TAG '09

Bonfire and party Saturday Night


Howard's Waterfall

Stephen's Gap




October 8-11
We drove up to TAG thursday. Joey and Aimee couldn't come up till Friday night after work. We set-up camp with the Nashville Grotto and Will and his friend Carolyn stayed by us. It was rainy and dreary all weekend so that put a damper on the partying but the caving was good. On Friday Jason, Will, Carolyn and I went to Steven's Gap and did some rappelling. We got there just as another group was leaving and rigged the keyhole. Not long after about 20 people showed up so they had to rig in on the other side. Will and Carolyn didn't have any verticle gear and Carolyn has done rock climbing but no SRT so we took turns sharing gear and I helped get them on rope and Jason took pics and was available for a bottom belay if need at the pedastal. The second time Will rapped down his beard got stuck in the rack. Luckily it was at the bottom. Jason had his knife out and was about to give him a haircut when he realized Will just needed to stand up and undo the rack. Jason got behind him and lifted him up so he could get unstuck. Catastrophe avoided.
It started raining just as we were leaving and severe weather was moving in. We had perfect timing all day.
Saturday Jason went with Joey and the Nashville crowd to Mystery Falls. He said it was really cool. It is 290 feet deep and is the deepest pit in TN. It has water flowing through the cave and there is a dam built before the pit with a gate so you can dam the pipe up and then release it when the pressure gets built up. I think we need to go back so I can do it! Aimee, Will, Carolyn and I went to Howards Waterfall and did a easy horizontal trip.

Red Rocks

November 5-10
On our last climbing trip to Moab Carl, the owner of the guide company we used, turned us onto Red Rocks just outside Las Vegas so we hired him to guide us. We flew out to Vegas on Thursday morning and Carl picked us up at the airport and took us straight out to Red Rocks so we could start climbing. We went to the "second pullout" and climbed the "magic school bus" area. We did two 5.8 climbs and a 5.9. As the sun was setting the girl climbing next to us took two lead falls and sprained her ankle. Michele wrapped it in an ace bandage and Carl tried to salvage their draws. He went through a lot of work to get one but then forgot to give it back to them. oops. Michele and I didn't prepare for this trip like we usually do and it showed. After the first climb Michele had lost the skin off one finger and by the end of the day she had no skin left on 4 fingers and I had 2 major blisters.We had to keep our fingers taped for the rest of the trip. Carl couldn't believe we were still climbing:-) We went back to the hotel and had dinner and went to bed exhausted. Michele had enough points to get us a room at the Belagio for almost nothing. We were always too tired to do much at night and we have very little interest in gambling anyway so we went to Vegas and stayed at the Belagio and never gambled. I don't know what it is about sister trips but we are always up before 5am and exhausted at night.
The next day we had a fab breakfast and Carl picked us up at 7am and went headed back out to Red Rocks. This was our first experience with big wall climbing. We climbed a 5 pitch, 600 foot route named "Birdland". I didn't enjoy this as much as I should have because I was so tired but it was a great climb. When we got back to the hotel it was not time to go to sleep yet so we walked around the whole hotel and watched the fountains out front as well as had a good Chinese dinner. I also found a gelato parlor. I think the gelato every night was the best part of the trip.
That night I slept for 8 hours and the next morning I was like a different person.
Carl picked us up at 7 again and we went to the "panty wall". Carl set up some anchors and we did a ground school on building anchors. Before we finished a large group showed up from the local college so we decided to go somewhere else to climb. We climbed "man's best friend", a fun 180 foot 2 pitch bolted climb. Carl led it the first time and we all rapped down then Michele and I mock led the first pitch with a top rope. Then I led it without the top rope one time. We got back early and my brother who is stationed out there picked us up and we had dinner with him and his family.
Sunday Carl picked us up and we went back to the panty wall. We did some lead climbing and built and cleaned our own anchors. Finally, real lead climbing:-)!!! Poor Carl was very nervous about having us off top rope while under his care. It got crowded again so we went back to man's best friend and Michele led the first pitch, Carl climbed second and I cleaned the route. Then I led the second pitch and Michele cleaned. In one day we went from lead climbing to lead climbing multi-pitch routes. We went to Bonnie Springs for dinner. It is a replica of an 1880's mining town just outside of Red Rocks. We sat around a big fireplace and ate appetizers and hung out.
Monday ended up being a hiking day. We were going to climb Cat in the Hat but it is a very popular route. We hiked an hour to get out there and found that we were third in line with more people coming in behind us. Carl doesn't do lines and I don't do crowds so we turned around and hiked out. We went to another area and hiked another hour to "the schoolroom" There were several easy trad climbs so Carl led them and left his gear in place so Michele and I could lead them. Then we hiked back out in the dark.
Tuesday we flew home in hurricane Ida. I don't know how we did it but we flew home straight through a tropical storm and didn't have any delays.

Coosa River Challenge October 3 , 2009

Friday after work Jason, Kristin and I drove up to Wetumpka and met Chris Coleman(Jason's partner) at Coosa River Adventures for check in. There was a little mix up and even thought I registered by computer Kristin and I were put in the co-ed category. We got that straightened out and dropped off our boats and bikes and went out to eat. The next morning we had to be at the finish line for orientation at 7am then we went up river to the start. We had to find our bikes and establish our transition area and get warmed-up. There was a staggered start so Jason and Chris started about 20 min ahead of us and we were in the last group.
The first leg of the race was a 4 mile trail run. At around mile 2 there was an obstacle. First you had to play even-odds with the race official to determine which team member was going to complete the task. Jason and I were both chosen out of our teams. There were two ropes strung across and small ravine and you had to walk on one and hold onto the other and cross the ravine. Then after you finish the run you end up back at the transition area to start the 7 mile mountain bike leg.
A week before the race I got new clipless pedals(your shoes clip to the pedals) and we came up to Wetumpka to practice on the course and I fell over about 10 times and cried and wanted to forfeit the race. I went back to my regular pedals before the race and managed not to have a breakdown.
On the first half of the course a lot of people passed us and I was going really slow but by the second half I was able to go faster and we passed some people back. About half way through Kristin and I were so tired we wished we had never heard of the Coosa River Challenge. My quads were like jelly but we made it and actually passed some co-ed teams that had a 10 min head start on us. Again half way through we had to stop and do a little challenge. You had to carry your bike over a fence across and 2x4 laid over a mud hole and then under a fence. Then you end up back at the transition area. We got our kayak stuff and set off for a 1 mile run to the river. Once you get to the river you have to traverse a boulder field then take a navigation test with a compass then climb batman style up an 80 foot hand line to the top of the "slabs". At this point you draw out of a hat to see who rappels. Again Jason and I both completed the challenge. Chris and Kristin went back down the hill and swam out in the river and Jason and I went to the top of the hill and rappelled down then swam out to our team mate and on to the boat ramp to get our kayaks. At one point I was backstroking with my eyes closed and I hear Kristin shouting at me. I open my eyes to find I got turned around and am swimming back to the slabs. We looked real professional.
So finally the 7 mile Kayak portion. Kristin and I were in the orange barge which is exceptional in its slowness. Jason and Chris rented a boat but neglected to sit in it and get the seats adjusted so we were all pretty miserable paddling. At the first island you had to get out and portage(carry) your boat across the island. At the second island you had to do a little run and swim through barrels submerged in a mud hole(this was Kristin's favorite part). Then paddle,paddle, paddle. We were so bored we started singing just to keep going. I did a little yodeling and I think we even sang the Star Spangled Banner. Next was a 1 mile poker run and finally right before the finish you had to swim out to a lock(brick wall) in the middle on the river and jump off about 15 feet then swim back to your boat and cross the river to the finish line. Jason and Chris's finish time was 4:10:00 and they placed 9th out of 42 teams in their age group. Our finish time was 5:19:00 and we finished 6th out of 13 teams in our age group. Kristin and I won the award for best lock jump. We did a short Taekwondo routine and did flying side kicks off the wall.

Morrison Springs August 22 2009

We are the only two divers in this area who have not dove Morrison springs. We went with Karen and Alec. They were on the Honduras trip with us. There is a small cave at about 60feet that has an air pocket in it. You can actually stand up on a ledge and stick your head up and talk. Just below that is the entrance to the main cave. There is a fixed line going into the cave and a warning sign at the entrance :-)We had perfect timing. There was no one there when we first went in and we had the cave to ourselves and it got crowded just before we left. We saw some cool eels scratching against the rocks and performeing cool tricks.

Fantastic Pit July 18 2009

In July we were supposed to go to Rumbling Falls with Joey and Aimee which has horizontal cave and a 200 foot drop but it was cloased d/t white nose syndrome so we went back to Ellison's. Last time we did the warm-up drop, skirted Fantastic and then did another 80 foot drop. Fantastic at 586 feet is the deepest freefall pit in the lower 48 United States. This time time we did the warm-up drop then Jason, Joey, Aimee, Owen, Christie and John Hickman dropped Fantastic. I would have liked to do the rappell but there was no way I was coming back up that rope with my ascending system. I have a"frog" system. Jason and Joey frogged up but everyone else had rope walkers. Aimee and I watched everyone drop then hiked out and hung out in the parking lot while everyone else explored the horizontal cave at the bottom of the pit and climbed back out. We were out there for hours waiting and were about to hike back but were procastinating because it is quite a hike to get back to the pit. Fianlly they showed up. It took a while for everyone to get out, pull the rope, hike out etc. Jason climbed out in 51 min. That is a long time to frog. He had harness marks on his sides for weeks.

Mt. Rainier June 2009

Mount Rainier is an active volcano in Washington state. At 14,411 it is the most prominent mountain in the continnental US. This an overview of the Disappointment Cleaver route up Mt. Rainier.


Jason arrived in Seattle and arrived at his hotel late the first day. The next day he explored Seattle, went to the Pike Place seafood market and did some shopping. The next day he rented a car(red Ford Mustang), and headed to Ashford. It took him about 2 hours to drive to the Whittaker bunkhouse and RMI guide service. He checked in and had orientation and their gear inspection. Orientation included watching a movie and getting acquainted with the guide and other team members. Jason had taken some of his own gear including his caving pit harness. The guide, Bob, had never seen a caving harness and had to check it out and give him the ok to use it but they were very impressed with its weight capacity. Next he went to Wittaker Mountaineering and rented his mountaineering boots, crampons and some other gear and got his food packets, food tickets etc.
The next day started training with Bob and Pete. They took a shuttle up to Paradise Lodge at 5,400 feet. This is where the parking area and visitor center is located. From Paradise they hike up through a thick fog to complete trainnig on walking with crampons,using ice axe, performing self arrests and walking in a rope team. They went back to the Lodge for a late lunch.Then they got packed up and ready to start climbing.



The next day they took the shuttle back to Paradise and started climbing. They climbed up to Camp Muir and estabilished high camp.The weather was still bad and they had to take shelter in their tents until the weather cleared. This picture was taken from Camp Muir looking over the Cowlitz Glacier towards Cathedral Gap.



In this pic Jason is hangin out with his tent mates Ed and Eric. Eric was already starting to suffer from the effects of altitude.



Jason rode out the storm in his tent and no one got much sleep because the storm was so loud. The next day the weather finally cleared and Jason was able to take this picture of the next peak, Mt Hood. You can see the storm clouds are now under them. This was a rest day for Jason's team. The team ahead of them were unable to summit because of the storm and were turned around at 12,000 feet.



On their rest day they were joined by the last guide, Gary. The walked across the Cowlitz Glacier to Cathedral Gap. They had to train to use their crampons and extabilish rope teams based on ability. They started out with 3 guides and 10 climbers. This picture is taken on the Cowlitz looking back at Camp Muir. If you look below the rope teams crossing the glacier you can see some large crevasses in the ice.




Here the rope teams are resting at Cathedral Gap and another group is passing through.



They returned to Camp Muir and prepared for their summit bid. They ate an early supper and went to bed at 6:00. Everyone got up at midnight, ate breakfast and prepared to summit. They hooked into their rope teams and set off at 1am across the Cowlitz Glacier. The weather was cooperating and everything was still and quiet, nothing coud be heard except the crunch of crampons in the frozen snow. It was still dark out and they walked by the light of their headlamps. Due to altitue sickness, one climber had to stay at Camp Muir. The climbing was steep and their were several crevasses that had to be crossed. The hardest climbing was Disappointment Cleaver. It was so steep it was almost like climbing a ladder. Eric was vomiting blood by this stage and at the top of Disappointment Cleaver he and another climber were turned around and taken back down by Pete. This is at about 12,000 feet and also the point where the sun finally came up. After a short break they continued to climb. It started to get colder and Jason had to start layering up and he also started to feel the altitude. At 13,000 feet the sun was out in full force, it was cold and Jason was really starting to feel the effects of the mountain. Basically he was cold and miserable. Then he wonders why I don't want to climb. Sounds fun doesn't it. At this point the climbe became a series of switchbacks. The teams in front of them were knocking stuff loose and it was coming down the mountain at them. They even had a snow shovel whiz by and barely miss them. At this point there were crevases that had he be crossed by snow bridge and seracs(huge ice blocks) overhanging the trail with increased avalanch risk. They made it to the false summit at 8am and Jason was worn out from the thin air, altitude and cold. This picture was taken from the true summit looking back across the crater at the false summit. They had to walk acroos the summit and the snow was real soft and difficult to walk in. Jason wasn't sure he was going to make it across.



This is Jason at the true summitt at about 8:30am. They stayed at the summit for about 30 minutes and then began the descent. You have to get down quickly because the mountain gets more dangerouse as the snow heats up throughout the day.



This is the descent. At about 1000 feet below the summit they came across a guy in his sleeping bag staked down in the snow that didn't make it and was waiting for his team. They weren't able to take many pictures because they haad to rush to get down and were only allowed 4 breaks on the ascent and 2 breaks on the way down.



The team arrived back at Camp Muir at around 1pm. Jason had a throbbing headache, dehydration and nausea. They packed up at Muir and continued all the way down to Paradise. By this time Jason was able to recover from the altitude and they were able to start climbing at their own pace and they would actually sit down and slide down the mountain and might of even had a snowball fight. They arrived at Paradise at 5:30om and took the shuttle back to the bunkhouse where they ate and received their certificates.



Here Jason is posing with his guides from left: Bob, Pete and Gary. This was Gary's 300th summit. That night they stayed at the bunkhouse and celebrated their successful summit. The next day Jason flew home. Once home Jason lost a toenail and his lips were swollen from sun exposure but he had a great time and said it was the best birthday present ever.



Looking back up the mountain.

Training in Wetumpka

This weekend Kristin and I went to Wetumpka to train for our race. We hired a guide and on Saturday we ran the river. It was really easy in our sit-on-top but there were a few places where we needed to know where to go to make sure we didn't miss any of the challenges. It was class II rapids and one class III, moccasin gap. We ran the gap a few times and it is not bad as long as you know where the best line is. Sunday we went mountain biking. Turns out I am really bad at mountain biking. I don't know why I was surprised I was never really good at riding a bike. I guess I just hoped somehow I had gotten better by not doing it for 10 years. I guess life doesn't work that way. So now I am going to have to train twice as hard just to be able to finish the course. You how people always compare stuff to "riding a bike", I hope they are wrong.

Training Day

While Jason is gearing up for Rainier Kristen and I decided to do the Coosa River Challenge. It is a race in Wetumpka that involves 3-6 hours of mountain biking, trail running, river paddling with lots of special tests throughout. Technically it is a sprint not an adventure race but for me it is a challenge so I am going to refer to it as an adventure race. We have started training and have been starting at the launch and doing about an hour of running/walking and an hour of paddling at least once a week. In about two weeks we are going up and hiring a guide to go over the course.

Kayak Surfing

We had our annual May tournament in Orange Beach and Kristin and I decided to take our kayaks down with us. Friday night I had to do a midterm testing and we had tournament all day Saturday. The surf report was not good so we left the sit on top and took the whitewater kayak to practice rolling and the touring kayaks. In the mean time a line of thunderstorms moved in and the surf picked up. There was perfect break right in front of our hotel. We had watched an instructional DVD on rolling Saturday night and after my lesson in Moab I thought I might nail it, but no. It was pretty much a failure. We both have the hip snap and could T rescue but that's about it. I did worse than I did in Moab. So then we took the kayak to the surf and caught a few waves but without a roll it was pretty rough. I got over ended once and had to do a wet exit and drag the kayak back to shore so we just did some body surfing and then it was time to check out. It was sickening to watch that perfect surf and know that you had left the perfect boat at home.

SERA 2009

picture by Kevin Bruff
Last weekend Jason and I went to SERA. We drove up Thursday and stopped at Alabama Outdoors on the way. The Nashville Groto was hosting so when we got there I helped Aimee finish painting the "burning caveman" and we set up camp. They had also volunteered us to lead a trip to Tumbling Rock Saturday and I helped clean the showers on the last day. After hanging out for a while and visiting vendor row we grilled steaks and James, Dave and Carol were practicing for open mike nite so we had an impromptu concert.The next day we went to Flowstone with Kevin. When we went to the meeting area there was this guy with a massive beard hanging out hinting that he would like a ride so I took a chance and picked him up. You never know what you are going to get when you pick up a caver but Will turned out to be pretty cool and since our friends were working the event and he didn't know that many people we ended up hanging out a lot over the weekend. Flowstone was close to Ellison's where we went last year and the hike was just as bad if not worse. Of course, if we were hiking we would say it was a nice hike but since we weren't... Anyway we finally made it and rigged up to a nearby tree. We had 9 people in our group so even though there was no cave to explore it took a long time just to get everybody up and down the rope. It was a 226 foot rappel that started out as a squeeze but after 15 feet opened up to pretty much a free rappel. After it opened up it was maybe 50' across(I'm guessing I really have no idea. With a waterfall that looked like a shower coming down right in the middle into a pool then flowing down the rocks at the bottom. The pictures don't capture how pretty the water running down the rippled rocks was.
This is a rattlesnake we met on the hike in:


Here is the opening. It was smaller than this when they discovered the pit 8 years ago.


Here are some pics from inside the cave. There were several salamanders down there and you can kinda see the waterfall.


Friday night we got back so late from caving we missed most of the festivities. We saw a little of open mike nite and grilled sausage dogs but that was about it. Saturday it was our turn to lead a trip. It was the only horizontal trip for the day so we had a lot op folks. There were 11 cars in the caravan and it took an hour and a half to get there. Gerald told us we just had to get them there and they could do the trip on there own but it was obvious some of them needed a guide. So Jason took lead and I was going to bring up the rear but there was one couple who it became obvious were not going to be able to keep up. I took them and just kind of did a separate trip. It was like being at work helping people with mobility problems :-).I had to physically assist the lady the whole way through. Jason actually had the harder group because he had everything from experienced and fast cavers to ridiculously slow cavers. He had to keep stopping the group and going back to get people so he ended up doing the trip twice. For an easy trip we were both sore the next day. That evening we had a "mardi crawl" parade and a band and were able to enjoy the activities. Sunday we cleaned up a little and headed home.

Moab Day 6

Last day. Time to go back to the real world. Landon had joked earlier in the week that his goal was to wear us out so that we would sleep to 6:00 and he finally did it. We did not get up until our alarm went off at 6:30. He also wanted us to go through Colorado National Monument on our way back to the airport so we did. He said that this guy wanted this area to be a national park so every Fourth of July he would climb this rock formation and fly the American Flag and finally they made it a national monument.


Maybe one day we will climb it :-)It's a 4 pitch 5.9. After that it was an uneventful flight home.

Moab day 5

Today was supposed to be while water rafting but as is a woman's perogative we changed our minds. We had spent all our climbing time getting ready for Ancient Art and had not learned how to lead climb so we asked if we could do a full day of climbing instruction and squeeze in another kayaking trip. Of course Red River came through as they did all week. It was drizzly again that morning(I know what you are thinking, rain in the desert? Well that was what I was thinking too. That is why I didn't take a raincoat which of course destined us to be rained out so I bought 2 rain coats and as soon as I did the rain cleared up for good.)so Landon taught us princples of lead climbing at the shop that morning while it dried out and even took us to the store to buy the rest of the gear that we needed. The we ate lunch and went back to "ice cream parlor" to do some lead climbing. We lead 2 climbs apiece and bagged our first onsight(lead climbing on your first attempt without falling or hanging on the rope). Then we went back to the hotel and landon and I went down the river again. The first time we went down the river I got caught in an eddy and flipped and did a t rescue the second time I knew where the eddy was I just couldn't do anything about it and I get flipped and had to T rescue again. At least I made it through the rapids and didn't have to do a wet escape from the kayak and have to swim.

Moab Day 4

Today we were supposed to climb Ancient Art. First we were supposed to meet at 7am but since it rained yesterday they pushed it back to 10 to give the rock time to dry cause it is covered in mid and really needs to be dry. We got up at 5am as we have been doing every morning for some reason and it was raining again. We went to the lodge and watched the sun rise, went for a little hike along the river then went into town for breakfast. I waited till 8 to call Carl because I didn't want to wake him but it turns out they had been trying to get a hold of us. They wanted to put the climb off till 1:00 which was fine with us but we expected to be entertained till then so we went to the shop and I asked if I could do some more kayaking while Michele hiked some more in Arches. They were like ok time to change gears. Landon had to undo his climbing gear from canyoneering the day before, reset for a multipitch ascent, load up kayaking gear, load his motorcycle and trailer up so he could run the shuttle for us and do this all while we were sitting there waiting on him. So it all worked out perfectly. Landon and I ran the same stretch of river and ended at the Hotel again while Michele hiked to Delicate Arch which she had wanted to do. Then we ate lunch at the hotel and went straight to Ancient Art which is down the street from the hotel. I don't have an kayaking pictures but here are some pics of delicate arch

So Ancient Art is the reason for this trip. Michele found this really cool climb and we planned a whole trip around it. Ancient Art is the formation in the pictures with the corkscrew summit on it. The cool thing about it is that it is a tower sitting on the edge of a cliff. So we climbed 200 feet but when you look down over the edge of the cliff you are looking down 1200 feet.

Here are some pics of us climbing. We didn't make it to the top of the corkscrew. Landon said it was their policy not to guide people up there for safety reasons and we pretty much agreed with him but we still made it to one of the summits and it was an awesome feeling.

Moab day 3

This morning we went canyoneering. It was a really nice hike through a canyon with 2 rappels the first one was 90 feet and dropped into a water carved sand stone chamber and the second was a free rappel under morning glory arch. Then it was a great hike through a beautiful canyon.We were running a little early to meet our shuttle so we did a side hike that involved some scrambling and a few rock climbing moves(like we didn't get enough rock climbing on out trip)up to a little cave.

Next we had lunch by the river and did a half day on inflatable kayaks. We hated the kayaks they were way uncomfotable. To top it off we got hit by a horrendous thunderstorm with like 50 mph winds and Michele's boat was wind flipped and she had to be rescued then she was freezing. Luckily our hotel was right around the corner so we just stopped our trip short and the guide finished up the trip by himself but then he came back and taught me to roll a kayak in the hotel swimming pool which I have been wanting to learn forever so we forgave him for making us paddle the inflatables. I can get all but the last little bit of the roll so I will practice more when I get home.

moab day 2

Well here are som pics of our room. We are staying at the Red Cliffs Lodge. It is right on the Colorado River and our room is on a little creek. The hotel is also a winery.

Today was our first rock climbing day. We went to a crag called "ice cream parlor" in the morning and did some face climbing and learned about lead climbing and multi-pitch. We climbed up to 5.10 We had 3 hours for lunch to avoid the hottest part of the day. We had a nice lunch and walked around town. We found a used book store and bought some books and read for a while. That afternoon we went to a place called "wall street'. It was literally on the side of the road so it was really nice because we didn't have to do any hiking to get to the climb. We leaned about crack climbing and did some check out climbs to make sure we were ready for "ancient art". We did a rediculously hard climb called minnie me so that our guide could check our "determination. I did a cool 5.8+ crack called 30 seconds over potash and did some real easy lead climbing. Here are some pics of my crack.(I bet you never thought you would want to look at pictures of my crack)

Moab-Arches National Park

We arrived in Moab yesterday. Our first flight was delayed so we had to literally run to catch our connection but we made it and amazingly so did our bags. We got to town around lunchtime so we checked into our room and ran into town to eat lunch. Then we went to Arches National Park which is only 5 min north of town. We did the scenic drive and a few short hikes. We had not gotten any sleep the night before so we weren't up for much. We actually stopped at a parking area in the park and took a 30 min nap. Here are some pics of landscape arch and double arch.


We have a tradition of walking across neat bridges on out sister trips.


After that we were tired so we went to bed at 8:30 and slept for 9 hours.

Another look at Bay Minette Basin

My mom and I decided to go kayaking this morning. I wanted to launch at the Causeway and explore the Whiskey Ditch but it was VERY foggy this am. I didn't want to get runned over by a boat so we decided to launch at Buzby's instead. I have launched here twice. The first time Jason and I went up stream and the river was ok but pretty wide and the second time I went with Michele and Karen and we went downstreatm to the Basin and circled around the south half. Again open water and developed shores. So I went into this paddle with expectations of a pleasant paddle but nothing special. We launced downstream and went around the top half of the Basin just to go somewhere new. OMG, it was the best paddle. Very shallow(read no motor boats), grassy mazes, blooming spider lillies, protected waters, 3 alligators, constant birdsong, it was awesome. I wish I had taken a camera. The weather was perfect, it was warm with a cool breez, minimum current, splashing fish...

Tower certification

The climbing gym Michele and I have been going to has an outside climbing tower. So today we did our tower certification to be able to climb it. We had to learn how to lead rope climb and we had to lead climb to the top. We didn't realize how tough the climb was going to be. At the top and bottom it was tilted out at an angle so the climbing was hard anyway and then to have to let go with one hand long enough to place a quickdraw, pull up slack in the rope and clip it to the carabiner, um it was hard. The we had to practice taking a fall which the guy could see I was about to fall so he had Michele pay out some line so that I would take a big fall. Michele did better than me so she had to pay out her own line then fall on purpose from the top. Anyway we did it so we can climb the tower now:-)