Enchanted Rock and Pedernales Falls

Time for some climbing. Enchanted Rock, the jewel of southern climbing. Or so they said. Yet more Texas State Parks administrative craziness, where you pay for both day use and camp fees, and it ends up being $20/person. Rude staff, hot and sweaty as all hell, what a joyous place. We went for a short walk with the "guide" that the rangers give out before quickly realising that we needed the real guide.

Which is awfully written and rather hard to follow. We later worked out some portions, but the bouldering we were looking for that afternoon was never to be found. We went back into town. We'd had a delightful lunch at the Fredericksburg Brewing Company, and quite enjoyed walking the streets. A lovely little town. Good food, good beer. Had a chat to some English ladies over for a wedding, also enjoying the sights.

We'd read the guide now, and had picked out a couple of climbs to do, though I was having a hard time picking out some well protected pleasant sounding routes. We off walking, and found where the parks have installed some quite nice coloured trail marker signs. This is not mentioned in the guidebook mind you, but with a bit of interpretation, we managed to pick the right one.

Or the wrong one. It was still hot and muggy, and the dead birds, feathers, and bird shit all over the rock in the area we were meant to be climbing was both rather unsettling, and rather smelly. We still had no idea where we actually were. I have absolutely no idea where the route photos in the guide were taken from, because it wasn't anywhere we could get to.

We did one climb. I found it a bit hard for a 5.6. Maybe it was just how painfully coarse the granite was, and maybe I was also in a bit of a bad mood with it. It was an ok enough climb, but way too short. And then it rained anyway.

This place sucks. We went back into town and organised Katie's flight details to get her home to work, and make sure she had enough money to eat. Had some more beers at the lovely brewing company. Had some extremely hot salsa. Watched a lunar eclipse. Much more fun than this texan climbing joke.

We had a date in San Antonio with a Delta Airlines counter, to pick up Katie's ticket, so we headed off the next morning, stopping in at Pedernales Falls state park on the way. A nice set of cascades. But swimming is banned. More unhelpful rangers. So much for texas being all big and tough and doing whatever they want. From here on out, Texas had even less going for it. It got hotter and more humid, had traffic jams, and was just generally a big flat hot place.

We stopped in at Lockhart, the BBQ capital of the world or something. Lonely Planet said to. The place they recommended had since split in two, with cooks going from one to the other and vice versa. The town was divided and all that good stuff. The BBQ was still quite an experience, in ordering mechanisms, in the equipment, and in the food, and was well worthwhile.

Everywhere else you expect texas bbq to be ribs. Or steak. This was more like roast, only cooked over charcoal, even more slowly. Served in chunks, with sausage, and some white bread, on paper. It was like fish and chips in australia, only with MEAT. Tasty, but needed more bread, and really wasn't as cheap as it should have been. A worthy experience though.

Sweat, 5.6, Enchated Rock	Pedernales Falls	Karl at Pedernales Falls	Pedernales Falls