Quadrant 1: Colorado

Guest written by John

The constantly morphing scenery makes Indian Creek – our last update – just a five star blur in the past, a faint memory stacked behind numerous others… except for that dirtbagger’s rope I core shot falling fifteen feet on Crack Attack (5.11-). For the non-climbers, the white guts inside the rope provide the tensile strength required to stop a falling climber, while the outer sheath serves to protect said inner fibers from dirt, abrasion and nachos. As a rope wears, the inner guts stretch out, reducing the rope’s ability to absorb energy over time by dynamically stretching during a fall. Thus, the energy (about 4.8 kJ in the above scenario) is absorbed in a much shorter interval, increasing the peak force on the rope. Conclusion: Don’t climb on dirtbagger ropes.

“It’s okay, I’ll just cut the last 3 meters off,” – Proud Free Soloist.

Fortunately, we’re rocking a brand new rope. Thanks Beth (a.k.a ‘mom’) and Baird!

The 25 mile drive along UT128 from Moab to Castleton Tower criss-crosses the Colorado River’s torrential path through deep-cut sandstone cliffs several hundred feet high. We pretended Ludwig was a raft drifting upstream through the Grand Canyon, and pondered the immense beauty… the canyon was barely wide enough for a river, let alone a road, and certainly too narrow for satellite radio. As we approached Castleton Tower, the stereotypical Utah cliffs suddenly met the quintessential Colorado Rockies.

We wish we could take credit for this picture

Pure sensory overload.

We weren’t able to climb the tower due to the rain, but we hiked to the base and were amazed at the choss factor. We camped at the Tower’s foothills on beautiful Access Fund land (OMG donate).

Castleton Tower from a distance… looks small from here

Lauren posing at the bottom of the tower after a grueling hike up

From Castleton Tower, we booked it into Colorado, stopping in Grande Junction to get Ludwig’s heat-warped brakes serviced. From there, we made a two day stop in Rifle, CO to climb America’s best limestone sport crag. Rifle is a primarily overhung, polished pumpfest on unique, blocky limestone. The established routes were historically so difficult that a few years back the city required route setters to put up one ‘moderate’ route for every new ‘hard’ route. Still, there are very few quality routes 5.10 and below. Every single route we ticked was better than nearly anything at our local crags. Rifle is so good that my main climbing partner (An)Drew is heading up to Denver next weekish for Rifle: Round 2.

Lauren pretending to climb to get a picture that showcases Rifle Mountain Park

From Rifle, we headed to Black Canyon National Park, which is a 2200 foot sheer cliff on par with Yosemite, except for the choss/rockfall/ticks/poison ivy/epic potential/etc; our guidebook gives it five stars ‘for the seasoned climber’. The Gunnison River loses more elevation traveling through the park than the entire 2320 mile Mississippi River.

“It’s so deep!”

…

While we were in Rifle, an old climbing buddy contacted Lauren and mentioned he had a cabin in Durango, CO, surrounded by excellent climbing. I knew I’d been to Durango in the past with my brother and Baird, but it took me a while to remember we’d previously driven CO550’s death-defying, guard-rail-less hairpin turns in a Jeep lacking ABS, traction control, or a sane driver (I forget whether Reid or I drove)… sometime around 2001 or so. I suddenly remembered an architecturally odd overpass, and then the hundred or so pre-EPA gold mines littering the highway. Fourteen years ago I’d wanted to climb into these deathtraps, and last week I finally did (safely, parents). Imagine my surprise when upon entering the structure I saw my business partner’s inscription in charcoal capitals:
CODY WILSON
ARKANSAS 2005

Impatiently sitting at Ouray County’s sole traffic light, I briefly pondered my future reintegration into large-town America (wherever that might be; certainly too far into 2016 to contemplate seriously). I suspect our ‘16,000 highway miles’ trip around North America is actually 30,000 or more; we’ve already logged 4000 miles exploring Arizona, SE Utah and SW Colorado. Ludwig’s holding an impressive 18 mpg over the trailing 3085 miles, with a 22.1 mpg personal best over 589 miles. Our overall trip fuel consumption is about the same, since we expected to get around 10-12 mpg. Gotta love that 35 gallon gas tank (which would yield an impressive 2100 miles in the Insight).

I miss you, Squib

After visiting two nonexistent Radio Shacks, our third attempt yielded the 220 kΩ resistor I needed to modify our refrigerator to work properly. Previously, the fridge’s brushless DC motor worked 100% on 12 V, but had an intermittent issue at 24 V. I knew the fridge used a Danfoss D35F compressor, and after reading the entire manual (a few times due to a combination Engrish and mind-baffling technical writing liberties), I knew what to do, but lacked the tools to do so. Undeterred and lacking a soldering iron, I kludged together a hack to fix the issue. Result: the fridge now works 100% at any input voltage. Add our brand new stove to the mix and our stomachs are finally content.