Tree Climbing

Today I was feeling a little less under the weather and I decided to go catch the second half of the tree climbing class that our/Sarah's friend Josh is teaching (the one that Seth went to yesterday).  It was at Shively Park, which is at the top of the hill in Astoria.  Tree climbing has a lot in common with rock climbing in the way of gear, knots, techniques, etc. so some of it was really easy to pick up.  Basically, you use something heavy to sling a rope over a sturdy branch (or, in our case, someone more experienced has already been up the tree and set an anchor way up there) and then you climb on a fixed single rope.  You have one line that connects your harness to the rope above you and one line that connects a foot loop to the rope, and you basically shimmy up it by moving one at a time: sitting in your harness while you slide up the foot loop and then standing up in it so that you can slide your harness line up.  Then repeat.  A lot.  Once you get up to the branches you can climb within them by a different method, where you have two slings attached to branches around you, moving them up to other branches one at a time with you as you climb (this way one is always connecting you to a sturdy branch).  It was tons of fun, and I'm really looking forward to getting to climb again with Josh.  He hasn't done much rock climbing but is interested so it should be a cool set of skills to swap.  No pictures, just having a great weekend and thought I would fill you all in!