My first 5.12!!!

Most of you have probably gathered this much so far from Facebook, but on Saturday, I sent my first 5.12!  The climb, Latin Lover (12a), is awesome and Greg took some sick footage that I have some snapshots from to share.

One of the holds at the crux on Latin Lover : Greg Horvath

Greg Horvath

Greg Horvath

Greg Horvath

Saturday was my fourth day on the route and the whole crew was nice enough to come over and support me.  My first go felt really good.  It was the best I felt on it the entire time, but I botched a sequence up high and got my third one hang.  On my second go, I felt tired and got another one hang.  I thought about calling it, but Mark said he would stay with me so I could take a longer rest and give it another go.  I was not too hopeful given it was my third go that morning but I pulled it off!  I really wanted to climb 5.12 on this trip so it was pretty cool to climb 12a three weeks in, and at Smith.  That night we went out to Diego's Spirited Kitchen in Redmond and got some surprisingly good Mexican food.  Mark and I split a Negra Modelo (on tap!) to celebrate the send.

There are a few climbs I would be interested get on, but for now I am pretty dang content (and psyched) to support Mark, Greg, and Alix.  All three have projects that they are close to sending.  Projecting is awesome!  On a somewhat similar note, Alix onsighted (sent the route first try with no beta) Pure Palm (11a) in the Lower Gorge.  Pretty awesome!  I also took some pictures of her freshly painted purple nails.

Alex on her onsight of Pure Palm

Other than that, the weather has been less than ideal.  It is funny to think that just a couple weeks ago Mark and I were sweating as we floated down the river, and now we are working around some significant precipitation.  However, the route that Greg and Mark are projecting is overhung, so it stayed dry this morning.  We were the only ones climbing, so it was pretty cool to feel like we had the place to ourselves.  Mark one hung the climb twice, so we are going to rest tomorrow, and he will get back on it Wednesday, weather permitting.

Rain at Smith

The forecast is calling for some high temps at Smith after Wednesday so we will most likely be heading up to Index, WA pretty soon here.  Supposedly Index has some of the best granite crack climbing in Washington, but I have also heard a rumor about some good bouldering.  After all this time on a rope I am getting excited to boulder and get some power back!