Camp Lo

One day, way back when snow was still on the ground, I got an email asking me to come to Camp Lo from Terry, my Boston pal. Not really knowing the fuck Camp Lo was I inquired and I got this email responding to my inquiry-

hey nora,

camp lo is the best time of the year.

charlie or ashley never told you about it?

you should come... seriously,

terry-

So Camp Lo was to remain shrouded in mystery...
After some back and forth with Charley and Jersey (no one I know calls her Ashley...) I figured out it was like a sleep away camp for "grown ups" complete with an arts and crafts table, boating, tubing, hiking, and drinking. Lots of that.
And then I forgot because snow and cold doesn't make me want to leave my well heated apt and think about living on an island on Lake George.

Fast forward several months- the gang's all here, in size order, on a dock.... waiiitttinngg for the mystery boat to pick us up with our gear.
The prep email we all received said something to the effect of
"You don't have to call, just be there by 4 and you'll get on the boat. If you miss the last boat, you don't get to come to the island until the next day."
To pass the time Charley had the really awful idea of playing badminton with himself right on the edge of the dock.
45 minutes later we decided to call.
And our trip was able to begin! Being a city gal, getting on a boat to get to an island where there is nothing really like civilization at all is really exotic. Even if is only a ten minute boat ride tops. And a walkie talkie. And iPods.
The NYC kids (us) were supposed to be on clean up duty after dinner, but I missed the memo and came too late to really help. I contributed by taking photos of Babs cleaning the skillet. She seemed to be having such a good time I didn't want to impede on her fun.
And later that night we played round after round of 13-person-teamed Flip Cup. It was my third time playing. Ever.
I loved it!
We must have played close to 10 rounds of the game. My team won all but 9 of them.
(see what I did there?)
The next day it RAINED every single moment. This didn't stop anyone from going on a boat, tubing, or swimming in the lake. The weather just contributed to making me sleepy as fuck, resulting in the most EPIC NAP EVER! Now that's what I call vacation.
Babs made her beer can carpet all by herself! Babs also loves skull caps and Joe Boxer bathing suits.
And any favorite rainy day activity- FACE PAINTING TIME! By the time I left most ladies had facial hair. Its tres chic indeed.

Climbing the 'Dacks!

It seems like when I go upstate to climb the weather just turns to shit and makes any attempts at outdoor climbing almost impossible. Saturday it rained the whole time so we hollered at the indoor gym instead.While the gym is mostly a bouldering gym, as the ceilings are not super tall, I was able to get some leading in.
What a thrill. My gym has a super rigorous lead test on an inverted wall at a super high rating (not fair! I'm a lady, I never claimed to be able to hold onto a wall for that long, upper body strength ain't my forte) so I don't get to climb lead there (YET), but I am able to climb at AIR, which I love. The thrill pushes me harder, and I love a throbbing forearm. Its less climbing vertical and more traversing at this gym (again, because of the low ceilings I presume) which can be more intense, especially 20 plus feet off the ground.
Someone at the gym had set up a swing out, aka super terrifying. Brendan has climbed about 6 and a half feet away from his last clip in and is prepping to jump off the wall any second now. Its like trying to tell yourself to walk off a cliff.
Every good gym has a dog. This one is Riley. She's adorable.
Speaking of dogs, look how good Brendan's are. SOOOOOO CUTE!fdasklg;jasklag
We took the dogs camping with us, but since it was raining and gross we did "fake camping" at Nate's grandparent's cabin near the lake. It wasn't real camping, but it was a real good time. One bottle of Jameson later, we all went skinny dipping, something I haven't done since 8th grade graduation. Even the dogs joined us!
One hung over morning later we got ready for some outdoor climbing!
We got ready very slooowwlllyyy....
Across the street from the lake shack was this house, which is maybe the ugliest, most poorly decorated, designed, and thought out house ever. Lets chat about it, shall we?
Oh yes, the ever popular vertical siding, commonly used nowhere, a mysical floating colbat mirror orb on a pedistal, THE LETTER Q, and last but certainly not least, an empty shrine, or as Nate insisted, a urinal. So bizarre.
We brought the dogs climbing- check out that figure 8 on the static line we used to keep them from jumping off a cliff. YEAH!
The walls were so wet from the day before I really struggled against the slime. Also our first routes were crack climbing, instead of face climbing. The most common way of climbing a crack is by jamming, which is exactly what it sounds like. Shove your hand or foot into the crack and twist it around until it stays there. Some people say if it hurts you're doing it right. Needless to say I'm not a fan of crack climbing.We switched to a climb called Afternoon Delight, which was something like 65 ft high. The exposure was fantastic but boy oh boy did I get super scared up there. Total adrenaline rush! I can't wait to get back at the walls!

That's me just about to pee my pants doing the swing out.

Mine dogers

"Hey, everyone, gather round. Let me tell you about this land. It was once Syrian territory which the Syrians heavily mined. Once Israel won this land, they also decided to add their mines to the bunch. This has resulted in the area being one of the most heavily mined areas in the whole world. OKAY! Let's go hiking!"
That is more or less what our tour guide shared with us right before this amazing hike through Nahal Jilaboun in Northern Israel. Israel is full of "not in use, well not right now anyways" military stuff, like old bunkers and shacks, like the one above.
It never stopped being strange to see tags thrown up on the sides of buildings, but have them not be written in letters I can read.
The landscape was remarkable, but also remarkably much like the North East. In fact, us Nor-Easter's commented that we could be hiking through the Catskills and wouldn't be surprised.
This one area two of my fav's, Randy and Erica, are posing in, so reminded me of the little bamboo swampy areas in Fire Island, if you've ever been there. I half expected to see a deer wander by. It was nice and cool down in the valleys, covered by trees and a small river running through. Unlike the rocks-
where there was no relief from the intense sun. However it was from these spots that we could see the landscape unfurl beneath us and really appreciate the hike.
The diversity of the plants was the only hint that, honey, we ain't in New York anymore. I can guarantee that there are no cactus growing upstate.
Something we learned, and then were reminded about all though our trip- since it was an off season for us to be there it was on season for Israeli schools. Apparently we were exploring the land during "Israel Take Your School Kids on a Trip Week," and kept running into very enthusiastic kiddies also exploring their homeland. These ones in particular stopped me to ask if I was from America, and New York in general (how did they know, I was dressing French!?) and totally needed to take a photo with me. I happily agreed in return for a photo with them.

At this point you're probably curious about the hats. Hats, hats all around and not a drop to drink (?). According to every tour guide in Israel the sun will kill you in 40 minutes due to dehydration and heat stroke, unless, of course, you're wearing a hat and then you're totally 100% fine. That is why everyone has a hat on. Its not optional, its mandatory.
Here is a place that you can "leave your DNA" according to our lovely tour guide.
And so concludes our Northern Israel hike. Just wait to you see the desert!

OH! And since this is a blog about New York, not Israel- I just found out about this really cool run that you can do ON JFK's RUNWAY! Its this Sunday, and I'll be outta town, but I think its a really cool thing that everyone should do, because how often do you get to do something like this?!