Another update

It looks like last time I wrote anything here was after spending a day at Carlsbad Cavers in New Mexico.  Right now I am in a hotel in Charlston, SC.  Here's how I arrived there....

The day after Carlsbad Caverns, we planned to hike up Guadalupe Mtn, the highest in Texas.  As we were about to get on the trail a ranger stopped us saying that the trail was closed due to a forest fire.  We hung around for a few hours, and luckily enough they determined that the trail up the mountain was the only safe one in the park that day.  We went for it, and was rewarded with wind and great views.

Wind

 

Great Views

Then we headed on to Las Cruces, with first stopping off at the White Sands National Monument.  Its a day trip sort of thing, but really cool!  The sand is white as snow, and was a ton of fun to run up and down the dunes.

Jumping off sand dunes

From there we spent 2 nights with Raimey and Ben, a couple fellow couchsurfers with 3 awesome dogs who kept me entertained constantly.  It was great to spend some time with folks from the area, and interesting ones at that.  They are also rock climbers and told us about a few places nearby that we should check out.  One of them was Franklin Mtns. state park back over in Texas.  There was some nice sport leading there, and it just felt great to get on rope outside and climb some rock.

Then we head into the Gila Wilderness in Western New Mexico.  There are these cliff dwellings there from people who lived in them about 700 years ago.  They have a great story, told by Chuck the volunteer, but most of it is a mystery as to why they built so much and then only stayed 25 years...

Being that it is a national forest / wilderness, we got to camp anywhere and even have fires!  It was also the coldest nights we've had so far (down to 18 deg) so it was really great to hang out by the fire until bedtime.  We did an overnight hike down to the Gila river which is in a canyon with at least 300ft cliffs.  There was also hot springs there that required 15 river crossings to get to each way.

Yay for ice cold water!

Following that mini adventure, we ventured into Arizona - home of the saguaro cactus.  (pronounced sa-wa-ro)  These are the iconic cacti from cartoons, but they actually exist!  and so do roadrunners!  They are also quite interesting, growing up to 50ft tall and hundreds of years old.  They even have woody stems within to keep it upright and can weigh over 15000 lbs.

This one isn't even the largest in the area.

We finally left the Tuscon area after a couple days.  Saguaro national Park is right outside it, and its ugly urban sprawl.  Defo didnt like it there as much as I would have thought.  Only an hour away though is Cochise Stronghold, a climbers dream.  It is a chain of mountains with climbable areas all over.  We went to only one small area that housed 3 crags, and was only a teenie tiny taste of what is there.  The climbing is great too on some nice granite, and this area was well bolted for fun sport leading.

Sweet Rock - our afternoon crag

From Cochise, we head straight to Joshua Tree.  You hear about tons of climbing there, and there is, but  it is all trad leading which we do not have the gear for.  We did manage to find one area with a couple bolts on top that we could toprope off off for half a day.  Then of course there are all the hiking trails too.  And Joshua trees, another crazy plant that looks like it came from a Dr. Suess book. 

Sunset from Key's view

And finally we moved on to something out of the desert!  It is a fascinating landscape and each one is a bit different, but it is really nice to get at something that is not all brown and deserty.  Also, interesting thing we've noticed about the national parks.  They are certainly in our American style of being able to drive up to something, get out of the car for a couple minutes to look at something cool, and then drive on to some other cool thing.  Sure, you can just go wander off up that mountain that is 7 miles from any road or trail, but there seems to be a lack of something inbetween.  Well, there is some, but just not as much as we thought.  Hence, we've kinda been jumping around from park to park spending only a couple days in each cause that is all it takes.  Being that it is desert, we are still limited in how far we can go without a ranger station with a water source.

As we drove towards LA, it was great to get up in the San Bernadino national forest and Big Bear lake, where it is high enough that there was snow on the ground and pine trees and water and colors other than tan!  We did a hike there up to the Pacific Crest Trail and up a mountain close by.  It actually closely reminded me of the adirondacks.  We also happened to be in town to volunteer to help them do a bald eagle count.  So we sat by the lake in our spot and actually spotted one of the 3 Eagles living around this lake for the winter!

So that brings me to LA.  Now Charlston?  Yup, I'm doing a little bit of work with Vertical Access.  Inspecting the Cooper River Bridge.  Its a really sweet one and I get to hang 500ft above the freeway tomorrow!

Nico silhouette - I just like this picture