thomasina pidgeon: Squamish Days

I know summer in Squamish is long past and I am a little slow at getting certain things done, rather, slow at getting lots of things done, well I even tend to move and climb kind of slow but that’s another thing though I guess all related... My point is that I had wanted to put together a little something in honor of this past summer in Squam-town which was most enjoyable as usual.
The summer, although brief, was overall entertaining despite the irrational amount of rain and inability of any sort of summer to come when it was called. The Americans migrated north which is always a pleasure, there was an amazing show put on by Katie Baggs and Settlers of Catan was discovered into the wee hours of the night.
For the first time in years we had a Salt Lake City reunion (at least half of the gang). Sundev, David, Shawna and their new baby, Mina came to Squamish for the month of June. These guys are some of my favorite and most entertaining climbing partners and above all, friends. They are usually psyched to try hard and divulge in various sorts of activities. As soon as they arrived, my motivation picked up. We went to new problems, visited projects and through some of the wetter days we went to Chekamus Canyon where we tied into a rope. The steep walls of Chekamus guaranteed some sort of continuous movement involving going up despite the showers of rain that were continuously coming down. The only thing to really interrupt the flow was the shaking of the forearms and the word “take” which was yelled due to the burning sensation felt in my forearms which made my hands incapable of holding on any longer. I guess they didn’t realize they were 30 feet off the deck and their survival was dependant upon helping the owner stay in the upright position. My endurance naturally sucks as I tie into a rope under 5 times a year but despite the struggling; I thoroughly enjoyed the experience and vowed to tie in more often.

Dave and Mina

Fresh sunshine

Cletus and Cedar

Team Utah's base camp

Throughout the Utahan’s stay, things changed as they do. Baby Mina grew an inch, we all became obsessed with the Method, the special camping spot open and closed and the house dwelling continued as did the baking. “Heavy fest” came and passed as did the Squamish Mountain Film Festival. The juice bar was replaced by a great sushi bar and the Texan folks going by the names of Andy, Ema (aka Allan or Keith) and the beautiful, crazy and might I add, surprisingly straight edge, Anne Raber dropped by for a little Canadian summer. Filming for The Season continued throughout the summer which got some unfailing coverage of me falling and falling, and falling again on my most beautiful and recent obsession. That one will have to wait for the crisp and hopefully dry fall which I eagerly and patiently await.

me on the Method. ema took this photo...

Dave on the method

Butters

Encore en Fois

Katie's show

Sunny

Sundev on defender's

Brian on The Black Hole

Stu on class dismissed

The highlight of the summer which has nothing at all to do with climbing was the amazing show put on by singer/ songwriter Katie Baggs. Katie comes from my home town of St. John’s and her presence and attitude is not only refreshing but inspiring. I am one of her biggest fans and rightfully so. She is amazing! Here are a couple links to 2of her songs:
http://katiebaggs.bandcamp.com/track/how-small
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gPZhxJnOxFQ&feature=share
Enjoy.

Some random photos: