Lets see here, right after I got my stuff back in Bishop I quickly continued on to Bend Oregon to check out the scene at Smith Rock and low and behold, no one was there. The campground was completely empty except for me and one other vehicle. Figuring my chances of finding climbing partners would be more difficult I choose to continue on to Salem where I could be up with Paul and Shawana. Paul and I came back for two days of climbing at Smith which included a night ascent of the Monkey's Face, which made for a interesting rappel off into the back abyss by headlamp. It was fun. The third day we were able to pull Shawana away from law studies to join us for a day of climbing for which the weather was excellent and when the crowds would then show up for. It was super crowded on the front walls. After this my hands were throughly thrashed and in need of some rest and recovery. With nothing really planned until meeting up with Cynthia in Red Rocks at the end of the week I put myself on the couch of Paul and Shawana's with the large flat screen TV and cable and proceded to not move for three days of "recovery" and brain liquidifying boob tube. It was just what the doctor ordered.
Knowing my brain was nicely pickled, and body less sore I decided to begin my trip back south. I chose to drive from Salem to Bishop, making it a full day of driving and an easy second day to Red Rocks. As I was driving through the pass to Bend I came into a nice snow storm, nothing to crazy, roads were slick but not bad, I got through and found a nice sunny day in Bend. About 20 miles south of Bend, and about three hours into driving into the day and during my usual boredom induced pondering, it came to me that I had not retrieved my trad rack and draws from Paul's backpack, which was happily sitting in his garage. After quickly pulling over and confirming this with checking the back of my truck I then turned around and headed back to Salem. This added about six hours of driving to my planned full day. This also resulted in me not quite making it to Bishop though I drove until about 3 am. I was able to find a empty campsite somewhere south of Reno close to Sonora pass. I pulled over away from the highway and set up my truck for sleeping. As soon as I opened the door I discovered it was quite cold but I had warm clothes and a decent sleeping bag. Six hours later I awoke still cold but rested so I continued on. Driving only a little ways away I saw that I had actually spent the night above 8,000ft. I was able to make it to Red Rocks easily that day.
Cynthia arrived the next day and even with having flown the red eye that night we had a full day of climbing sport routes. That night we met up with some of her friends for a shin-dig and after drinking a copious amount of spirits, I ended up passing out at a neighbor's house and awoke late the next morning and we did a nice multipitch trad climb. I was feeling less than stellar but the sweating of booze from my pores probably really helped. We had two more full days of climbing here in Red Rocks until Tuesday night when it started to rain. This is the first time in several trips here that I have ever seen rain. I guess I needed the rest day anyway. I'll just hang out here with some new friends until some more friends of mine will show up in the coming weekend. The weather is suppose to improve.
I hope everyone has a good Thankgiving, there is suppose to be quite the gathering here at the campground. I'll post next time I have something.
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