In 1932 I am sure that Montpelier was a bustling state capitol with many things happening.  There were many houses built around this year within the town even though it was during the great depression in the economy. As new houses were being built people were thinking about cars as they were just becoming affordable to the middle/upper class of society. The Empire State Building was in the process of being built and one of the famous black and whites of the workers sitting on a girder was just taken.  The assembly line concept was a major process of society in this day and everything from cars to houses were built in this style.  Rail cars shipped Sears Kit homes to towns and there were assembled right there via the part numbers on site. The auditor of My Left Foot was born with Cerebral Palsy and his mother believed that he was very intelligent despite what doctors said.   FDR ran for president and won b y a landslide (although VT was not a state he won in...) 

In Climbing history the first ascent of the lauper route on the North Face of the Eiger took place.  It took two days and was considered a fast and direct route.  In today's standards it can be done by superhuman athletes in about 2:45 for a speed record.

And I am writing all of this because Steph and I have finally found our house that we are moving into and close on tomorrow.  Our house is a colonial type revival and it was built in 1932.  I have been researching history and looking into things as I have my spare time.  Our first task is going to be the wallpaper in the master bedroom and getting down to a nice white wall with no paper.

Very Exciting....

Deer Leap

Steph and I have started getting ready for our trip to California in between all of the house buying things that have been going on.  I will post on the house later as I could not be more excited about it I just am doing my research for the post. 
We made it to Deer Leap on Sunday and did a bunch of the classic cracks and face climbs that are pretty good and I am hoping will get us in gear for Tahoe area and Donner pass/lovers leap. 

We ended up doing one called the monkey that is good finger lock type constrictions in a slanting seam and another called offwidth but it is just a changing crack size the whole way and then another that was a simple ramp type climb but was good to get some feet in of climbing.

I got one picture in of Steph rappelling after we did the offwidth crack. 

Mountain Fit!

Two months ago I was talking with my wife and I found that she had signed us up for the cross-fit program.  It is an exciting thing and also an overwhelming thing to try a new type of fitness regime. The first four sessions were two hour training classes where the technique of each of the moves that happen during a typical class have been reviewed.  This was the first time that I have learned some type of physical movement that has some serious technique to it.  The concept is to take high intensity movements such as an Olympic weight dead lift and combine the timed aspect of a cardio type exercise and enough core exercises to make my head spin.   The idea is to do this two days a week and get some serious power in all my movements beyond climbing so that I am more efficient. Each of the four workouts that we have done so far has used some form of body weight type exercise and another piece of equipment to build accuracy and fitness. Each time I have also been sore enough to know that I am going somewhere with the program.

The hope has been that it will help me on hard sport climbs to just power through the tough overhangs and get to a point where I can relax again during the climb. In my research while learning about the crossfit program I found a gymnastics specific type WOD or (workout of the day) type program that looks really interesting too.  It makes me wonder if there is already a climbing one out there and some searches have revealed that there are but I have not been able to do the full amount of reading.  The one thing that I will say even though I am trying not to drink the cult like kool-aid is that there is a lot of camaraderie it seems in the workouts and I like that aspect.

Now I am at the point where I have completed two months and have enjoyed it emensely and am thinking that it is time for climbing outdoors to see what it has done.  I am also thinking that this is something I could get back to.  So far I think that the most impressive thing I have learned to do is a gymnastics style muscle up on the rings.  This I am hoping will make my mantle type move in climbing really progress

My new favorite Crag!

It is 20 minutes to drive to the cliff and 25 to hike in at a good clip.  At 200 feet tall it is awesome.  Some of the climbs can be done in one single push with a 60m rope and 17 or more draws and the face climbing and intricacy of it all is also really good. And the best part of it is that it is all close to home.  Crag 82 is quickly becoming my favorite home cliff.  

On sunday my friend Zach and I went out and did this route called block party.  It is a nice 5.10a route that has some cool climbing and it is a nice couple hour jaunt to do it from home.  It is about 2.5 hours with the hiking from car to car if you are pushing it.

My first race ever!

A week ago I ran my first race ever.  I have been actively training since November. It was the 6.4 mile relay section of the Burlington marathon.  At work we have had about 9 people running off and on and I have had good lunch time training partners.  Someone had the idea of doing a relay team for the marathon and so three of us entered the lottery for this race and we got two teams accepted.  It was good to have someone at work to run with during lunch breaks for the last couple of months but I did find that I was a little more hardcore about it like going in the rain and snow and cold. 

On race day during leg one Steph and I stood by to watch the marathon start and Steph immediately commented as the race leaders were running by "It is only mile one and they already look like they are in pain".  This reminded me to smile and have fun during the race.  When it was my turn to run the third leg our team was running along with the ten minute mile section so since I was running faster I got to pass lots of people.  I have decided that there was no better way to start learning how to race.  I was happy and running fast and I ended up running faster then I had thought I was.  The leg I had included one hill at the end which I sprinted up and was nice.  I ended up running 6.4 miles in under 47 minutes.

Laraway Mountain and Ramp Ravioli!

Last Weekend was one of the best we have had in a while weather wise and Steph and I spent it with some friends hiking on the long trail.  We did a section that is pretty lightly used just north of Johnson VT and I also found a cliff that I think I will go back to and put a sport route up.  The cliff is right off the trail and the climbing looks excellent on these small and large pockets that are pretty untypical of VT.  There are even a couple of Mono type holds.  I am thinking it is going to make some excellent pocket climbing like training for limestone type climbs.  The cliff also overhangs like 15 degrees which is cool.  More on that later.  Project....

The Hike
We started out on Friday at route 109 and hiked in two miles to a really new and nice shelter.  IT was a neat one with barn doors and a sky-light.  Saturday morning we did 7 miles and ended at another neat shelter where I found some ramps on the descent into camp.  Dinner at camp consisted of Thai style peanut noodles with chicken, ramps, a red pepper and other food ( I think I gained weight on this trip).  Sunday we hiked over laraway mountain and back to our cars.  On the way up in the morning I stopped for about 20 minutes and got a bunch more ramps and the final 5 miles was hiking but I was just really thinking of how I was going to cook the ramps.  Hiking always gets boring for me so I find my mind wandering...

The Meal:

Back home after a little Internet research I found a recipe for ramp ravioli at a Fork My Life blog!  I am starting to think that soon cookbooks will be all outdated and no one will have them.  They will go out of print and people will just follow blogs.  After seeing a recipe on a blog complete with up to date pictures I decided it is how I want cooking how-to's to be for me.  If only climbing techniques could be learned so easily. 




Steph Expressed experience to learn how to make ravioli so we had this endeavor together.  We did this on Tuesday night.  I have to be thankful for the granite slab kitchen table that we have and got at a yard sale.  It is a great surface for these types of things.

It made for a fun evening and something to do.  Steph started asking about doing rice noodles and other things that were exotic with the maker so maybe I will have to start doing food blogging in the near future.   





 I have to thank one a friend of my parents friends Janet Tambascio for teaching me to make ravioli back when I was homeschooling for high school. 

Intimidation and head games!

Well this weekend I ate some humble pie.... Steph and I went to Marshfield for some serious granite climbing.  We had been to this cliff and climbed once before and I remembered it as being big but I forgot how awesome it really is.  You drive to Groton which is the middle of nowhere VT and then get on an old logging railroad bed that is now a road and drive 2 miles until you get to a spur road.  The road gets progressively worse so I just stop where there is a good pull off and don't beat on my truck too much. 

From there it is a half an hour hike on logging roads, faint trails and across an old beaver type flow area. The cliff is between 300 and 700 feet tall in places and has some really good slabs, faces, and features on it but it is exploratory type terrain.  Because it is so tall you can see a bolt line going up the cliff and think all the climbing will be bolts but then you get to pitch two and find you need gear.  The rock also can change as you go up so it can go from grainy to smooth slabs or holds to no holds.  All of this adds to the commitment.

When I first looked at the weather in the morning I saw that the percent chance of rain had gone up to 50% from 9-4pm so when it got cold briefly I questioned if I should start up the mossy slab. The sun came out a few minutes later and Steph was saying I should go so we went for it. 

I picked a slab that was close to the trial in where it met the cliff just thinking it would be a nice long moderate with a chance to explore and really see the cliff. 

I started up a relatively clean but with some lichen that looked like it would vanish as I went up.  It ended up being about 5.7 with one hard move at the bottom and was 4 bolts over about 110 feet so it was a little run out. For the last ten feet getting to the first ledge which was full of branches and leaves and was a little heady on lead since I have only been climbing in well travelled areas lately.  Steph made short work of the slab on toprope and so I started off exploring the sections above when I was back on belay. 

It turned out to be another slab pitch after doing some high angle leaf crawl/climbing on lichen to get to the clean stuff again.  As I was going up the rock got cleaner and cleaner but the rope drag got pretty bad and the bolts got really spaced out even though the climbing got harder. The rock also got pretty smooth.  The bolts started traversing to the right and they had some space so I just kept telling myself I would make it to the next one and see not knowing the grade or anything else. 

After 4 bolts on pitch two like that and around 100 feet I was heading out and feeling bad so I rested at a stance and tried to talk myself into the rest and had no luck.   We bailed..... It was a neat day and we had the whole cliff to ourselves.  There is so much adventure climbing there and so few people show up to do it. This is one area that is so close to home for me that I have to start getting out here more.   I guess humble pie never tasted so good!