From City of Rocks we headed for Bend, Oregon. We were out to spend a few days climbing with Calvin, learn more about Big Walling (for more info on that, check out the Yosemite page), give him an update on how the trip was going so far, and visit at his Church.
On the way to Bend I got to find out two things: for one, in the desert regions of Oregon gas stations can be over 40 miles apart, and secondly, even when the gas gauge says completely empty my car can still go over 30 miles.
Once at Calvin's we got to see again and hang out with him and his pretty awesome kids.
We didn't climb very much for those couple of days, however we did some preparations for our upcoming visit at Yosemite, and the Big Wall we were going to attempt.
...which included both physical and mental training...
Finally we went out with Calvin and his daughters to Smith Rock to run through a practice pitch, just as if we were on a big wall. This was my very first experience jumaring (going up the rope instead of climbing the rock) and I found it to be tricky to say the least.
Did I mention I found it to be pretty tricky? Here Andy is already done hauling the big heavy haul bag, patiently waiting as I try to figure out which way I'm supposed to go.
After I finally got to the top, and we got back down both Calvin and Andy jumped on the route to free climb it. The route was a 5.11 finger crack and I had no intention of even touching it, but Andy was excited about it for a week afterwards, so he must have really liked it.
Somehow Andy tracked down a sample of the local fauna - not quite as exciting as the bears at yosemite (trust me - you do not want to miss that entry) - but a welcome change after the squirrels of City of Rocks.
On Sunday we headed out to Calvin's Church. This particular Church met in a school gym, in a super casual atmosphere. This is one of the pastors of the Church.
We got to wear our nice clothes, go up on stage and tell a bit about ourselves and our mission - we also met a ton of great people who were all very supportive of what we were doing.
Right after the service we hopped in the car and headed south towards sunny California, taking a quick detour to check out crater lake.
The road looked promising.
