Always good to get a little exposure therapy in winter - sun and verticality...
Always amazing to get to witness your partner becoming more confident and passing milestones - First lead climbs, first rappels, first mulit-pitch sea cliff, first time on limestone, first retreat off of a loose trad route, first time rapping to the end of a rope several feet off the deck, first simul-climb, first solo knife-edge ridge traverse, first time climbing and shooting with a camera. Perhaps the most impressive is surviving living in a tent for a week and sharing a kitchen with a dozen dirtbag climbers for the first time.
I am amazed and realize what a gumby I was my first couple decades of climbing when my partner realizes all this just a few months into her climbing career - and in just a week.
all images ©Bennett Barthelemy, unless otherwise indicated...
