Red River Gorge Torrent

This past weekend was spent at my old stomping grounds: The Red River Gorge. I spent as many weekends as I could the second half of college down in KY climbing. This past weekend my old climbing buddies got a cabin at Torrent. This crag has been closed to the public for some years now due to climbers not being respectful of the private owners rules and wishes, now the crag is only open to those who pay to stay in the cabins. I went last year with this group of climbers from Columbus and loved it! Waking up and looking out your window and having the rock 20 feet from your window- SO great!!

we got the climber's cabin:)

the view from my bed- looking at the warm up climbs for the day

the door to the "climbers cabin"

the gear stash outside

one of my favorite climbs in the red. Name: "pocket pussy" - the guys loved this one and never ran out of jokes for it

warm up for the day

Within the first 15 feet Kentucky rock showed me how angry it was that I had left it for 6 months without a note, phone call, or even a visit. I, somehow, in my attempt to get back in the zone, stupidly grabbed for a draw and got the end of my pinky caught inbetween the bolt and the caribiner on the draw. I blame it on not climbing for so long and feeling a little freaked out for some reason, but I re-learned the lesson to keep your hands away from metal even if your taking a break on your warm up while top roping.

nightly festivities in the cabin

the two boys that came along, sported their Halloween costumes to show us all, we had a ripped spiderman and  a ninja climbing around the cabin all night:)

my friend and i that didn't have too much time to plan, went to Rock House cafe that just opened for breakfast both days. It was delicious. A little more upscale than other places geared towards climbers but still really nice. Along with Miguels pizza shop, you should try this place as well.

"group photo" minus 5 people including the two little boys that came for the weekend

Overall great weekend. I am just as sore from laughing as I am from climbing. I realized just how blessed I am to have such a loving and supportive community of climbers in Columbus. I hope to be able to cilmb with them for many years to come.

Pedal People

http://vimeo.com/31179676

check out this video about the world of cycling. I dont know too much about cycling but the little that i have experienced the cycling world I have enjoyed it and wanted to have more of it. maybe one day, bikes are expensive. This video helps give an insight into the world of cyclists

i found it on the Prana Blog today while I was surfing round.

Adventures with Quiashia

So I don't know if I have introduced you guys to Quiashia.

She is quite a good friend of mine. When I first laid eyes on her I knew that we be great friends. The first time we spent some time together we hit it off. We have been on many trips and have gotten to know eachother pretty well since last spring when we decided to commit to eachother and support eachother no matter what state we were in. I took her "camping" in the Gordon area (a school  little North of Boston) this past weekend to visit friends, and  we had a lot of fun together. So I figured you guys should meet her since she means so much to me and is such a big part of my life.

 The closte/bedroom/livingroom and kitchen table and pantry

One of my favorite breakfasts

And a Beautiful view out the bedroom/kitchen window:)

A beautiful weekend made possible by my trusty toyota truck named Quiashia.

Over the Rivers and Through the Woods to Grandma's House I Go

It has been ages since the last time I wrote. I have spent the whole Summer and then some working for a program called Lavida. It was my third year being involved and my second full summer as a "sherpa" (or trip leader) The summer was filled with many new challenges and struggles, but as many times as I felt challenged and pushed I felt an equal amount of times where I felt very blessed to have such an opportunity to serve and love everyone that I came into contact with. Ive sat here for quite a while typing and then deleting ways that I want to communicate what the summer has meant to me, and to tell you the truth, it has meant so much that i cant communicate it right now. When you are a sherpa you are supposed to be drawing kids closer to God through the wilderness and through the La Vida experience but, truth be told you are learning just as much or even more about yourself, your life, and your walk with God. I stayed after the typical summer and did two extra trips this summer so I ended in late Sept.

My next adventure is my last requirement for school - an internship. I am now the intern for a company called Equinox. They are based out of Williamsport P.A. and they manufacture everything in the US which is quite rare in the outdoor world! Instead of hearing me blabber on about them check em out for yourself! I am living at a house that my grandparents own, but since my grandfather passed away and my grandmother in a nursing home a couple of years ago, it is just my dog and I living in the house. It is a great house with great view of some of the surrounding fields and farms. I will get some photos up soon. So I am very excited to see how this internship plays out because so far equinox has been great and very flexible and open minded to anything I have to offer. I am working on their outdoor gear line and re-working a lot of their products. I will be getting some photos up here soon so that you will be able to see what I'm doing.

So a totally new and different challenge for me: learning to sew, having an hour commute to work rather than a 3 minute walk, living alone, and designing gear but most definitely an exciting adventure.

Climbing and Cycling

This weekend I opted out of doing a long day trip (5am-10pm) to the Red in KY and stuck around ohio to catch up on some rest and be ready to go for the next week of school. Some-times the day trip can really throw you off since its such a long day with 6-7 hours of driving, and a lot of climbing. Instead of focusing on climbing all weekend I switched it up a little bit with some other forms of fun training. Sat morning I did a 5miler with a couple of friends, and in the afternoon I planned on playing ultimate frisbee, but unfortunately we didnt have enough people to put together a real game so we just tossed the frisbee around. On Sunday I headed to a friends house and we biked to Scioto Audobon climbing wall and spent the day there in the sunshine n 84 degree weather. It was so nice to finally have nice weather in Ohio, the last couple weeks I have only experienced nice weather traveling outside of OH, but it was perfect - windy enough to make it not feel like 84 but still sunny and beautiful. 

Scioto Audobon's Climbing wall also called "Whittier" by most of the locals, islocated a little off of front street in downtown columbus. They have imitation rock and some climbing holds on as well, so climbers have the option of climbing "natural features" or using the holds. There are two or three lead routes that require only 6 draws (i believe), and the rest are top rope. In order to set up the top ropes you have to "bolder up" an 8-10 foot section in the back, and while wearing your harness, clip in a set of slings to the cable that runs throughout the top of the wall and run your rope through whatever climb you want. There are also some spots here that are just bouldering sections that are pretty fun.

Here's a photo of one of those boulder only sections. This is usually what I end up doing here when I go because I am not patient enough to wait for and open spot on the top rope climbs. This wall has gotten very popular among the climbing crowd in columbus, especially since it is FREE to climb there, you just need your own gear. I climbed here more last spring when it hadn't gotten as popular yet. I love the idea of being outside in the sun climbing only 15 minutes away from my apartment, but the "imitation rock" and holds have all gotten pretty slimey and you have to be careful with the holds because they tend to spin pretty easily. I've heard rumors that this is due to the lack of volunteers willing to tighten the hold and help clean em off, apparently the climbing wall itself is all volunteer run, except for the rangers that drive by and make sure no one is climbing after it closes. I might be spoiled with super frictiony and sticky rock with only climbing in the spring and fall because of my summer guide job at La Vida, but its too slimey for my tastes, and like I said before it does get very crowded on nice days. Most of the time I can spend a whole day here and just end up socializing more that I do actually working out. So if I'm looking for a day of fun climbing in the sun with friends I'll go here, but if I really want to focus on training and getting a really good workout I'll head to trusty old VA, where I always seems to leave sore, especially on the slow days where there are not as many people to distract me from my work out.

The bike ride was my first long ride, it was about 10 miles each way and we biked with all our climbing gear for the day there. I was thankful to have to fight the head wind on the way there, so that on the way back, when we were tired of climbing all day, we had a tail wind to help us out a little bit. But the overall pace of cycling I must say is really refreshing and I can see how it can be addicting. Its nice to be able to cover 10 miles no problem, in a short amount of time. Its such a big difference than running/walking/hiking, and so much less strain on your body it seems. I finally understand why it has gotten so popular with the younger crowd recently. I have been wanting to try it our for quite some time, but havent had the chance to. I thoroughly enjoyed it and could totally see myself getting into, I just need to quit buying climbing gear for a while so i can save up enough money to get a decent bike. The bike that I rode on yesterday was worth 1200$ new, 200$ less than what I paid for my truck. Its really expensive, but if you use that as your way to get around the city, it is essentially your car, especially if you live in a city where you don't get that much snow or bad winter weather.

If you haven't tried it yet, find someone you know with an extra or older bike and try it out. Its an awesome way to get some exercise, get outside, and go exploring your city or anywhere you feel like that day. Careful though, you might start having to survive on a diet of ramen noodles to afford a good bike.

Spring Break Trip:)

Instead of Blabbering on about my Spring Break trip to Foster Falls Tennessee and Huntington State Beach Park I decided to just tell you the story through photos.

  

Overall Great trip. Lots of laughter, sun, and new experiences.

Was A perfet Last-spring-break-ever trip.

Online Portfolio Finally Published

Hey guys I finally finished my online portfolio! I used carbonmade.com which has a "free version" of their portfolios. I'm sure it would be cooler if I paid and got all the perks for it, but for now this will do. Check it out at http://www.kbirdsall.carbonmade.com/!!!!

Sign up for your free portfolio now here!



Fading Tradition of Hand Painted Advertising

Thanks to OrganicClimbing's facebook page, I watched this cool video that emphasizes the importance of patiently working through a process. Nursing a pulley injury in  climbing right now I am more acutely aware of the process of patiently, but still very determinedly, working towards your goals. This video touches on the slow but beautiful process that we encounter in life sometimes, a process that us climbers and athletes are all too aware of as we strive to obtain our own personal goals.

Watch the video Up There by Mekanism on Vimeo.com 

Sleeping bag fun

Hey guys I'll post more on what i've been up to for the past two weeks later this week when I don't have so much school to do but I found some fun videos for sleeping bags on backpacker.com.

I spent all last summer in my dad's Marmot Pinacle 15 degree bag. I actually borrowed it from him before he actually had a chance to use it and then -the horrible daughter that I am - borrowed it for the whole summer of leading trips in the Adirondacks and I never washed partly out of laziness and partly because I wasn't really sure how to wash down bags. But here's a helpful video explaining how to wash your sleeping bags:

Washing your sleeping bag Video -backpacker.com

I'm excited to try this technique out on the Stoic Vamp 15 degree down bag I just got off of Steepandcheap.com for a very good price. I will look like a carrot when I'm sleeping for sure, but if I roll off my hammock n down a hill in this thing - It will be an easy search and rescue attempt with the extremely bright orang color. But I was preasantly surpised with the leg room for how light this bag is when I tried it out in my apartment. When I'm sleeping on my back outside, I sometimes like to bend a knee to the side, and in some mummy bags, that just isn't possible, but this one it worked out great. I'm very excited to see how it holds up this weekend in my second trip out to start the climbing season out. I'll let ya guys know how it works.

 here's some other fun videos and such that backpacker offers:

fun sleeping bag  test

Fixing your bag guide

shopping guide

Happy Sleeping!