lee vining

[Crack]

what a killer time: i flew down on southwest for about 60 bucks each way (the internet purchase seemed to bypass the 2 week advance criteria) and we stayed at murphy's for 50 bucks a night...the ice is fatter now than any pic i've seen, and it's fuckin' great to climb ice and not freeze like i'm used to up north (one stick wonders feel like cheating!). the approach is a lickety split donkey trail, and for some reason the loads of people back there all crowd the chouinard wall. we climbed there for 3 days (thurs. - sat.) and never had to wait on the main wall and the dale-barrington wall. a lot of people seem content to just stand around and smile. weird. if i ever develop my pics and scan them and get the know-how, i'd post -but i probably won't ever on all 3 of those. loads of moderate lines (2's, 3's, and 4's), but not much for the hardmen. killer granite and mixed lines though. the biggest drawback is the "town" of lee vining -it sucks ass. the one bar closes at 8pm, and the one venue for food (nicely's) is unbelievably awful (breakfast is ok, but even canadians can't fuck up eggs). we finally headed to mammoth where the scene is like so totally freakin' l.a., but all in all a great fix for someone who needed to get out on some ice now it's back to work for this bitch