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So I have been back home for about 3 weeks now but have been too busy to update the blog.

At the beginning of the summer Kaleb posted a tick list of 25 boulder problems on Sendage. With the idea that whoever climbed the most of the boulder problems from the list before september 1st would win a free pair of shoes from Evolv. Most of the problems were climbs I had done before, but in order for them to count for the list I would have to repeat them this summer. I thought being away for 3 months would give me a fun handicap and I would have to catch up by sending as many as I could in just the month of august.

However it seemed like while I was away everyone else lost interest in bouldering... choosing instead to spend what few dry climbing days were available this summer hanging around on ropes down at flatrock.

So I found when I got back I was not as far behind on the list as I had anticipated. Still the list includes many of the hardest boulder problems I have ever done around here (and a few that I have not been able to do yet) So I decided I would spend august trying to tick as many of them as I could.

The very first day I arrived back in St. John's was a clear sunny day so a very jet lagged version of myself went out with Jamie Robbins to try to start ticking problems.

We went to the Vacation Boulders, a cluster of three short boulders on the highway barrens. They've never been my favourite spot to boulder but they had a few of the easier problems from the tick list so we decided to head there first and get them out of the way as a warm up and then head to hard stuff.

We made short work of both

"Monkey Trainer" V3

and "Hula Girl" V4.

Both low to the ground traverses on grainy slopers.... which reminded me why I was not so keen on the Vacation Boulders....

So then we headed on to try "Beat it like a red headed stepchild" a V8 that I had only climbed once before. I had already spent two sessions in the spring before going away trying to repeat it but despite doing the problem in two sections on both occasions was unable to link the whole thing. I was hoping a summer of regular bouldering on steep terrain would let me finish it off quickly. But after a prolonged session I had to give up once my fingers hurt to much to grab a painful jaw-like hold any more and leave without finishing the problem.

Ok, out of blogging time for today, so this is to be continued, next post should be soon and include a video of some of the problems climbed from the list so far.