Seneca Rocks: Then and Now

Then:

December 2009

My first trip to West Virginia was the winter '09-'10. We were going to spend the weekend skiing with his parents and some friends. Ross wanted to drive a little bit out of our way to see Seneca Rocks. Now, I had never heard of the place, but he explained it is a popular (and challenging) place to go rock climbing.

I distinctly remember keeping a lookout for the rocks as we got close to the point in the GPS. And then all of a sudden there it was. "What?!? You're telling me people actually try to climb those things? They've got to be crazy."

Now:

July 2013

That's right, I'm now almost one of those crazy people. I say almost because I actually didn't climb what you see in the picture above. I did a route to the side and was pretty proud of myself for my first outside climb.

This post is actually late and has been sitting in draft form for quite awhile. We went out to Seneca at the end of July with some friends. We hiked, camped, climbed, and eventually started a fire with wet wood.

Can you spot Ross?

And since I was a newbie and the least enthused to climb, this is how I spent most of the days. Sitting at the bottom reading a book. (Highly recommend And The Mountains Echoed by Khaled Hosseini.)