The Weekend That Was

"Defeat" is the word that could best describe my weekend...

Saturday I woke to the sound of raindrops on the camper roof. Luckily it was a light rain and only lasted for an hour or so. After the rain subsided the sun appeared and a light breeze developed. By 8:30 the classic rule "If the road's dry; the rock's dry" was in effect. Around 9:00am Ron, Christina and I left the campground heading for the CCC parking lot. There we ran into an old friend, Paul. We talked for a little bit, and then started to make our way up the CCC trail.

At the top of the CCC trail we ran into Coach, who was stylin' at the Campus Wall. We chatted for a little while with Coach and did a little walking and talking as he was moving to Mouse's Wall.

We continued to our destination of Psuedo Hawk's Nest, where we dropped two ropes; one on "Chicken Delight (5.7)" and "Chicken Tonight (5.8)" and the other on "Beginner's Demise (5.11a)". Ron took the "honors" and warmed up on a somewhat jacked (due to rope placement issues) combination of "Beginner's Delight" (5.4) and "Chicken Delight". Christina went second with a successful burn on "Beginner's Delight".

Then the flailing started as I took the first of seven (yes seven) unsuccessful burns on "Beginner's Demise". On most burns my foot continued to blow off the same hold at the upper crux. Once I managed to make what I refered to as "a complete mockery" of the lower half of the route. Twice I managed to pull through this crux and fall off the jugs above it. Several times I erupted into tirades so embarassing I felt obligated to apologize to other climbers nearby.

Ron left around 2pm (after sending "Chicken Delight" proper and absolutely hiking "Chicken Tonight") in order to attend his Dad's birthday party (and probably from the shame of being around me). Christina (and her apparently infinite patience) stayed to belay me on my final two or three attempts at "Beginner's Demise". She cruised the direct start of "Chicken Delight" into "Beginner's Delight), I'd call the linkup 5.6.

Saturday night Christina and I had dinner with my parents for Mother's Day, and Ron returned to the campground after his Dad's party.

Sunday morning I woke to raindrops on the camper again, but these were much bigger and more frequent than Saturday. It rained most of the morning and into the afternoon, and so much of the day was spent on site improvement.

After the rain stopped Christina and I went for our training run. This shut me down as well, 2 miles into our 4 mile run I had to stop because my shin splints were so bad. Defeated again, I walked in pain the rest of the way around the Lake. The beautiful afternoon shining in stark contrast to the ugliness of my physical performance for the weekend.

Anyway this weekend is over, and I am psyched for the next. After all it's always darkest before the dawn. I think I'll get on "Pacific Ocean Wall" (5.11d) next weekend. That bitch is going down!