Final Countdown...and I'm off

Right now I'm sitting upstairs in my aunt and uncles house on Mercer Island with my bags already packed in the car ready to be driven to the airport or the flight to Frankfurt. It has been a good stay in the Pacific Northwest. I have gotten to know my aunt and uncle more than I ever had before because I stayed for longer than a week. My usual stay is quick before moving on to Montana, Alaska, or Colorado and I never get my bearings on the city and its layout. My uncle and I got a few (not enough) ski tours in and I'm sad to be leaving right as the backcountry starts to stabilize around here (sorry Scott!). Thanks to my aunt Doreen for connecting me to the Middleton's who I will be in contact with far into the future and thanks to my aunt Marilyn for all those jobs on Bainbridge.

After living here in Seattle for 5 months I feel like I could get to most places in Seattle without getting too lost which is a huge improvement from when I first got here. I remember trying to drive to the climbing gym in Ballard and getting so lost I gave up and ended up just sitting on the couch drinking beer and watching a climbing movie instead! I loved being able to spend more time with my cousin Colin climbing even though it was winter and cold fingers were common. If you can't feel them they won't hurt! My favorite trip we got to do was a quick three day trip to Smith Rock in Oregon where we even met up with my friend Basevi to get some climbing in together. It was sunny on the first and the last day with a snowy day in between but we climbed anyways blowing snow off the hold as we went. Spending time with him in Bellingham was fun too but I'm still stumped on how I managed to be back at  his place at 1pm after two failed ski attempts and one rolled snowmobile that got pinned against a tree. I hear the sled is out now so that's good! I have been able to hang out with the Boknechts more than ever and that was really fun for me to be the older sibling. I've had a fun time watching Jeffrey ski and ride his bike on everything he could and am still having trouble getting the echo of him calling my name over and over (and over and over) again. I think my score in any Wii game has gone up as a result of staying over at the Boknechts as well. It was fun to watch Ally smear cake all over her face and practice making her mouth as wide a possible! lots of good memories here and now I'm of to make some more elsewhere but I'll be back!
-Owen

Jeffrey ripping!

Ally being wide eyed

Roasting wieners at Vantage

A euro point

The least photographed part on PNW ski touring 

The bags are packed!!

The bags are packed and my mind is preparing for what is to come in 6 days. For the past week all I have been thinking about is packing my bags and boxes to ship and climbing even though I have already made my last outdoor climb in WA which, in typical Pacific Northwest fashion, got shutdown after two climbs when it started started to down pour. From then on I have been going to the gym at least one time   a day (thanks for the free month pass Seattle Bouldering Project!) and getting in a good climbing session before calling it a day. My goal is to be in good climbing shape by the time I arrive in Heidelberg and I feel like I'm on track for this goal because I haven't stopped climbing all the way through ski season making fitness easy to maintain. In all honesty I feel prepared to fly out today but this last week in Seattle will give me a few days to say goodbye before leaving again for who knows how long! :) Come Monday my travel plans should look like this:

The baggage!

1. An 8 hour flight in a cramped airbus to Amsterdam 
2. Five hour layover 
3. Flight to Frankfurt
4. Minivan to Heidelberg
5. Climbing in Shreisheim on Tuesday!

This sounds easy enough but all I can remember from the last time I went on this voyage was getting stuck in Philadelphia overnight in a Best Western because my flight came in too late for me to catch my connection. I can't imagine my flight coming in 5 hours late but if it does I can't think of a better place to get stuck than Amsterdam! Looking forward to the this European trip and a new stage for my life. Well have to wait and see how it goes!
-Owen

 The crazy family that is meeting me at the Airport, MY FAMILY!

-Owen

Index Town Walls climbing

I just got back from a killer time climbing (more hiking than climbing) with Josh up at the Index Town Walls. As it was one of my first times to the place I found out very quickly that the routes are for the most part pretty hard. We wanted to start on something easier, within the 5.8 to 5.9 range and got worked just trying to find a route that was that easy. There are more routes on the range of 5.11 to 5.12 than anything and being our for a nice relaxing weekend, we might have chosen the wrong place to climb. At the start o the day we made our way up to the upper town wall because I had scoped out a nice 5.8 in the guidebook but having missed the turn to the wall we ended up hiking all the way to the top of the wall. It turned out to be worth the hike with a super scenic overlook but still a very steep section of trail. We made our way back down the trail to search for the 5.8 and quickly found out it was more of a 5.10+ than anything so we decided against it and kept walking around the base of the cliff. We came around the corner to a beautiful crack that had been bolted that leaned off to the left. Josh made a joke about trying it and I took him seriously and soon we were stick clipping the first bolt. The finger slots were just big enough to fit one or two digits with minimal feet to keep you from swinging out the left. After a few tries on that we left to head back down to the base of lower town wall where we sat for a few minutes before deciding to hike up to a smaller set of cracks on a route called Ultrabrutal which is anything but what its name implies. After free climbing it and giving a go at aid climbing (first time) we made our way to a cave to do some exploring. I went and grabbed a headlamp and we made our way into the darkness. I held up at the entrance and let Josh head back further in but quickly made my way out after getting hit in the face by a BAT! It was not the most comforting feeling to get hit in the face by a bat but just like him, I didn't see it coming.

The next day we woke up late and walked from our camp just across the road to the easiest crack at Index (5.8) and waited in line for 2 other groups to get on it before we did. The first pitch was pretty crappy but the second pitch more than made up for it with a nice finger crack with cool lie back. Great climbing and the funnest climbing I've done in a long time. After climbing and rapping down we picked up our stuff and headed out to the car to sort our stuff and head out for some food. I had been to the the burger joint Zeke's one time before so we stopped there on the way home and had a burger which turned out to be one of the best burgers ever. These burgers are good! Not like a fast food burger but an actual real burger. Some of the best after climbing food you can have! All and all it was a great trip but I wish I would have brought us to somewhere with a larger variety in the types of climbs and the difficulty. Great time!

Detour with a great view

Walk along railroad tracks

Fun easy route

Index Town Walls

Meeting Fred Beckey

Josh and I got the chance to go to a slide show at Marmot Mountain Works in Bellvue showcasing some of the earlier climbs that Fred Beckey has done in the Cascades (the Tooth) and in the Alaskan range (Mt.Seattle). It was a great time and funny to see the types of techniques that they used to compare them to current techniques used today. I couldn't imagine being on either side of the rope taking or belaying a big fall. To tie in all they did was tie a knot around the belayer and the belayer used a hip belay and some other around the body method to rappel that looks like it would not be the best on the family jewels!

Me in 70 years? Maybe...

Here's a video to give you an idea of how big Fred is in the Cascades. Too many first ascents to even try to count them all, absolutely crazy! It was also cool to see that he was talking to his partners about heading out to Rainer on Friday. He is still heading out into the mountains and hasn't slowed down at all!

Josh in Seattle

My good friend and climbing partner Josh Dalton arrived in Seattle yesterday so naturally we went out for a quick climb within an hour of him landing. We chose Exit 38 in North Bend because of how close it is to Seattle so that we could make it back in time for me to drop him off at his girlfriends house. We ended up only getting 2 climbs in because of rain but it was still a good time. We are planning on hitting up the Index Town Walls this Wednesday and Thursday and possibly some alpine climbing on Friday if all works out. Shaping up to be a fun couple weeks before I leave to Germany.

Bouldering in a parking lot

Seattle Bouldering Project opening

 I have been going in checking on the on construction of the Seattle Bouldering Project (SBP) just off of Rainer Ave since I arrived in Seattle in December so you can imagine how excited I was when they opened their doors this Friday. I didn't take any pictures when I was there but I found some online to give you an idea of the place. They even play good music!!

Cannon peak attempt

Leaving the house at 4 in the morning is usually hard for me but I woke up for this trip ready to go. After picking up our two partners (1 skier and 1 snowboarder) we were off driving toward Leavenworth and up Icicle Creek Road parking at the trail head at __. Once we packed up the skis on the pack we got underway with the fun part and started climbing straight out of the valley bushwhacking the whole way until hitting the snow line. I was the only one wearing shoes for the first part and was very happy about that fact! After hitting the snow line I swapped out the shoes and we started booting up the right side of the valley until hitting tree line where the snow was filled in enough to start skinning through large roller balls of a wet slide  that had happened a week or two prior. Two hours later we had made it to Conney just before the Summit of Cannon and this is where we went wrong. We decided to go up onto a ridge that we though connected to the main summit instead of booting up one of the three couloirs to the summit. We got cliffed out on the ridge and ended up skiing straight back out the way we had come through crusty and super mushy snow. After a super long exit we finally made it back to the car at 9:30 and were back to the house at 12:45. LONG DAY!!

Way too close!!

April 30th and May 1st Climbing

This last weekend was one of the best weekends I've had for a long time and also had some of the best weather that the area has gotten since I've been here so naturally I was going to be climbing.

Ben topping out as the sun drops 

I had received a call from one of my climbing buddies from back in Leadville, where I was going to school and he said that he had the day off from working on the boat and wanted to climb. I had already made plans to do some work at one of my aunts friends houses on Bainbridge Island so there was definitely a conflict of interest but I sorted that all out. On Saturday after ripping through the work I was on the ferry back to Seattle by 1 where I picked up my friend Ben, and were off to the closest climbing to Seattle, Exit 38 (Far Side), just outside of North Bend. I had never been to this area but it proved to have quite a few routes with better quality rock than expected with fun moves. After climbing four or five routes we headed for the car at 8:45 using one headlamp between the two of us on a very muddy trail. We decided to head back to North Bend to eat some dinner before heading all the way back into Seattle where I had to drop him off at Fisherman's Terminal. We chose a restaurant along main street and had a Burger and a beer which is one of the best ways to end a climbing day in my opinion. I had a great day and so nice being back with one of the Leadville friends again after a long time.

Nice climbers trail next to the stream

The next day was just as nice as the day before with not a cloud in the sky. I knew I wanted to climb (no shit!), but didn't have a partner. I loaded up the car and headed off to the crag anyways to try to find one. After scoping out the most popular area I met two guys that were my age and they invited me to climb with them which turned out great. We were very compatible and climbed two routes under the trestle and after that went back to The Far Side to some less crowded stuff. It was nice to be able to see all of the climbing in the area which there turned out to be way more than I had first expected and far better rock than the first place we had been.  All and all we climbed 8 routes ranging from 5.6 to 5.10b and had an awesome day. I hope to do more climbing with them up at Leavenworth later in the year so we exchanged info so this can happen.
This was one of the best weekend I've had and it was great to climb with old friends and also meet some new ones. GREAT WEEKEND!