Squamish, redux

We arrived in Squamish at the tail end of their long winter and dragged out spring to enjoy a week of 90+ degree weather!  We immediately settled in and got down to business...there's more climbing to be done than we could possibly touch in a lifetime.

For those who don't know about this climbing paradise, take a look at the western coast of British Columbia, find Vancouver then go North about 25 miles to the little town of Squamish at the tip of Howe Sound.  There you will find a formation called the Stawamus Chief, 2000 feet of granite walls rising straight out of the water.  Not to mention all the other 'smaller' formations in the area that would be world class in their own right: the Slaney (formerly Squaw), the Papoose, the Malamute....400-1000 feet high and riddled with amazing rock to climb.  If you're interested in checking out the area try this site: www.squamishclimbing.com 

So far we've climbed about as much as my muscles can handle (Mike could climb 24 hours a day).  We've done some incredible routes, including a day of 18 pitches and over 2000 feet of climbing to the top of the Second Peak.   There's so much daylight here that you can literally climb until almost 10 at night (and we have done so accidentally on a couple of occasions!) .  We've met a lot of nice people here, including a whole crew of folks from the UK.  It's interesting, when we were here 2 years ago there were a lot more Americans from all over the place.  Now we see a few license plates from the Northwest, California and Colorado, but by and large everyone else is either Canadian or has traveled from Europe.  The cooking area at night is a hodge podge of languages; we've heard German,French, Dutch, Swiss, Flemish, Hebrew, Portuguese.....it's a pretty cool mix!   Not a lot else is different from our last trip here, the campground is a little bigger and there's now a water tap at the cooking area, oh joy! :)  Simple pleasures!  

Last week there was big drama: a guy tried to BASE jump off the top of the Chief on a very windy day.  He ended up getting blown back into the cliff with his parachute and (very luckily) got stuck on a small ledge a couple hundred feet from the top.  A huge rescue effort was pulled together that took about 6 hours and lots of helicopter time.  He was eventually pulled up and flown away, with only a broken ankle.  Incredible!  So that's the big news for now!

We'll stay here a bit longer, not really sure exactly when we'll be able to drag ourselves away or where we'll be next, so stay tuned!

Hope this finds everyone well and enjoying the summer!

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