Desert life begins

Vee
May 9, 2017
3 min read

After a week of that San Francisco city life we were itching to get back out in to the wild. We heard through the grapevine that our friend Tilley, with his fiancee Maddie, was living basically at the entrance of Zion National Park until the end of April, so we felt the urge to go visit them and check out Zion, which is a place we've never been and wanting to see. While we were figuring out a route to Utah, we learned that our preferred routes (going down the coast via Big Sur or going through Yosemite) to Zion were not going to work due to road closures. Luckily California is full of beautiful places and we ended up going through Bishop(where I've never been) and getting some hot spring action along the way.

We learned quickly that roads like this...

Could cause disasters like this. We had to step it up on the interior stabilization front. #vanlifelessons

We went out on a search for climbable rock in the Sugarloaf area and found this instead.

Not a bad place to be.

Travertine Hot Springs.

Highly, highly recommend taking a soak in one of these.

A wonderful day wrapped up with a yummy dinner made with foraged wild fennel from the Bay area!

Bishop was as advertised: beautiful, full of climbing, and windy as all hell.

Vanna in her natural habitat

The Buttermilk Boulders

Me: I like this warm-up!

Dylan: That's the down-climb

The majestic Sierras

After a short stint in Bishop we continued our journey towards Zion, through Death Valley.

Waking up in Alabama Hills near Lone Pine, CA

This overachiever went for a run and was doing this when I woke up, groggy and confused as per usual.

He also made me coffee and a delicious breakfast.

Running around in Death Valley, bye bye California!

We finally made it to Utah! We met up with our friends Tilley and Maddie, who graciously hosted our two week stay in the area. Climbing and camping in one of the most beautiful places in the world, with free showers, laundry and awesome friends nearby? Lucky lucky us.

Tilley showed us around his favorite local climbing spots. Shown here is Lambs Knoll.

I somehow ended up projecting a climb here and eventually sent it before we had to leave Utah. (Photo from TIlley)

We tried to rescue a baby mouse. Hope he's alive somewhere and is free of the Hantavirus.

Goofing around in Moe's Valley

Boulder time!

We tested our little camp oven to see if we could make pizzas.

Et voilà! Here we have a double tortilla pizza with cheese in between the two tortillas, to create a "stuffed crust" effect. Invented by yours truly!

Camped out in Utah Hills with Tilley and Kyle from Boone. This is their campsite.

This was our campsite. Also pictured is Tilley's dog Luna, the senile senior crag wolf.

I have never seen climbing so close to camp. To the left of the white arrow is Dylan on the wall.

One of many beautiful Utah sunsets.

Checking out the trad climbing in Zion National Park!

Dylan up high and I'm making lizard friends. #badbelaying

Zion is incredible.

Lovely hike through the Kolob Canyon...

To the Namaste Wall! Tilley powers up the juggiest jugs.

Not only was Tilley a super fun climbing partner, he also shared my fierce love for noodles and even brought them out to the crag to share. Best. Day. Ever.