Leaving the Valley

We made the decision to leave Yosemite a day early as Martin has been feeling under the weather and the forecast was looking grim. It would have been nice for Martin to get another shot at Midnight Lightning but from the looks of him not much climbing will be done. There is always next time.
While Martin got the short end of the stick I left the Valley quite content. I climbed 7 out of 8 days and I managed to send the majority of my A-list problems, even scraping up two of Camp 4's most beautiful lines on my last morning (Bruce Lee and King Cobra) . There's still heaps to go back to and Yosemite is officially my new favorite place. With any luck I'll convince Lina to move there for a season as the place needs some more development.

Martin feels worse than he looks

Climbing 7 of 8 days. And this is my good hand

Greg on the El Cap boulder

Geg on King Cobra

King Cobra

Images

No trip report of Yosemite would be complete without some pics of Midnight Lightning.

Martin takes a ride on the dyno

Mike tries the Moffat start

Unsightly graffiti mars the boulder

The incredible King Cobra

A Pretty Good Off-day

The force went down first go the day after the mini-epic. I then send midnight lightning in a couple tries and was happy to see Martin actually get motivated. Mind you a motivated Martin is indiscernible from an unmotivated Martin. "I'm so psyched," he said in a monotone voice with no signs of any emotion whatsoever. I'll have to take his word for it. He did try quite a bit and is dreading the infamous mantel at the top. Hopefully today is the day.
Yesterday was supposed to be an off-day but I decided only climbing on two problems almost counts as not climbing, especially since I'd almost sent both the day before. Leroy and 6 Degrees both went down first try and very little skin was wasted. It was a pretty good off-day.

Here's a little vid of the force. We plan to put it up on crimp.se in a few day but until then....

May the Force be with you

Saturday was spent wandering around to different areas, gazing at the many gems and willing our skin to grow.
Sunday was spent epicing as my battle with "the force" took up the majority of our day (thanks to Martin, Greg, and Tim for their patience and support). After falling past the crux over and over again I walked away with hopes that I'll send first thing today. So much for preserving skin as my tips are still screaming. We'll see how it goes.

The Force

Greg on a sloppy arete

Martin on the slopy arete

Life in the Valley

Despite being dinged for $20 on a failed attempt at free camping I'm still in high spirits. The bouldering here is incredible and I'm destroyed after two days of flogging myself. Sooooo many good lines. I'm anticipating the confused looks I'll get when I say I went to Yosemite for bouldering. So it goes.

The nights are below freezing but it warms up nice and they forecast perfect temps for the foreseeable future. It's quiet here and our little 4 man crew (Martin, Greg, Tim, and myself) pretty much has the place to ourselves, but it's the weekend now so we expect an influx of pad people for the next couple days.

I don't know the names of most of the problems we've climbed but they have been of the highest quality. I've already collected a grip of problems to go back to or try for the first time. Whether or not my skin/body will hold up is yet to be seen. Life is good.

Martin on his way to the boulders

A sweet seam.

Martin

More Martin

Yosemite

Lina has left and been replaced with Martin. No offense to Martin but that is a raw deal. So while Lina works feverishly for the next few months, Martin and I plan on sampling some of the USA's finer bouldering areas (speaking of raw deals...).
Our first stop is Yosemite since favorable weather made this climbing mecca a possibility. Seems odd coming to ground zero of the climbing world and not putting on a rope, but the bouldering here is pretty spectacular.

Martin has the first of many "taco wagon" experiences

The Valley

Greg on a sweet arete

Martin on Thriller

Greg on Thriller

Horse Flats

We've been full booked with family gatherings. It has been fairly exhausting but we finally managed to branch off for a day. We drove an hour and a half into the moutains, escaping the pollution, congestion, and mayhem that is LA for two days of climbing at Horse Flats. It was hotter than expected and I never wore more than a t-shirt. Glorious. Sorry to rub that in to the folks in Sweden. It was wonderful but no quite long enough.

Downtown LA sticks up through the muck

A fun arete

Flying backmeat at 6000 feet in early Dec

A sweet crack

Warming up