Carly and I made the Labor Day long weekend extra long and took Friday off as well. Weather in much of Utah was looking questionable so we used the extra day off to make the trek out to Ten Sleep, WY. We were there just about a year ago after our wedding. We did some climbing and running like last time. Temps were a bit warmer and less rain, though we did get a pretty gnarly storm on Sunday eve.
The climbing was awesome, I on-sighted a 5.12a, Cocaine Rodeo—my first on-sight of the grade. It would seem that the climbing training I’ve been doing has been working.
We also were (eventually) able to meet up with John and Lindsay. There’s no cell coverage in the canyon and we knew they’d be there but not where they’d camp. We did our own camping spot on Friday night. Saturday after climbing we happened to see their car and that they’d left us a note. The note was super thoughtful of them to try and clue us into where they were camping. The note said site 24. We headed up there, knowing they wouldn’t be there yet but expecting to see some of their stuff at the site. As we pulled off the main road we saw a van, definitely not theirs, in site 24. The owner got out and I asked if he’d seen stuff in the site when he rolled in, which he hadn’t. I was confused by that but asked if he’d mind if we stayed there since there was enough space. He kindly said we could.
After hemming and hawing a bit we decided perhaps the 24 was actually a 29 and so we decided to drive up to that site. As we got closer we realize that, nope that wasn’t it either. We had stayed in site 29 the previous night, but hadn’t noticed the number. So back on the road again. As we got a ways down the dirt road I stopped and started to try and figure out where we’d gone wrong for finding John and Lindsay. As we were stopped I noticed a head lamp flashing behind the van (climbing starts and finishes late on the ‘sunny side’ in Ten Sleep). I got out and it was Lindsay. We’d happen to stop just a little way down from where they were camping, and obviously they’d come back while we’d been searching for them.
They’d mistook some of the signage on the camp spots and thought they were in 24. In fact they were in 23, 🙄. It all ended find and we camped with them the next two nights.
It was another fun trip to Wyoming in late summer. While no high marks were given for Wyoming waitstaff (a bit of a clusterfuck actually), the climbing as always was top notch.
