miss akay

Climbing at Mickey's Beach with John David

Wow! Another fabulous outdoors excursion. Though John left his Bay Area climbing guide when we had lunch in Santa Roas, we seem to hit the jack-pot from the moment we pulled up on the roadside to scope out the climbs. We walked down a rather moderate switchback down to the ocean. The beach just a few hundred yards north of us is a nude beach. It is sort of funny to search online for information on the climbs we were attempting, because there are pictures of naked, old men climbing the rocks. Hilarious! Anyway, we didn't see any. And we decided to keep our clothes on. Personal preference, you know how it goes!

There were atleast 6 routes in the immediate area with bolts sunk into the rock. None of them was within my lead climbing skill range. John got partially up the first climb on lead. We decided to top-rope it and it was still challenging, but very do-able for us both. Alas, I have no idea what the route is called or what it was rated because we didn't have the guide with us. The second climb we did was also a good challenge, but neither of us made it over the final crux. Bummer! I nearly took the prints off my fingers, trying to hold on with any friction I could generate. At least the view from there was spectacular! I decided it couldn't get much better than climbing right on the Pacific Ocean. Every so often sea gulls or pelicans flew right overhead. It was beautiful! The weather was warm but not too hot, by the ocean. The sunset turned everything a goldeny hue as we packed up and head back up to Route 1.

All in all it was a blissfull end to a great 24 hours of camping, star gazing, shooting star watching, tearing up to wine country and back, driving through cow country and finishing with great climbing on the ocean just before sunset. If you ever have the chance to camp with John, do it. I nearly forgot to mention his crazy quesadilla making skills! Bravo!

posted by miss akay @ 9:50 PM