So after finishing the time-lapse of Aiden in his playpen, I decided to up the ante a bit.  I realized it would be really cool to do a time-lapse of all the climbers at our local rock gym!  I’m still learning how to do all this stuff, especially since I’m doing it without all the “proper” equipment.  You can’t believe how many different variables there are when it comes to creating one of these!  You have the shutter speed, the interval between shots, the angle, the frames per second you choose to compile the images at…etc.  There’s a lot to think about!  All in all, I’m definitely pleased with the final product but there’s always room for improvement.  This particular video took about a month for me to make since I had to get to the gym three separate times for each of the three shots.  Enjoy!

Chris Johnas and I headed out to Alapocas woods today for some winter bouldering.  It wasn’t even that bad with the cold weather.  Click for more pictures…

I look like a bug that got stuck on a wall!

So, I had another trip out to Colorado a few weeks back.  I was in Denver for a week, starting the planning process for the LIFE 2010 Conference.  Its always fun to hang around with fellow youth pastors…needless to say, I was able to get out and do some fun stuff with the guys.  Actually, the first night I was in Denver I decided to drive all the way up to Boulder to visit a bouldering gym called The Spot.  I had seen the gym before but only in a youtube video with Chris Sharma.  I had no idea how close I would be to it until I arrived in Denver.  It was a spur of the moment thing but it was totally worth it! The gym had two freestanding boulders that you could top-out on!

I went to The Spot by myself, but was able to take two other guys on my planning team to another gym in town.  This gym was much older but was really sweet because it used to be an old movie theater.  Not as clean but still fun…there’s more pictures if you click on them.

We did it!!!  We actually built it.  It was like legos all over again putting this thing together!  Chris Johnas, Chris Wells and I had a blast doing all the work and it turned out great.  Faith and I climbed on it for the first time tonight.  I was a little worried after it was all done that it was too small to really have any fun on or actually get a workout but I was completely wrong.  I was pumped out in 20 minutes after traversing back and forth trying out all the new holds.  Its still going to take some creative route setting to make the lack of height work but I’ve got that to look forward to.  Technically there is one piece left that hasn’t been put up (in the corner obviously) but for now its a nice little impromptu campus board.  The above is a video of all the construction.  If you want to see each of those shots individually to get a better look you can click here. We basically used the instructions from the metolious website if your interested in checking that out.

Here are pictures from out latest rock climbing trip…

At the end of July Faith and I took the weekend and drove down to Virginia to visit Tyler and Janelle. It was an interesting weekend to say the least but we were able to climb some sweet Virginia Rock! Hidden Rocks was awesome and we’re totally jealous! We hiked out in the dark Friday night and camped out up on top of the cliff. Then we got up early the next morning and spent the whole day climbing! We hiked out late in the afternoon and celebrated with Thai food! Just like every other post…click the picture for the whole album!

So its been too long since our last post…a lot has happened! Here are some pictures of a climbing trip I took with some guys from the gym at the end of July (click the picture for the whole album). It was quite an experience because I didn’t find out that we had to hike through private railroad property until we were actually doing it!? Getting a citation wouldn’t have been very fun. I heard the fines start at $250! Plus the approach was about 3 or 4 miles in the baking sun and by the time we got to the walls we were all dripping with sweat and exhausted! I didn’t climb very hard but I did get a chance to use my rope for the first time!

So I’m totally late in posting this but a couple weeks ago Faith and I and some friends went out to Birdsboro, PA to an old quarry to climb! It was the first time I had ever roped up outside! Andrew even forced me to lead a couple climbs! Also, I repelled for the first time which wasn’t nearly as bad as I expected. I’m so glad I’m getting over my fear of heights! Anyway, I posted a short video of me going up a simple but really fun 5.8 and there’s a bunch of pictures too.

Yay, they finally made it up to visit! They came up two weekends ago so this is kinda late but better late than never.  Anyway, we finally got to climb together at the gym!!! Ashley and Brandon made it down for the evening and then at midnight on Saturday, Tyler and I went out to get Mario Kart Wii! Couldn’t ask for a better weekend! The picture says it all…click it to see more climbing…