Labor Day climbing

Who wants to wake up at 6 a.m. to go rock climbing? Anyone? Well, we did. After staying up 'til midnight the night before. I need more sleep.

We got to Mt Lemmon a little before 8 am. Can I just say some bicyclists bug me? We must have passed 30-40 on the way up the mountain. They wouldn't stay in their bicycle lane. Why in the world would you bike on a winding mountain road and not move out of the street when a car was trying to drive around you?! You have your own special bike lane people! Moving on...

Justin was getting scout training for climbing and rappelling and wanted to take us. I wanted to go too, since I've never done it before, aside from a fake climbing wall once.

It probably took an hour or more to get all the ropes untangled and tied up to the hooks embedded in the rock. I went down second, after Samantha. Scariest thing I've done in a really long time.

I couldn't look down. The hardest part was getting over that first ledge. The next hardest part was trusting that rope and my own strength to stop it so I wouldn't go down too fast. Oh man, gets my adrenaline rushing just thinking about it again.

Here I go! I think this was my second time though. I wouldn't have gone down with a backpack my first try. It was a little less scary the second time.

There was this crazy old hippie that was rappelling next to us on the left. I think that guy had a few screws loose but he was a really good, experienced rock climber. He had been climbing for either 15 or 50 years. I couldn't tell what he said. He kept telling me to let go of the rope with my left hand because I didn't need it, I would just use up my strength needlessly. He may have been right, but there was no way I was going to let go for too long, and certainly not while I was descending. My right arm was getting tired and my hand was starting to get rope burn after a while.

You can't see it but there's a hoop in front of me that's got the rope wrapped around it to take a lot of friction and slow me down a lot. You just bring the rope out to your right to go down a little.

This was just a really cool shot, not much further down than the previous one.

Whew, my nerves were tired when I finally made it down. So were my arms.

Here's the master. He was a lot faster than the rest of us. He stayed at the top to belay the rest of us and then rappelled down so we could start climbing. There was a little path off around to the left where we could hike back up, for those of us with babies and strollers and no skill for climbing all the way to the top. :)

Go Meagy, go! Look at that skinny little thing! She loves climbing. She went up several times and would have gone up more but there were some serious rain clouds coming in and we had to go before she could.

Such skill. I can't believe she wasn't scared.

Here she's at the highest she can go, and will now rappel down.

Here's Meagan rappelling. She was so funny. She really liked jumping down and kept telling everyone else to do the same.

Our group, minus me and Justin at the top and Samantha off with her baby.

Here's Justin at the part where I stopped climbing. You can even see the smoother rock up ahead.

Look at that form! He could go higher with those climbing shoes on. Painful things! Well, not those so much, the other pair we brought.

Victory! King of the Mountain. He made it all the way.

And now, for a brief break in climbing for a little spelunking.

Candace was not interested in climbing at all. She did have fun with rocks and sticks though.

Here's my attempt. I got scared right at about this point. I couldn't get my right leg any higher. Plus, my right hand was getting scraped on the rock. Luckily Justin talked me through it and gave me a little more confidence. I'm glad he did. It made me overcome my fear and I was able to go higher when I didn't think I could.

There's my limit. Nice little safe ledge. It was fun to rappel down when Justin had the ropes instead of me.

How we all felt by the end. Poor little guy tuckered himself out playing with all those grapes and crackers. He ate the whole time. What a mess!

We'll go again soon. Really fun. Definitely need climbing shoes, helmets and gloves for the next time. There's nothing like conquering your fear and doing something you didn't think you could do.