Granite

Some of you may know my friend Rebekah Granat. She is a rock climber. Like she climbs all over the world in between being a nurse. We did the triathlon together with Ariana in San Jose in 2008.
I, on the other hand, think rock climbing is amazing in theory, but until yesterday I had only done it inside. And that was only like 5 times.
About a year ago, I got an outdoor rock climbing experience for my birthday. Whichever one I wanted. I just used it yesterday.
It was hands down one of the coolest things I've ever done in my whole life.
So the class I chose was about a 7 hour class. It could have up to 6 people. It was only me. My instructor is 30 years old. Her name is Amylee. She's been climbing her entire life. And snowboarding. And mountaineering for 23 days on an Alaskan glacier. And being a hiking guide. You know, ain't no thing. But seriously, she's so cool. And she has a little girl named Aven and I LOVE that name.
Amylee and I got along super good, and that made the whole day amazing.

The climbing we did was quite a bit different than I thought it would be. I was picturing climbing something like this:

Something very jagged with lots of places to put your HANDS and FEET. This mountain is in the middle of town near my house.
Instead, this was my first climb:

 

This looks like I'm way far up, but really, it's only about 15 feet at this point. I did go up to about 40 feet on this climb though (and about 80 feet on a climb later). I almost cried going down I was so excited. (Not because it hurt or anything- this was one of the easier climbs.) But the view and everything was just beautiful and I could not believe I was really doing it!
So the rating system of climbs is basically 5.0-5.15. 5.0 is really easy. Only a few people in the world can do 5.15's. This is a 5.4 or 5.5. The one where I'm sitting at the top was a 5.6 or 5.7. I did one 5.8 that kicked my butt. I could not even start the 5.9. I was tired, but it was also really really hard. That's the bottom picture.

Amy and I climbed together, so I would climb and then she would climb and I would "belay" her, which means I held the rope and made sure she didn't fall. At the first location, she just walked around the back of the mountain and placed the rope, but then we got in her Subaru (shocking, I know) and drove to another location, where you could not do that. Instead, she climbed up, attached herself to one of the anchors and then kept climbing until she got to the other one. So then I was called a "lead belay." Which basically meant I had to keep the rope the perfect combination of loose and tight. Too loose and she would trip. Too tight and I would pull her off the mountain. And always paying attention because if she fell, it would always be at least 8 feet. No pressure. Before she got on the mountain, she said I looked nervous. I told her of course I looked nervous. I learned how to do this 2 hours ago. She told me I was doing awesome, that I was a fast learner, and that she had complete confidence in me. And that she wasn't going to fall, anyways. And then she got on the mountain. And she didn't fall and it was fine. And then on my climb, I got to take off all the "quick draws" (the carabiner's that she had put on the anchors) and even though it wasn't hard, I felt cool. :-)

I love my arm in this picture :-)

In one place (on the 5.8), I got stuck for like 10 minutes trying to get up and my foot kept sliding. I was getting so frustrated. It took me forever to try to get up. Later, when Amylee did the same climb, it took her a little while, too (Not nearly as long, but like 1 minute instead of 10 seconds). When she got to that part, she was like, "Good work up here! This place is BLANK!" It made me feel good to know that even someone who'd been climbing her whole life had a hard time in that place. :-)
So, all in all, I climbed up in 6 different places and went up 7 times. I got two tiny little cuts on two fingers (Amylee called them "rips" and then taped them. So I was like totally authentic then.)
Amylee said we could be climbing partners- like she'll call me if she's in Phoenix and I'll call her if I'm in Prescott, and that made me SO EXCITED!!!! And she might go camping with me and my friends sometime. And basically, it was just the coolest day ever.

The hardest one. No, I could not get up it. 

The View from where we started.