Rocky Mountain National Park

Rocky Mountain National Park

So this weekend, I went to Rocky Mountain National Park. It was an awe inspiring experience, thats for sure. My partner and I arrived in Colorado at like five and went up to the trail head to the heinous hike up to the boulders. We had NO clue where we were supposed to go or where the boulders were. But we saw a guy with a pad and asked him if he could show up. He ended up being Nick Duttle, (he's done Esperanza (V14) in Hueco Tanks National Park) and he guided us up to Lower Chaos. But we went up at 5..... So we arrive at the boulders and warm up on some weird thing, do a V7 that felt like a four, then headed off to a really cool boulder. The boulder had an 11 called Bush Pilot that had a hard start move into an awkward aerate. Nick was projecting Freaks Of The Industry, a James Litz boulder problem. He worked that until it got dark enough to motivate him to leave, and we hiked out with 5 minutes of daylight left. As we hiked on, the light died a lot. It made it really hard to see, but you could see a white-ish glow of the rocks on the path and a dark spot in between them, so you could kind of see where you stepped. One thing that was awesome about hiking in RMNP at night was the starry sky. It was a humbling feeling looking up seeing the crimson sky with all the stars and the silhouette of the mountains in the background. After what seemed like an hour long hike, my partner and I made it back to the parking lot. We drove back to Estes and tried to find a place to camp. We barley found one in a campground that was full, but we snuck in, woke up, and snuck out without paying. The next day, we went up for a full day of climbing. We warmed up at the same boulder, no big deal, then we went on to Tommy's Aerate, a 14 move boulder problem going up an overhung prow. It was long, but fun! Two cool pinches, a huge jug rest, and a scary landing. I sent after maybe 10 tries, and my friend worked it with all his might. But then it got a little crowded, and he lost his psyche, so we moved on. The next boulder we went to had The Centaur, a Dave Graham V12 or 13, but it also had an 8 called Gang Bang, and a 9 called Handicaps, and an 11 I think. We worked on Gang Bang most of the time. It was also on an over hung prow like thing, but the moves and holds were harder. The move that was most intriguing was a throw to a sloper. You would go from two crimps, and a slick foot, throw, hit the sloper and you have to fight a helicopter swing.

Gang Bang V8

Once you control the swing, you have to do something with your foot, which is hard, because there ARE NONE!! But I found one I had to press hard on, but I could make the next move. I tried a lot to get it, but I worked all the moves all the way to sticking the sloper and the dish next to it. But I could never get my foot up on to a hold after sticking the two holds. After a bit, more people came so we left. We drove to town, and ate at Ed's cantina. There were two girls that we met earlier at Tommy's Aerate that worked there, so we got a little special treatment. I had a DELICIOUS cheeseburger that made me a very content boy. When we were done, we tried to find a place to camp, but all the camping areas were full or too expensive, so we decided to head to Casper. I fell in love with RMNP, and would loooove to go back sometime.