This was a real fun trip. I happened to be visiting Seattle, Washington for a conference and was staying with my friends, Nathan and Sara. It was nearly Sara’s birthday and for the previous couple years she had gone deep water soloing as a birthday trip. She proceeded to bump up the usual birthday trip to the weekend I’d be in Washington so I’d be able to join them.

The trip was to Banks Lake in central Washington.

On Friday, we drove from Seattle towards Banks Lake and found a spot to camp about forty minutes away.

The next morning, we woke early and headed to the marina that rented us pontoon boats. Our crew started with two boats and then a third joined us midday.

We spent the whole day cruising around on the boats; swimming all over the place and climbing random cliffs in the area. It was a ton of fun. The weather was perfect.

Here is a photo of me climbing and then jumping to the water. This line started down and to the right of where I am and finished where you see me start the cliff jump. From where I am in the photo, I continued moving left to the blunt arete and then transitioned around it to go to the top.

Here is a shot of another random climb. This one was pretty neat and involved some fun overhang and then slab. Many people, including myself, jumped off before the slab section.

We wrapped up the boat shenanigans in the late afternoon ,found a place to camp, and ate some food. It was a great day.

Here is a shot of our view while camping Saturday night.