If only Climbing Trees was an Olympic sport...

So i woke up incredibly early today. im talking 4 am early. then i took a nap around 8am. and slept for ever!, come 1pm. im ready for my second breakfast of the day. the day was scheduled to be a busy one. K.C. was going to stop by at 3 to say goodbye before he headed back to collage, then the army of people my mom invited to dinner, would start arriving at 6. with nothing to occupy my time wile waiting for case to show, i thought back to my adventures yesterday. that tree i climbed. how much fun it was. it took little convincing myself, that it was time to find the biggest, unclimable looking tree i could... and climb it.. now preparing for rock climbing, is simple. i know the ropes. ( sorry for the cheesy pun), but tree climbing? this was new to me. i took a second to think about, and packed my gear. .Equitment. 1 harness 1 80 foot rope 1 15 foot rope 3 carabeaners 1 ACT 1 Figure 8 1 ascender 1 6 inch, saw blade 1 chalk bag Also in question, was clothing choice. tree bark is alot roughfer then most rock faces, so this also required some thought. .On me was. short sleeved shirt. Sweat Bands ( fore arms) short fingered glove, right hand only ( break hand ) long pants, rolled up to shins ( "pegged" for those of you 80's children ) XC shoes shades chalk ( i was covered, head to toe. traction was key ) .On the tree was. Branches Pine needles sticky stuff bird poop (sometimes in the form of just mentioned) bird nest bark The start of the climb was the hardest part. the nearest branch was a 15 foot climb. tossed the 80 footer over the top, and ascended my way up (slowly). from there, it was 5 to 10 feet between what i have since dubbed as "base branches" .Tieing off to one safety takes a while. theres no rushing when it comes to making sure the knots are secure. then setting up another safer, from below, climbing to it, then untieing your previous safety. it was all very time consuming. very usfull was the saw blade ( a last minute stroke of genius on my part ) there was alot of dead branches keeping the rope from running a strait line. life thretning moments ( which of course, there were several. because, lets admit. its not an SSA without them.) first was about 30 feet up. i had just compleated a pretty technical line, and was untieng the several safeties i had set up for this route ( very week branches, i tied off to several to be safe ) i lost the use of my brain temporarily, while untieing knots, one by one, and suddenly found myself standing, with no safety. in no way was i secured to the tree. i shock a little, and gave my new best friend (tree) a big bear hug. got my line together again, and resumed climbing relatively unshaken.. The next came when hooking and unhooking beaners on my harness. i dont know how, but i droped my figure 8 AND my ACT! (repelling devises) which i had stupidy kept on the same carabeaner. having no way down. i sat. and sat. and enjoyed the view, from the point at which i decided was the furthest any mere mortal could climb. then sat some more. pondering my getting down from the tree. lucky me. someone came along, and i was able to persway them to tie the figure 8 to the end of my rope, so i could pull it up to myself. from there it was a little rearranging of the ropes, and down i went. stopping every so often, to enjoy the view, and savor the moment one last time. even taking a second to do a little Australian Style repel ( head first ) to show off to the now crowd that had assembled at the base of the tree. all said and done. it was 4 hours well spent on a Sunday afternoon. i will be keeping my eye out for the next tree to attempt somewhere down the road.. Until then. Cyclocross! --CM MeThingPretty