Birthday Bash: Moab

Anthony Riske and Co. hosted their annual rock climbing Birthday Bash in Moab, UT over Easter weekend.  It was a great weekend of camping and climbing in the desert with some old friends and a lot of new ones.  Anthony knows a lot of great people and I was blessed to meet a lot of them over the weekend.  Since my brother, Matthew's birthday was on March 29th.  He flew out for the birthday festivities as well. 

About half of us met at the Gold Bar Campground on Potash Road just out side of Moab late Thursday night. The rest of the crew (20 something in total?) trickled in throughout the day on Good Friday. 

The climbing highlight of the trip was Fine Jade (5.11) on the Rectory.  5 of us, Anthony, Zach, Jean, Matthew, and myself, drove to the Castleton Valley Friday morning.  We charged up the approach trail with extreme levels of stoke about our climbing objective.  It was also Matthew's birthday and I don't think there was anything else he would have rather been doing for his B-Day.

The climbing was exquisite.  It was lazer-cut desert splitters of varying size for 5 pitches (we did it in 3), and it was very well sustained in the 5.10-5.11 range.  It was great to be in a party of 5 too.  It makes for a nice social outing, and everyone was a strong climber, allowing us to be relatively fast and efficient. 

Hiking past Castleton Tower, STOKED!

Fine Jade climbs the sunny face on the Rectory

Anthony in the physical crux of the climb.

Jean chilling on a belay ledge enjoying the view of the La Sal Mts. 

Matt belaying us on the direct 5.11 face finish

Summit Panorama

That evening we had a great time around camp hanging out with friends and celebrating Matt's birthday.

The next day we headed to Wall Street to party crag.  It was a lot of fun, but I was pretty tired from fine Jade the day before and I was getting over a bit of a head cold and it was also very hot.  Thankfully we had enough strong leaders that I could be a top-rope tough-guy in the afternoon heat. 

Unfortunately I had to be back in Boulder for Easter Sunday to help out with the service.  Matthew and I also needed to be back for work Sunday night, so we left Saturday Afternoon after a quick dip in the Colorado River.  We were sad to leave so soon, but Easter was really special and it was good to be back for the grain market open.