Thursday, August 27, 2015

Throwin' it Back to "Living the Dream" Last Summer

Last summer my good friend Phil and I went on a climbing trip to the Bighorn Mountains in Wyoming. You can revisit that post if you'd like, or you can just enjoy some of the photos set to music in the video below.

Sunday, August 9, 2015

A Quick Note from the Tetons

I've been in the Jackson area for a little over 24 hours now. I landed in SLC Friday night about 10pm Mountain. Jon picked me up at the airport, and we drove for a few hours before crashing at Allred Flat Campground in the Bridger-Teton National Forest. The next morning (yesterday) we finished the drive in the morning, and checked in the American Alpine Club Grand Teton Climbers' Ranch (GTCR).

The weather was questionable at best, Jon wanted a nap after a long week of working the Outdoor Retailer Show - I wanted to breathe some thin air and get myself a little acclimated. So Jon napped while I carried a light pack to the Lower Saddle and back. When I got back, we had dinner and spent some time hanging out in the GTCR Library with the other climbers staying there. Sitting around the fire, swapping stories, looking at photos from a Liberty Ridge trip. Sitting in that room, surrounded by stocking-footed (no shoes allowed in the library) climbers and artifacts from well-over a century's worth of climbing I felt I was surrounded by close friends, despite only knowing one other person in the room. One of climbing's greatest strengths, and pulls for me is the community of people it brings together.

This morning Jon and I were both slow to rise from our bunks, but the fog was slow to lift from the valley too - so it didn't matter. Mostly it's been a slow day of resting, eating, and getting our kit put together for the next two days. We plan on starting up Teewinot tonight around 2am en route to do the Grand Traverse over the next two days. We had hoped to get a warm-up route in beforehand, but the weather looks questionable later in the week - so we'll use the two days of good forecast to go for it.