Tuesday, August 01, 2006

Vedauwoo Picnicking

July 16, 2006

(The next several postings will be about the vacation we just got back from. I wrote most of it while we were on vacation and finished up many of the articles after we got home.)

Since my oldest daughter was going to start a volleyball camp at the University of Wyoming on Monday the 17th I wanted to try and get her used to the altitude in Laramie. Laramie sits at a slightly elevated 7220 feet above sea level. I know that there is no way that my daughter would get acclimated to the altitude in only 2 days. But I wanted her to get used to doing things while breathing hard. So the first day there I took her out for a little 2 mile walk before going to bed that night.

The next morning my family and the friends we were staying with packed up and headed for the Vedauwoo. Vedauwoo is a large collection of rock formations that lies just north of Interstate 80 near the top of Sherman Hill between Laramie and Cheyenne. I first started playing, picnicking and climbing there when I was a junior in high school in 1975.

Vedauwoo is a great place to climb. There are small boulders that kids can play on and around and enough complex climbs to challenge the most experienced climbers.

We had a blast up there. The place has changed a lot. The parks department has taken over and you have to pay to drive in. There are some facilities there – bathrooms, drinking water and parking places. All these things were not available when I used to climb there in my younger indestructible days.

We did a little bouldering, and I did a lot of reminiscing, my family did a lot of ignoring me and then we took a walk around the park area. It was a little over 2 miles around the Turtle Rock trail.

This picture is the area called Walt’s Face where I used to climb. I free climbed the red route. Lead climbed the blue route and second climbed the green routes. The two white lines were fun rappels.

ground

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