Climbing at Castle Rock Water Falls 01 November 2009

It was a gorgeous Sunday, and a few co-workers and I took a spur-of-the-moment rock climbing trip to Castle Rock State Park , which is located off Skyline Blvd here in the south bay, and where one can find an abundance of what are called Tafoni formations - basically nooks and caves weathered into sandstone. We had intended to climb Castle Rock itself but it was too crowded, so we ended up next to the waterfalls. The thumbnail above is a sketch of the rock face we ended up climbing showing the designated routes from the book "Rock Climbing Guide to the Castle Rock Area", by Bruce Morris - who also has a book out on bouldering in this area. We ended up doing an amalgam of routes C and D.

Exciting highlights of the day - 1) only the second time I've set up an anchor system (and second time I've used my own equipment), and 2) when Dave put his hand in a large crack, high pitched squealing and rattling noises started emanating from it. Needless to say, he removed his hand rather quickly. The noise turned out to be a bat! (Picture below).

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