Joshua Tree Rita's Birthday Challenge (31 routes in a day)
March 12th 2012
The Challenge:
Late night at Pappy and Hariets, the group of 5 of us (Vivky, Lea, Tony, Rita and I) were sipping some drinks and relaxing to some live music. I was trying to stay awake (I got 2.5 hours of sleep the night before) when I heard Tony energetically announce "We are doing the birthday challenge, what time should we wake up?" He explained that the birthday challenge is that you need to climb your age in routes. It was Rita's 31st birthday. I didn't think it was possible, but we went for it.
The Planning |
The Routes (35 are listed, we mixed and matched a few different ones):
Eye Sore 5.4
Eye Strain 5.3
Simptaico 5.1
The Trough 5.0
Karpwitz 5.6
B-1 5.1
B-2 5.3
B-3 5.3
Tiptoe 5.7+
Eschar 5.4
Tulip 5.6
Lizard's Hangout: 7 total
Off to see the Lizard 5.5
Lizard Taylor 5.5
Lizard Breath Arden 5.5
Goeb's Goes Gecko 5.2
Poodle Lizard 5.7
Lizard Skin 5.9
Right Lizard Crack 5.9
Dairy Queen Wall: 10 total
Leap year Flake 5.7
Double Delight 5.7
Chili Dog 5.6
Scrumdillyishus 5.7
Frosty Cone 5.7
Mr. Misty Kiss 5.7
Dilly Bar 5.5
Double Decker 5.7
Bill's Nuts 5.7
Nuts and Cherries 5.6
Unwiped Butt 5.4
Taurus 5.7
Men with Cow's Heads 5.5
Self Abuse 5.6
Solar Technology 5.6
The Celebration |
The climbing was so much fun. We comboed some lead climbing with some soloing with some top ropes and between the five of us, we climbed 155 routes. As we climbed each number, we reminisced on significant events during that period of our lives. Stories were shared: Living with your grandma, getting married, living abroad, singing in a band etc.. Twelve hours later landed us with huge grins on our faces stuffing our mouthes at Pie for the People.