DAY 169

This was also a night that got me back into parkour and made me determined to keep up with it. 

Speaking of night climbs I climbed a tree in the dark at George Rogers Clark Park again last night.  After a long days work on the Zephyr deck I just didn’t feel like getting right back out there to climb.  Then I blogged and got hungry and ate.  Before I knew it, it was dark and late and I really had to go climb.  And, as I currently live in Germantown, GRC Park is so close and full of trees.  I biked over there which was a little scary since many spots along Poplar Level Road still are without power.  Riding through pitch blackness can be nerve-racking.  Luckily right around the park electricity has returned.  I rode into the park and leaned my bike up against a picnic table.  Then I heard voices.  I looked around and realized there was a group of teenagers hanging out in the park.  I decided to walk a little further away from them and then spotted a tree that looked good for my climb.  I locked my bike to a small tree and then walked up to the base of this tree.  It was a harder entry than what I thought originally so I had trouble at first.  The bark was thickly ridged but slightly brittle.  I dug my fingers in and jumped to secure my feet against the trunk.  I walked my hands up, dug my fingers back in and hopped up a little higher.  A large branch was near and I reached one arm to hook around but I wasn’t close enough and I slipped.  I lost all my grips and went sliding back to the ground.  I thought about pulling the picnic table to the trunk as a step but it was too heavy for me to move by myself.  So I pumped myself up to repeat my previously failed process.  I just had to hop a few more inches but my fingertips were sore and tingling.  I walked up, gripped and jumped like before.  I did this again but twice more rather than once.  I reached my arm over that large branch and this time I held.  I lifted my other arm up and grabbed a higher and smaller limb.  I was then able to pull my legs to secure a foot hold and start my climb up the branches.  It was a good challenge since the limbs were a good distance apart.  I just kept pushing myself higher and eventually made it very close to the top.  I was surprised that the thin limbs didn’t bend as much as I thought they would.  The stillness helped with taking pictures.


Even so, there just wasn’t enough light for good non-flash pictures.  So I had to use the flash even though I took the risk of drawing attention to myself from the group below.  As I took my pictures I started to hear louder chatter below like, "did you see that?"  "Look in the tree!"  "What the hell?"





By the time I finished with these shots I could hear that the group was on the move.  They had left their area of picnic tables and was on the street headed nearer to me.  Then I heard something about a plan to say something to me and then run.  I sat waiting then I heard, "Please stop taking pictures of us, we don’t like it."
I smiled and laughed an replied, "I’m not taking pictures of you."  Then I heard screaming and running.  Seconds later they were in their cars tearing down the road away from the crazy tree guy.  Haha.  That was awesome.  I wish I could have gotten some pictures of them but it was just too dark and they were too far away.