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It had always been an option, but we had never gone to pace bend, and one photo in the Texas Limestone II guide was not luring me in big time or anything. But what the fuck, lets give it a go. Our friends were coming down from Dallas anyhow, lets all meet out there and do some bouldering or whatever.
John Hogge, he was the man, he had purchased two- three man (or two man, one cooler) rafts from REI and we were rocking in Thurman cove. Thurman, Warren, Marshall who named all of these coves after chief court justices anyway.
The shitty part is some assholes go to Pace Bend to party. A bunch of cock slapping punks who play loud music, drink shitty beer, throw the pigskin around and break bottles. So wearing only bare feet and my disco surf shorts, I was careful where I stepped as I headed out to the edge of the cliff. My feet were pristine at this point in time, only to be later waterlogged and diced upon the unpolished limestone. A standing long jump and my feet smacked the water within a few feet from the sloping shelf. Across the way the phenanom was already underway, lots of bikini clad young women and baseball hat donning young men, all standing at the edge of the 30 footer, sizing it up for potential fatalities, and then a brave soul would taunt death and just "go for it" sometimes they clustered. A rope was affixed to a tree so they would not actually have to do what we were there to do, a little climbing.
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So be it. I did not even have a floatation device, but I could see that Hogge and Capps and Stephen and Katie, and a new guy had scoped out a cool area, and there was room on the huge ass rafts. I did my "surge" impression with the new guy’s sunglasses, and then poorly threw them short of his hands and they sunk into the abyss. I make new friends quick. Well the problem is probably a 5.10, but you have to red point it barefoot. There are bolts, rustier than my wiffle ball pitching arm, but also a good resting cave about 2/5’s the way up. My first day was all about getting pumped before I shoved my ass in this cave. Steven and Hogge were doing it. I scurried up a crack and was pointing out holds to Hogge as he was topping it out, only to get pumped and bail. I understood the feeling as I reached that point weeks later. Well, there I was, 30-35 feet up and ready to jump into the water, but I wanted to do something cool, and I felt that a long, slow flip would be cool. My dumb ass did a 11/4 and smacked the water with face, chest, wind knocked out, some gland in my jaw felt like it popped like one of those vitamin E gel pills that got squeezed too hard. I think it actually burst, I hurt like a mother, and I could taste that bitter gland juice.
C’est la vie. Cool problems around the corner. Blocky, fun. 14 year old girls sitting around on 700cc jet skis watching us boulder, not trying to give me a ride, or let me borrow one. I asked real nice, "Why don’t you take me for a ride on that thing?" "Oh… It’s not mine," was her unsettled reply as she soon roared off, leaving a cloud of gas-oil mix, 2 cycle or something, I learned that in shop class.
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Some other dumb ass boat and kid owners let their young-uns come climb the rocks and jump over our bouldering heads into the water. After the lake rose an inch from the flowing tears of young boys and girls with raw armpits, boat-owner-Dad instructed the young lads and lassies to remove their life preservers before they jumped into the water. A pfd III life preserver is slightly more boyant than a no fd 80 pound body, and as newton said, "a body in motion tends to stay in motion, and a pfd III life vest will tend to stay on the surface of the water."
Lunch pulled the liner out of my stomach, and subsequently, I later deposited it in the woods. Actually, the lunch was tasty. O’gara provided about six courses of sausage, to be followed by two chicken breasts for each person still standing. Luckily we stopped him before he started tenderizing his red meat. It had been marinated in Steven’s "special" sauce for two days straight. I was chugging Dr. Pepper, and everyone else was slurping down shiner blond, brunettes, skinheads, hairpieces etceteras, and smoking choice Hogge Ornalias’s, A pretty damn good smoke.
The water was calling us back and we made our way around the left wall picking out what were largely bouldering problems because no one was doing much topping out. I found a one move dyno that blew my shit out; lunging out of the water and kicking like flipper, I went for a gritty sloper, that I could stick for a second, but could not move my feet after I stuck it and would peel off. (weeks later, my uber-bud, Judd would hang all day on the same hold). It was real cool.
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At the end of the day, I found another impossible (for me) move. I was beseaching all my "good" climbing friends to come bust out instead of paddle off to the sunset. No such luck. One day I will know a 5.12 climber with my same armspan who just rips, I will ask him or her, to bust it, and sure enough it will be busted, and I will be some where claiming the discovery.
Ok, a coulple quick words on Mogham cove which we hit the next day, because it is fun as hell, I am just not powerful enough to get full enjoyment out of it. One guy was out there, close cropped hair, donning a little plastic inner tube (obviously made for kids in the pool) around his waist busting out what seemed to me to be 5.11 moves. He was cool because he was fully giving beta and being a normal person, without acting like he was the baddest motherfucker to hit the water. So go there too, You can figure out all of the routes pretty easily. I guess there is some climbing at Marshall cove as well, I have not checked it out yet, but if it is in the book, it has got to be pretty fun.
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For summertime fun, climbing that will pump your forearms like a mother, and no gear needed except some swim trunks, and either some old climbing shoes, rental shoes from REI (see asshole of the month) or tape up those big toes and re-enforce with some crazy glue. You will be in awesome shape to attempt an overhanging V0 and back slap into the water.
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