Johnny and Alex Trail Day, "All My Friends Are Living Saints"

As of today I have been in the Red River Gorge for two months; two months have passed since I left home.

And I still have little to no intent on returning.

Since I've arrived, my climbing has improved by at least one full number grade. I have no fear of falling, and I have met some of the most interesting and awesome people while down here. I have a job working with stand-up locals (for the most part), and I enjoy it, even if I spend most of my time mopping floors and dealing with foolish tourists.

Yesterday was the Johnny and Alex Trail Day: a day spent improving trail conditions around the crags in the Southern Region in the gorge. The day is to honor Johnny and his son Alex who passed away a few years ago, both of whom had probably the largest hand in making what the Red River Gorge is today, a most fantastic community of climbers, and extremely well-developed crags.

I awoke at 7:30, exhausted from the previous day at work. I made some coffee, hopped in my car with Al, Eric, and Brandon and headed over to Loga Linda's to get trail assignments.

I wasn't assigned with anyone I knew. But that was fine. I like meeting new people. I jumped into a random jeep and flew down into the PMRP, where I was dropped off at Curbside. I felt fresh, I hadn't climbed in the last few days and I was ready for a long day of manual labor.

Well, that long day was a lot shorter than I thought it was going to be. The group I was with built two new belay stations, one new landing zone that was previously underwater, and then made some switch-backs and stone steps. All this was done with by 1:30. Lunch was provided by Miguel's, though nothing was vegan (not surprised, but I later found out Melissa had told Miguel to make a vegan wrap for me, he just didn't).

With the trail work done, and the afternoon heat just starting to warm up everything to a cool 95 degrees, my group decided to start climbing. I took off to the Sore Heel parking lot looking for more work, in part because I didn't bring my climbing gear. I ran into Matt, the president of the Red River Gorge Climbing Coalition, and then I found myself building a bridge.

After a few more hours, when that was finished, we headed back to Loga Linda's for food and, well, beer. Mostly beer. Speeches were given in honor of Johnny and Alex, some were moving, some were comedic. Somethings said in the speeches, especially about the preciousness of friendships, sparked a Polar Bear Club song lyric in my head: "all my friends are living saints." That's a fairly accurate assessment, I think, of what everyone felt at that time.

After the speeches a torrential thunderstorm hit us hard. to the average camper walking by would be shocked by the group of 75 climbers standing around a pavilion, screaming and hollering for the storm to come hit them. Insanity. There we were, hollering every time a gust of wind barrelled through the pavilion or lighting flashed in the distance. The thunder only made us yawp even louder.

The band that was schedule to play huddled all their gear together, covered in tarps, worrying about the condition of their instruments. And right in front of them are half-drunk climbers chugging beer while doing a one-armed lock-off from the rafters as rain cascaded down. The pelts of water against the tin roof almost drowned out the thunder.

With the worst of the storm past, a band, 27 String Band (I think that was their name), kicked up some of that good ol' bluegrass, and the rest of the night was spent in a rowdy drunken dance. All night long. Whiskey, beer, a keg-stand or two, and all was well in the world . . . in our world, at least.

I remember all of the night in case anyone is wondering.

The only downside of the day was that 120 people registered for the Trail Day and only 65 people showed up. And half of them weren't registered. I wasn't, and I've only been here two months. I feel a part of a community like never before.