J-Tree '07

I had been looking forward to this trip for quite a while...
Good weather, good company, good rocks, breath taking night skies, and tons of sleep...
Just what I needed after the last couple of stressful months...

I left the Bay Area last Sunday around 3pm after picking up Emily and Paul. The original plan was to leave at 2:30, but it took a little longer to stuff all the camping and climbing gear plus the food for three people into my Celica :-) We managed it though!

We arrived at the group campsite at Sheep Pass just after 11:30pm. Although I brought a tent this time around I didn't bother putting it up, given the temperatures in the 60's. Setting up camp was pretty quick, I was tucked in my sleeping bag by midnight.

The next morning we met up with Sam and headed over to the Lost Horse area. Sam led Dung Fu, Overseer and Feltoneon Physics which I followed. I led White Lighting being followed by Sam. Contend with climbing four pitches we returned to the campsite around sunset. After dinner and some chatting with the rest of the gang it was back to the sleeping back.

Tuesday I climbed with Ian in the Hidden Valley campground area. We started at Toe Jam, which I led, Ian followed and Emily TR'd. Next was Buissionier(?)...Ian led, I followed. The descent was quite interesting... The rappel sling mentioned in the guidebook seemed pretty nasty to get to, as did the 'walk-off'. We decided to look around for some other rappel anchors, which we found on the top of the formation. It ended up being a quite interesting rappel, since I couldn't see the ends of the rope from the top due to the overhang over which I would have to go. Well I had tied knots in the ends, so I knew it would be safe. Clearing the overhang I found myself free hanging pretty far away from the wall, where I spotted another anchor...Wondering if that was the actual anchor, which would provide to reach the ground I tried to reach for it...
Well...there is something as conservation of momentum, I started spinning and had nowhere to reach to stop. I still couldn't spot the ends of the rope, but there was a big ledge about 40 feet below, so I continued to rap... Once on the ledge I could see the ropes touch the ground...That was it...Quite the exciting rappel, stretching my 70m rope...
After this adrenaline pumping intermezzo we went over to Overhang Bypass, where I led the first pitch and Ian finished the second pitch.
After another four pitch day it was back to camp...
The next day Sam and I climbed 'Walk on the wild side', which also had an exciting descent. This time around we decided to walk off, which involved some interesting route finding and some nice down climbing sections. It was a fun adventure though.
We ended up at DQ Wall, after checking out Echo Rock, which was super crowded. On DQ we did Mr. Misty Kiss and Frozen Cone... both were more like face climbs than cracks...but it was nice to have the crack for protection. :-)

Thursday morning we headed back to the Bay Area, since I had come down with a pain in my right ear during the night...I guess I should have used that tent after all...Well, it was an awesome trip no matter what.