Jackson Falls Weekend

I was lucky enough this weekend to spend the past three days living my dream at Jackson Falls in Southern Illinois. Pretty awesome! I cruised in on Friday night and stayed through today, climbing with tons of people and getting to climb on tons of new stuff! Here is a quick recap:

Saturday:

I camped with Evan and Katie, who are both from the Chicago area, and we woke up early to head out to a very hard to find sector at Jackson Falls called The Promised Land. It's pretty awesome, and was named because of the high potential of really amazing lines that were there. They were right.

When we got there Evan and I warmed up on an awesome .10b called XOXO (hugs and kisses), which I sufficiently sucked it up on by falling once and then taking twice after that I believe. It was a really cool overhung route though. The kind of line that I really love, but the kind of line that I'm not so great at due to my lack of endurance on that style. Next, we went over and I TR'd an .11a called better late than never that I was able to get clean. Maybe, I'll lead it next time. After that Evan led up a few .12's that I decided to not get on and then we left. On the way back though I was able to stop at Industry and give it one quick go and reached a high point just past the 3rd bolt. It will hopefully go soon with the change in temps coming up this next weekend.

Sunday:

Evan, Katie, and I woke up, and had an epic after Evan locked the keys in their car. Mike ended up coming in too and we were finally off and hit up The Sophomore a super run out 5.9 that I luckly onsighted. Then, I moved over and flashed this cool .10c called Tons of Fun that Evan had just set the draws on. After that we cruised over to the Mr. Jimmy Boulder and did an .11b variation of this arete route called Piss Ant. I led it up but took a fall and had I believe another 2 or 3 takes. It was pretty stout for sure. After that Evan and I hit up Who Needs Friends a super stout 5.12a. I led it up through the 3rd bolt, clipped the 4th draw in but since I have no endurance I just couldn't stick with it and took the whipper and let Evan have his 10 minute epic near onsight.

Monday:

With Evan and Katie gone I ended up hooking up with an old climbing parter of Dads, Dave Downy. It's definitely really cool to get to climb with him and it's really great to to watch him climb harder than me and he's like 60 something. We got up and chilled out for a bit in the morning and then warmed up on TR on a trad route called Suspended Animation 5.9, which I was able to turn into a 5.10 with my terrible beta. Next, we went down and I was able to onsight a cool .10b at The Gallery called Deep Throat. After that, Dave and I husseled over to Big Star Wall and I gave an onsight go of The Birthday Route, 5.10b, which I flubbed up about 4 bolts up by missing some dumb hidden foot hold. Go figure. Next, I was successfully able to onsight another route, also a .10b, and it is called Alaska. It wasn't my favorite. It was nice to be able to really get to work on some of my endurance on that route though. Finally, Dave and I ran over and I gave a go on Group Therapy, one of the best .10c's at Jackson, and probably even in Southern Illinois. I sucked it up on that one too. It's basically and overhung jug haul, not my style...yet, so I ended up taking a few times and having a fall. Kinda bummed because it would have been really nice to have red pointed that one. There is always next time.

That's pretty much the weekend in a super quick summary. Definitely, was worth it though and I think that I might finally be getting some endurance back! I can't wait to be back to full form for sport. It looks like I'll be at JF again for next weekend too so I'll definitely be posting some stuff up after next weekend! I hope that everyone is doing well!