Exit 32, June 17: Son of Jesus (almost, again)

It’s Exit 32!  It’s close to Seattle, so it’s easy to get to after work on a long summer evening.  We managed to amass a pretty big herd: Evan, Rose, Sketchy, and I from Seattle, Matt and Brea passing through on their way from Alaska to Colorado, and Chris from Cle Elum.  One might notice that this is an odd number, which leaves one spare climber to keep the slugs off the ropes (ah, the joys of climbing on the rainy side).  On the tastier side, it’s salmonberry season (red huckleberries, thimbleberries, and raspberries are coming soon).  A “chupacabra” apparently broke into my fridge and ate my afternoon snack while I was at work, so I took advantage of a five minute head start up the trail to pig out.

At latitude 47.5N the days are pretty long in the middle of the summer but unfortunately they don’t go on forever, necessitating the usual “hey, who has a headlamp?” conversation. Sketchy usually doesn’t bring his, but he just bought a new ridiculously bright one so got the opportunity to play with his new toy. I had to make him walk in front of me because the shadows it was throwing was completely washing out the less intense blue light from my city headlamp.