DAY 169
09.20.07
TREE 86
I waited till just after sunset to head to Louisville to climb. Since I was headed to U of L campus I wanted to make a night of it so I called Will to meet me there for some parkour. Only he had fencing and yoga and couldn’t meet me till after 9pm. So I drove over to Charlotte’s to see if she was there… and she wasn’t. And Drew wasn’t at his parents place so I just drove my way to U of L. I parked right on 3rd Street by Eastern Parkway which was near the tree. I think it may have been the exact same spot I had parked in before. 
By this point it was dark but there were plenty of lights from buildings, posts, cars, traffic lights, etc. I got to the trunk and noticed a little plastic sign nailed to the trunk. I remembered it once I saw it but as I go through this project I’ve been trying to pick up the names of the different trees. And this one made it easy since the sign read "Sugar Maple." 
I pulled myself up using two low branches. Then I went left around the trunk remembering that last time I went right. Going left was easier. I moved up the tree from limb to limb in often lateral movements. Since it was dark I couldn’t see my ribbon and only had a vague sense of where it was from memory. But after much climbing and searching my memory served me correctly. I found it and pulled it off. 
I got a little higher with ease which made me wonder why I hadn’t gotten this high the first time, but I guess my abilities just keep improving. I wonder if they will ever plateau or if it is limitless? I can only hope to find out by continuing to climb. Anyway, I took a bunch of really great long exposure shots. 
Using a flash always blacks out the background. 
With a strange orange glow through the silhouetted limbs they were a little like Halloween.
Also some good shots with headlight streaks.
Then I climbed down avoiding all the dead limbs. On the ground I took some more shots then warmed up and stretched till Will showed up. A good night of parkour and a good climb too.
9-20-08: I believe this might have been one of the first night climbs where I discovered the cool effect of streaking car lights. Also, when you walk around a well lit place at night do you see the orangeness of the light? I wonder why the camera picks up so much orange, or why our eyes don’t?
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.
So I climbed down amused by the recent event. I got down smoothly and dropped to the ground rather than sliding down the trunk. Funny climb.