young and the rackless

erica and i went up the canyon early on friday afternoon to do some climbing. good thing it was early. we started up a four pitch sport route called "the young and the rackless". seemed like silly and simple fun... it's rated 5.9, but the party that developed the route rated it 5.10b. i think that might be accurate if you don't have as much span as i do - erica found it a little tough at the headwalls.

from the top of the first pitch.
 

erica so smiley before realizing that the start is a little funky :( she also started yelling a "huge spider" in front of her face. she later revealed that said "huge spider" was in fact a daddy longlegs before trying to convince me that they are 1.) poisonous (but their mouths aren't big enough to bite people) 2.) spiders, neither of which are true. fibber! gladly, she made it up the first pitch.
 

starting up the second pitch. crux for shorties.
 
we made it halfway up the climb before deciding it was going to get too dark (and i was already shivering quite a bit). it was erica's first rappel (and retreat), which was exciting all around.