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Reached for the pocket but inside was a........

Dirty Gri Gri, or is it GiGi? · · Vegas · Joined May 2005 · Points: 4,115

In Red Rock: I was about 30 feet up on lead when I had stopped to place a cam; as I had steadied myself ,and was just about place my hand and the cam in the nice horizontal crack, I noticed a Mojave Green rattlesnake right at my eye, and hand level. It was comfortably seated in the horizontal crack; it must have come in from the gully on my far right. I was excited to see such a snake that high up on a climb, but I thought it would be a good idea to give it some space. I moved slightly left of it, and had called down to Jonny to not stick his hand in the crack where the snake was, when following. He immediately yelled up to me, “Uh, I’m NOT climbing past a snake!” I assured him it was slow moving, and not to worry but he didn’t want to believe me. I offered to use my nut tool to gently flick the snake out, as the horizontal crack that the Mojave Green was lying in was shallow enough to do it fairly easy, but Jonny yelled at me, and said, “NO, it might fall down on me!!” Jonny was adamant that he wasn't going to follow me up, so I had no choice but to down lead. When I started to down lead, the Mojave Green warmed up, and started getting a little fiesty, so I quickly slithered down to a piece of pro I had placed below me. It was fun.

Coz Teplitz · · Watertown, MA · Joined Jan 2007 · Points: 215

I had a fun run-in with a baby copperhead at Table Rock in NC. I was a pitch off the ground, belaying my partner on a rather bush-filled lead up a corner, and he's knocking off all sorts of sticks, leaves, etc. One stick fell into a mountain laurel branch ~1 foot from my head and stayed there. I glanced over, bored, and nearly leaped of my skin when I saw a baby copperhead, maybe 12 inches long, hanging from its tail a foot from my face. We were both petrified - just standing there staring at each other. I inched as far away on the (small) ledge as I could, and he just hung there for the 10 minutes it took my partner to finish the lead. When I heard the "Off belay" call, I looked away for a second, and in that time he fled into the bush. When I looked up, I panicked again, and spent another five minutes peering into the bush until I figured out where he was and that I could safely climb past. Poor little thing - probably as freaked out by me (and the fall!) as I was of him. (BTW, baby copperheads make me more nervous than big ones, as they more often envenomate).

timt · · Wheat Ridge, CO · Joined Jan 2006 · Points: 50

so i parked illegally in clear creek.... yeah i saw the cones!
when i got back to my poor little honda, THIS was all that i found!!!!!!

lunch

Daryl Allan · · Sierra Vista, AZ · Joined Sep 2006 · Points: 1,040

I was following Christian up "if you bolt it they will come" on mt. lemmon this past weekend and nestled perfectly into a nice little pocket was a bird nest... complete with three sightless chirping baby birds. Awwwwwwww...

Dirty Gri Gri, or is it GiGi? · · Vegas · Joined May 2005 · Points: 4,115
timt wrote:so i parked illegally in clear creek.... yeah i saw the cones! when i got back to my poor little honda, THIS was all that i found!!!!!!
Your buddy can swallow my little Toyoto Dragon (Echo) any day!

Bat story: When I had first started leading trad at Red Rock, we headed over to First Creek Canyon, and I chose a beautiful varnished 5.6 crack on the Romper Room Wall. We had done some other routes that day, but we had the habit of climbing till dark to squeeze in as much climbing as we could. We were losing daylight fast, and as I was about 40 feet up, I noticed a bat right at my face level in the crack I was climbing; it was on route. At first glance the bat looked innocent, and kind of cute, but I never had my face that close to a bats before so it began to feel unnatural for both of us. I got creeped out as it started to go into methamphetamine withdrawals (so it seemed). I was up shit creek without a paddle and felt more vulnerable, as I didn't have my pro loaded yet. It got paranoid, then I started to get paranoid, it looked confused, and I didn't know what to do either, and the bat started to shake violently with severe tremors, then I got an Elvis leg, and searched for some protection, as I was at an awkward stance. It looked like it wanted to kill me, and it's teeth were all scary, and fuc*ed up. I thought about blocking it in with my #2 to protect my face, just in case it was homicidal. It sure looked like it was waiting for that window of opportunity to bite me. I stood there, gripped, and frozen, but finally got the nerve to bust a move, and that's when it bolted into the night's sky. I finished out the crack in the dark, but kept looking over my shoulder, just in case.
Shawn Mitchell · · Broomfield · Joined Mar 2008 · Points: 250
Dirty Gri Gri, or is it GiGi wrote:then I got an Elvis leg
In the wholesome Heartland and in-shape Rocky Mountain West, we call it "sewing machine leg." I guess in Sin City it's all about celebrity. Ha! Spooky story Gigi.

I was aiding a traversing crack under a roof on a wall route, and a swarm of little gray buggers--seemed like a cross between silver fish and some kind of swirl fossil--started dive bombing me. Eyes, ears, neck...it's hard to move fast on aid, especially with your eyes squinting half closed.

EDIT: I forget to delete Gigi's "?" and have to fix the post every time!
Buff Johnson · · Unknown Hometown · Joined Dec 2005 · Points: 1,145

I hate it when you reach for a good juggy hold only to find it was already occupied....

A typical summer day at The Wood

Dirty Gri Gri, or is it GiGi? · · Vegas · Joined May 2005 · Points: 4,115

See Just-in! You're not the only one annoyed with my

?

Edit:
Shawn Mitchell wrote: In the wholesome Heartland and in-shape Rocky Mountain West, we call it "sewing machine leg." I guess in Sin City it's all about celebrity. Ha!
That's how we can tell if you're a tourist in Red Rock! ; )

PS: send more water.
Jim Amidon · · Unknown Hometown · Joined Jun 2001 · Points: 850

While on about the second bolt of a new 5.11 in Ten Sleep Canyon I look up to see a perfect 4 finger pocket in that beautiful Limestone. In goes my four fingers and shortly after wards it feels like some one is driving a nail thru one of my fingers as the nest of hornets eject me from the route.....

FALLING

Mike Pharris · · Longmont, CO · Joined May 2007 · Points: 125

this reminds me of an incident my daughter had a couple years ago - she was about 13 at the time and on a top rope at Happy Hour Crag. She reached for a jug just above a roof and had a spider crawl up on her hand - she FLUNG herself off the rock, kicking and screaming "SPIDER, SPIDER". Her brother and I could hardly contain ourselves. Needless to say, she didn't want to try that route again.

Mike Lane · · AnCapistan · Joined Jan 2006 · Points: 880

To clip the anchors of Pay Homage at CWC, there is a blind reach over the lip to a horizontal hueco. Both Tom and I have seen rattlers curled up in that hueco.

Mike Dudley · · Vegas · Joined Nov 2008 · Points: 155

Fuck snakes

Shawn Mitchell · · Broomfield · Joined Mar 2008 · Points: 250
Mike Dudley wrote:Fuck snakes


EDIT: Gigi rode up to tell Mike what's what. How about Micah or timt, will this outrage go unrebuked?

EDIT 2: Gigi, notice how the colonists depict snakes about as malproportioned and misshapen as midieval artists did infants? Wonder why.
Dirty Gri Gri, or is it GiGi? · · Vegas · Joined May 2005 · Points: 4,115
Mike Dudley wrote:Fuck snakes
It's snakes fuck, not fuck snakes.

Edit: It's snakes fu*k, not fu*k snakes.



They move so beautifully together, don't they? Just look at them intertwined; the two becoming one in their dirty dance. The California Mountain Kings got it going on, but what else is new?
Mike Dudley · · Vegas · Joined Nov 2008 · Points: 155

oh man I cant even look at that stuff, snakes are just the creepiest and most evil things out there.

camhead · · Vandalia, Appalachia · Joined Jun 2006 · Points: 1,240

I have a few snake stories. Had a baby rattler fall off the top of the crag at Shelf Road and land just to my side, pissed off and striking at me the whole time.

Got my rope stuck while rappeling in the dark eight pitches up in Potrero, gave it a yank, and dislodged another baby rattler, which fell into my lap.

Found a full-grown rattler wedged vertically in a 5.8 corner handcrack in Red Rocks. It turned to 5.11 stemming for about five feet.

Was lounging and laying around, belaying a friend on TR up the Big Baby at IC, heard a rattle, and saw a rattler about two feet from my head.

And just a few weeks ago, I took a 45 fall at the Red River Gorge, pulled my belayer up to the first bolt, came within 3 feet of the ground, looked down, and saw a copperhead coiled up right where I would have cratered.

Mike Dudley · · Vegas · Joined Nov 2008 · Points: 155

Reading your stories makes me feel sick. I have a very irrational fear of the bastards and I know it. But knowing your fear is irrational is not enough to make it go away! Can we talk about teddy bears or something fluffy now please?

jcntrl · · Smoulder, CO · Joined Jun 2008 · Points: 0
Mike Dudley wrote:Reading your stories makes me feel sick. I have a very irrational fear of the bastards and I know it. But knowing your fear is irrational is not enough to make it go away! Can we talk about teddy bears or something fluffy now please?
Sure, Mike. We can talk about Teddy Bears. TEDDY BEARS FROM HELL!!!! MWAHAHAHAHAHAAAAA!

Dirty Gri Gri, or is it GiGi? · · Vegas · Joined May 2005 · Points: 4,115
Mike Dudley wrote: Can we talk about teddy bears or something fluffy now please?
Okay. If you ever come across any old Steiff Bears, I'll buy them from you. Distinguishing features: it's not a snake, it's fur is mohair, and stuffed with straw, not with rodents, has glass eyes, not snake eyes, and feel for a button in it's ear, and don't worry, it doesn't have a rattle. If you can produce, I promise I won't talk about snakes anymore in any thread you're posting in, Mike.




Oh yeah, the long snouted bears, not the long nose snakes, are more desirable as far as the age period goes.

And they don't have sexual relations with snakes. Only with other desirable bears, and old German Dolls, which I'd also be interested in, if you happen to stumble across any, of course. ; )
Shawn Mitchell · · Broomfield · Joined Mar 2008 · Points: 250

Well, if we're whipping our snakes out...

Before Boone Speed was a phenom and he was just a friendly, artsy, hippy college student (at BYU, no less), we climbed Tick Fever in Little Cottonwood Canyon. While I was leading the pitch, a large rattler strangely made a beeline straight toward Boone! It got within 10' or 15'. Don't know how close it really would have approached, but we weren't going to find out; Boone pelted it with large rocks. I don't now recall there being a stance good enough to hang and wait; in any event, I kept climbing and, while hearing his grunts and chucks and echoing rock hits, hoped he had a grip. The snake slunk away and disappeared, but we stayed nervous. After we rapped, we found it dead under a bush.

Mike Dudley wrote:I have a very irrational fear of the bastards and I know it. But knowing your fear is irrational is not enough to make it go away!
Mike, what is it in your psyche that makes you keep clicking this thread? :)
Guideline #1: Don't be a jerk.

General Climbing
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