My record-compulsion has been nagging at the back of my head for months now, so here I am.

Marcus and I concluded our run with a semi-burned out trip back to Sierra Eastside to get some alpine climbing in on our alpine climbing trip. You can read about our misadventures on my Sierra Alpine trip report. This saga concluded with a few more memorable characters: Angelo the very stoned Hostel caretaker in Bishop who answered the door in the middle of the night in a rainstorm, took us in, and earnestly discussed the merits of Totem camming devices in his dank bouldering cave well into the next morning; and Stan the Man, the most excitable FS ranger anyone will ever meet.

After the Sierra, Marcus and I parted ways — both beat and ready for a break. I motored home to Myrtle Creek, Oregon to stay for a few days before heading East to Wyoming. After working the rock climbing section of an Outdoor Educator semester I bummed around Lander for a few weeks getting my sport climbing on. I made an interesting few friends in the free camping section of Sinks Canyon and was reminded again of that powerful and hilarious tendency of climbing to bring bizarre people close together.

Soon after I met up with a friend Bryan and we headed to the Tetons to hopefully catch things in winter condition, still. You can read about our numerous (and eventually successful) attempts to climb the Grand Teton car-to-car in a day in winter conditions on my Grand Day trip report page. In between our Teton attempts, we spent some quality time at City of Rocks — a spectacular maze of granite domes in rural Idaho. Here we made friends with the cattle we shared our random BLM campsite with, ticked off a long list of classic trad climbs, and got very dehydrated. It was hot.

Bryan and I concluded our honeymoon with a humbling trip to Fremont Canyon for more Wyoming hardman climbing, which, you guessed it, is on my Fremont Canyon page. Since then, both Bryan and I set off on 30-day backcountry rock climbing courses in the Wind River Range. Every year it seems I am awed again by the scale and potential of the Winds.

After that I moseyed home for family time at the South Umpqua Intertribal Powwow and to give much needed love to my wheezing Subaru. On a short trip to the PNW to visit friends, Marcus and I met up again to climb the North Ridge of Mt. Baker, which was awesome.

Starting in October I’ll be living in Dahab, Egypt doing a whole bunch of cool climbing things in the Sinai desert like teaching basic climbing classes, developing new routes and areas, and working with Bedouin guides. The Desert Divers Dahab webpage has some info and guidebooks for climbing in the area.

Now it’s written down. Phew. I’ve been writing a few other things, too, so check them out:

Adventure’s Beginning, a story about my first time riding a motorcycle