Weekend

A funny thing happened this weekend.  Something that was unthinkable 2-3 years ago and I honestly can't remember a time that it's happened to this extent.  Maybe when the Duluth crew came down but I can't remember.

On Saturday Katie and I took a crew from St. Louis around for the day.  We spent some time up at Monolith, North Shore, Anchorpoint and Jenga.  As always it was fun taking people around the lake for the day and giving a tour.  Venus Rising and Anchorpoint got done by one of the guys and another guy punted off of both after hitting the last hold.

Doug on Anchorpoint

Big Bud and Slope of Dadaism were each done by a number of people and I threw another lap on the latter, remembering how much fun that one is.  Surely one of the best at the lake.

While we were up at Monolith a group of five from Minnesota came by to boulder.  They did some of the Spotted Cow problems and later on met up with us over at Jenga.  In all there were 12 people bouldering that didn't live in Wisconsin.  Not a big number by any stretch but still impressive considering the area and, by my count, more than the 7-8 people that were from Wisconsin.

A couple things.  First off, that's super cool and something that would have been unfathomable in 2009.  The fact that the bouldering at the lake has grown to a level where out of state boulderers outnumber in state boulderers to that extent is nothing short of amazing.  In 2009 Katie and I saw maybe 3 different groups of boulderers that we didn't know, all year.  It just wasn't a place that people went.

Everyone who reads this post should be proud of the type of area Devil's Lake has turned into.

Secondly, the diversity of the climbing is astonishing.  In total people climbed on established problems ranging from V0-V7 in four different areas on the West and East Bluffs.  Another group was out establishing problems over by Smooth Operator and Big Red.  On Sunday Dobbe took a group up to Smooth Operator and established another handful of problems.

It's absolutely incredible to see what type of area Devil's Lake has turned into and the development is nowhere near stopping.

Just the other day Katie was showing me some pictures of some boulders she found.  I paused for a second trying to place the boulders in the pictures.  Sure enough.  She'd refound the Twins Boulders on accident.