Friday, October 21, 2011

Joe's Valley is Beautiful


We've been here for a week now and it's been great. The autumn colors against the brown and black rock make for a perfect setting. Combined with the unique movement and varied angles of the problems and I couldn't think of a better place to spend these last weeks of October.

There's been a lot of flashing, sending, failing, and scoping, but here are a few bouldering related highlights:

Getting ready to climb The Angler V2. A great warm up next to the river.

Lib made short work of a few classic V5's including Kill By Numbers and Smoothie as well as a near flash of Chips V7 (We'll be back to New Joe's soon for her to finish it off.)

Lib on G2-07, V7

I've been circuiting through the classic V6's and 7's in the area. The most enjoyable so far being Wills of Fire, Dirty Harry, Pocket Rocket, Planet of the Apes, and Bring the Heatwole.

We managed to get some flash footage of Worst Case Scenario V9. It's sloppy, but that's what flashes are, right?

Last night after climbing on the invalid drop-offs of the Big Joe cave I decided to take advantage of the evening temps and try Hydrogenated Oil V11. Though pockets (and certainly monos) are not typically my thing, the climb looked very aesthetic and after trying a couple times I managed to figure out some beta and surprised myself by chucking big and sinking the jug while locked off near my arm pit.

With a couple weeks left I'm not sure what to try. There seems to be an endless amount of quality here so it's tough to sort out which problems to give the most skin to. If anyone reading has suggestions I'd love to hear them.

-BLOCHEAD

5 comments:

  1. black lung, obviously.

    for reals though, resident evil, fingerhut.. beyond life looks pretty sick to me.

    why not try worm turns? that feature looks rad..

    I was gonna head to Bishop for thanksgiving, but Steve-o suggested Joe's.. so maybe I'll be out there flopping around on your warmups then.

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  2. All of those suggestions sound great. Worm turns looks like a rad feature and Resident Evil is the obvious classic. So so jealous, but Black Mt misses you guys, and implores you to come back.

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  3. trents mom, man from the past, battletoads, poseidon, resident evil are all pretty awesome, eden too.

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  4. Hey Max, I've been reading your blog for a few days now but have read a lot of the backlog. I love reading about this trip of a lifetime you guys are on, and I'm psyched because I'm hitting the road with my girlfriend Vikki and my buddy Byron in a couple months. If you are willing I'd love to get some advice about life on the road! I hope we can meet up in some boulderfield, somewhere...

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  5. Hey Spenser,

    Thanks for reading! I was planning to update about life on the road here in the near future, so I'll keep you in mind for sure. Where are you headed on your trip? Rope, bouldering or both? Trad? Keep in touch, it would be great to see you out there and in the meantime I hope the preparations go smoothly and the psych builds!

    -Max

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