Bishop Report

Bishop is renowned for it's winter bouldering. With thousands of problems and generally stable weather it's a popular choice for those hoping to escape their cold and dark homes for some climbing in the sun. Unfortunately Bishop is not immune from freak storms that can dump snow on unsuspecting road-trippers. It was one of these unplanned storms that chased us to Joshua Tree but several days after the weather cleared we headed back to Bishop to assess the damages.

The good news was that we would be climbing, but unfortunately we had to settle for the volcanic tablelands as the granite areas were socked in. We cut our losses and made the most of the situation, accepting our fate and searching out the best problems in the Happy and Sad boulders. This being Peter's first time in Bishop he had no idea what he was missing and I tried not to taint his view of the volcanics with constant slander and comparisons to my beloved Buttermilks. We did enjoy the extra degrees of warmth you get in the volcanics and I figured worst case scenario I'd get a bitchin' tan.

In the end the volcanics weren't quite the purgatory I thought they'd be as Peter found some problems he liked, Lina went about repeating problems and wrangling with some projects, and I began trying things I've never had the skin or the motivation to try before. Some of the crappy looking "hard" problems turned out to be pretty fun and a few highballs even go on the recommended problems list.

We did get one day in the Milks but our problems were chosen for us as snow still covered the top of most boulders. Being back in the Milks made regret the 5 straight days in the volcanics that had me feeling wrecked but I still managed to flash Moonraker (an uninspiring sideways climb that was dry. thanks to David for "making" me try it) and got close on Little Forgotten and Bubba Gump. Now that I'm starting to feel in shape I'm jazzed to go back.

Peter got painfully close on Soulslinger but as you saw in the last post it ended badly.

Between my wrecked boby, Peter's flapper and a nagging elbow and shoulder for Lina it will be good to take some days off and recuperate. No better place to do that than Malibu.

Here are a couple pics from the day in the Milks.

Snowy

Peter about to get a flapper from hell

David climbs sideways on Moonraker

Bubba Gump proves a little too much for me