From Hueco to Where Co.

Hello All, Today is day 5 at Hueco Tanks State Park and Historical Site. Hueco means hollow and Tanks refers to water: Hueco Tanks is an oasis in the desert where there is water in hollow formations. Its a pretty rad place: boulders are everywhere and when you go up to them you may find a cave on one side which opens up a passage to many more boulders and caves.

The climbing here is stupendous. At first it just stupifies; the "Oh my god" factor takes over and I find myself salivating over routes and sussing beta. The rock quality is mostly great, and the amount is huge with first ascents waiting to be had. This morning for example, I went with some friends Gustavo and Dingo to a good boulder called Ghetto Simulator - V2. I think it should hardly get a boulder grading... the problem is 20+ moves and over 10m long up this boulder. Whatever it is it's awesome! As I was talking about first ascents a climber named Jason Kehl put up a new problem behind Ghetto Simulator yesterday. This proud line visible from many areas had somehow remained unclimbed.

I spent the rest of the morning soaking up some vitamin D and working out the moves on a problem called "adjust you attitude." I got all the moves and now it comes down to linking them together: maybe with an adjustment of my attitude it will go... but probably not on this trip. Hopefully, though, on the way back north.

We will probably leave for Mexico on Friday morning, with hopes of crossing at the Columbia crossing (or possibly Laredo). Then we'll head south and take a bit of a break from the climbing bum lifestyle. I'll appreciate it and hopefully I'll come back to climbing with even more pysche. I know my heels will love the rest and lack of smashing.

On our first day I took a fall onto the rock and smashed my heels up good. I smashed em so good I couldn;t climb the next day and climbing isn't exactly happening without some of my new found best friend ibuprofin. The hiking across rock all day and constant impact is the worst for them. C'est la vie. It's all part of the game, and when you wager on the rock you sure as hell pay for it.

Tonight is movie night at the rock ranch. There is talk of Borat. If we watch that I don't know if Thomas will ever stop quoting it. hah. Now, though, I'll end this post here.

-Charlie