The Black!

Yet another adventurous weekend for the Schneiters! Over Memorial Day, we headed to the Black Canyon of the Gunnison for some quality campfire time and rock climbing with some quality friends. We met Wes and Stef, Mark, Katie, and Curtis. On the way down on Saturday, we took the scenic route, detouring in Thompson Creek for some sport climbing.



Saturday night, we drove to the Black. We parked, looked around for a campsite, and went to start the van to drive to the campsite--it wouldn't start. So, we camped where we were and decided to just worry about that later--we had climbing to do! Mike and I got up early Sunday morning to tackle the Scenic Cruise, a route we've been wanting to do for a while. It is a 13 pitch 5.10+, with the crux of the route entailing navigating 6 foot tall man-eating poison ivy at the base!



It was an amazing route. It was also long, difficult, and intimidating. The Black Canyon is unique in that you descend steep gullies (they actually require rappelling) to get to the base of a route, and then climb basically to the car at the top of the canyon rim. We finished mid-afternoon to find Wes working on the van. He tinkered, gave it some gas, tinkered some more...to no avail. We ended up having it towed all the way back to Glenwood--Thank you Stef for AAA!! We took full advantage of the 100mile tow limit and Wes and Stef drove us home. It is now waiting patiently to be fixed. Needless to say, I purchased AAA myself--that was the second time this month the van has left us stranded. (And Mike continues to make fun of my old VW van! It never gave us this much trouble!) Anyway, all is well and good!