penguins. After enjoying the sites food and penguins we head further south. The landscape is so bizare down here. ocean on both sides with massive towering domes of chossy rock and bushes capped with mist that appears in thin air. further south still. Well actualy i'm making this sound like we drove a long way but in actuality the end of the cape is only an hour south of Cape Town. But anyways down the cape we go. We get out of the car a walk up the ridge to the light house down below a thousand feet, waves slam against the coast on all sides but north obviously. This is great at the end of the world with every language being spoken around us. Its getting closer to 3 when nick gets in so we head back to the airport. on the way back we take the eastern coast through surfing towns. Eventually we are just south of the airport but we can't figure out how to get across the 3rd world country the sprawls for ever infront of us. These are called townships. In reality this is not the safest place we could be, but this isn't our concern we are just trying to get accross. none of these roads are on the map. So we head through the townships. I have never seen a place like this. People walking everywhere cooking on the side of the streets. small little bungalos same corigated houses,20 by 20 feet. SO crazy. so many people everywhere. everyhouse is thrown together and everyhouse is every color you can imagine bring yellow,marine, easter green every color and all right on top of eachother with people pouring out of ever door way washing clothes cooking food playing soccer. so i guess bad things happen here but during the day your more or less ok. but we made we are alive. so now we are all together we have booked a place to stay for tomorrow night in montegu which is our next destination. until then cheers as they say here.

Capetown

made it to capetown. After 26 hours I arrived in capetown minus nick. After many hours of excited conversation Nick and I arrived in Joberg SA. I made it through customs to look back and see Nick walking with some guy in uniform towards a door. they dissapear. I get the bags thinking nothing. i can't even imagine what could of happen. I collect our bags and crashpads. and sit down on all of them. Damn this is comfortable, but where the hell is nick. I wait for 20 minutes and finally think something has happen. I inquire at the customs desk as to where my friend has been taken. Two ladies who don't care at all give me a few words like "don't know and hold on." after a few minutes of asking i am given a phone. "hello" I say. the lady on the other end says nick didn't have blah blah something something, hes not coming." I try to get anything out of her, like where is he. nothing. so i hang up comletely confused as to what the hell i am going to do. Some how as I am walking back to my bags a man walks by me and i don't even remember how This works but some how i figure out he is helping nick. I say I am his friend and that I am looking for him. He is very nice and seems to care. He says nick cannot get into the country because he didn't have room in his passport for the visa stamp. WHAT. he is flying to Botswana to try and get more pages added to his passport. he hands me a letter scribbled by nick ment for Jenn. On the papper is Tristens number, walker doesn't know whats happening I love you and i'm sorry. I figure i should head on to capetown and that there is nothing i can do. AFter walking from desk to desk checking my bags and getting them weighed getting money exchanged I eventually board the flight to capetown. I sit down and ask the guy next to me is he from capetown. he says yes, what are you doing here he says. I am here to climb I say. Oh he says. he is a climber as well and gives me beta. I arrive in capetown collect my things and stumble around hoping that Tristen is there and will recognize me. He does right off. hes wearing a 'mad rock' jacket and says he has talked to nick. Man am I happy to see him. Wow we speed off to his house where I log on and somehow nick is online, we chat and he tells me to continue as planned and he will hopefuly be there soon. This morning i went to the airport to get Jenn luckily she is there. Wow someone else to be with this is good. I feel better about this situation. We rent a car and head for downtown to the waterfront. ANd here i am. enjoying the sights and still waiting to see what is happening with nick.

off to Africa so ecstatic

Its too bad the season is over for Jailhouse cause I was just getting into it, oh well next fall. Anyway I had some fun and hopefully got some fitness. I got on misdemeanor which I liked except for the beginning and a handful of other climbs that I had been on before. Soap, line up, and supreme. And nice send to Jamie on fugitive! It got me kinda psyched up to start sport climbing, so i'll have to seek out some sport climbing in rocklands. I hear they got climbing on plasma orange rock that is super killa.

This is a new area in Yosemite for bouldering, there are as of now about 15 problems. The main cave area is the crown of the area, but there are some other interesting chalked up lines including an arete, some cave crawling and side pull throwing. My buddy Matt found this place a few weeks back. He cleaned off the obvious line out of the cave. I snagged the first ascent shortly after. The area is dubbed the Garden and I named the line out of the cave, Black widow. The direct finish aka. Black mamba, which I did today makes this line much more complete. I would say it goes at somewhere V9ish.
Directions: about .5 miles past camp four headed west on the right: Past the crystals is a large rock slide on your right when this ends, this is also the end of the manure pile buttress. There is a pull out on the left. In the future you can park here, but for now the road is closed. Walk directly across the street towards a stump with a rock placed on it. Angle slightly left and the cave area is bout 300 feet back.

Its funny how climbing can make other things in your life so insignificant. Yesterday my friend Brandon and I hiked to the top of Yosemite falls and repelled down into the notch of lost arrow spire. We had been planning on doing something a little out of our comfort zone for the last few weeks, but it kept getting pushed back. So finally we made it happen. As I said before, I have been in Yosemite valley for most of the last two months, making 200 miles dashes to the bay area for work and a few showers. But the weather has changed and the bouldering season is over. Each day is hotter then the last. Even waking up as early as possible, lets say seven, is not enough time to warm up and give projects enough attention before it is too hot and your greassing off holds unable to cool down your hands. I returned to the valley 5 days ago thinking that I could send thriller. I had stuck the
ice cream hold a few times the week before and was anxious to continue progress. But small windows of cool temps weren't enough and together with my ever worsening skin I said to my self next fall I'll come back stronger and try again.

SO the spire. the first pitch is fine its not very exposed and its pretty straight forward with a lot of fix bolts. I came around the last bit and peered up the off-width crack to see Brandon's smiling face, he just laughed as I got used to jummaring with my ascenders scraping the inside of the crack. I pulled my self onto the small ledge and Brandon set off on the next pitch. Aiding is slow, so I got pretty bored at each belay and even the adrenaline was wearing off as I fed rope out once every minute or so (at least thats what it felt like, I had no watch). I threw a baseball sized rock off the ledge and watched it plummet forever until it exploded at the base followed by a small pop seconds later. Finally after about an hour of sitting at the belay, the rope was pulled taught and a few jerks on the end of the line was my cue that he had made it to the top. I Gathered up the slings and beaners and inched my way along the ledge. As I came around the corner of the ledge the rock sheared off for 2000 feet straight down, with my feet dangling and the ends of the ropes flicking in the wind I snapped a few pictures. This was by far the most exposed I had ever been. I mean sport climbing can be scary but not when your just hanging on the end of the rope. At this point I remembered a joke that this guy in camp four told around a fire. why is sport climbing and getting your dick sucked by some guy the same? It feels good at first but then you look down and think this is kinda gay. I guess theres something to be said about big air. Anyway back to the wall I got my head on and started jugging up as quickly as possible but still very cautious for I had no idea of what kind of limits there are with all this gear. Scraping over the slab I gain the mattress sized summit, Still Brandon smiling. pheww!!! a big sigh of relief as I sit down on solid ground. But quickly I am reminded that we still have to tyrolean back across. Now comes the exciting part. Brandon pulls the rope that I have been trailing since the repel into the notch, tight. He sets off, hes not smiling. A bit of holding your breath and he's across. Now its my turn unfortunately my set up is not very advanced and the traverse seems to be ten times harder for me. Now that I look back I realize I needed my ascenders on one rope instead of on on each side. I was struggling trying to not let fear in, occasionally I would steal a glance at the ground thousands of feet straight below me. Just a few more feet and I can touch the rock, not that I am safer but your brain works in funny ways. I grovel up the slab exhausted my arms burning, until now my brain has been firing adrenaline like crazy trying to keep me alive but now that I have my feet planted on the ground I feel the burn, its sooo good. nothing in the world matters, I am alive and it is over.

FIrst blog, well i thought I should keep a blog running for those of you who are interested to see what I am up to. I don't know how much i can update once i leave for africa but if its a possibility then...

Well today I went to Jailhouse, man that place always kicks my ass. I guess i never have really given it a chance, it always seems to be a spontaneous decision to go every couple of months and it never seems i am in good route condition. But compared to last time i was there It seemed much easier. Even though i have been bouldering for the last 4 months getting on some routes felt great. My skin needed a break I have been batteling a craked tip ever since a tried 'bruce lee' two weeks ago, so i decided some smooth jug pulling could do me some good. It was a beautiful day in california a little too hot for climbing but better then trying to hold on to some v+ yosemite slopers. One thing that I always try and work on and something only recently that I have been able to improve is remembering beta. I was surprise today when I flowed up Soap and it all came back to me, I haven't been on that thing in months. But it felt great to get super pumped and take a few whippers. Another highlight for those who know, Mike A. sent I thinks its called whipping boy. I know he's been working on that thing foreverrrr. So congrats thats one for La Honda.
For the last two months I have been going to Yosemite and bouldering a lot. There are some amazing new problems and hundreds more waiting to be found. After ticking off many quality problems I have been committed on sending Thriller. I have been eying this problem ever since I first saw it this winter. A few weeks ago I witnessed Natasha Barnes send thriller and I decided I wanted to send that thing too. SO Thriller. Its hard, seems way harder then anything else I have ever done. But this was expected. THe trouble with working a route in yosemite and in general is the ever changing conditions. Lately the valley has been a little on the warm side. so waiting all day for good temps is difficult, SO I have been exploring the valley combing the woods in search of new boulder problems. It surprising how many blank boulders there are. but it makes it that much better when you find something worth trying. During the last few days I have been working on thriller with Sam Edwards. the Sam from Australia who FAed goldfish trombone, Bishop. It has been educational hanging with someone who has been climbing for so many years, and its good motivation not to fall so I don't look too weak. anyway hope thriller goes down wednesday its suppose to be 45 degrees and I gave fresh skin.
Until africa hope all of you make it to the valley for some bouldering.