Saturday
After my third day of climbing in a row, and Alexis's second, we decided to take a rest day. While most rest days in Potrero for me typically consist of sleeping in, making a late breakfast with coffee, and relaxing a lot, Alexis really wanted to see some petroglyphs mentioned in the guidebook in an area called Boca del Potrerillos, and I suggested that we should also check out the hot springs, so we had a fairly ambitious rest day ahead of us. The only problem was figuring out how to get to the petroglyphs... searching the internet for directions gave us a halfway decent idea about how to get there but it wasn't exactly clear if the directions would work or not.So soon after we headed out, we tried to follow our directions, and ended up on the road to Icamole. We were pretty sure we had missed the turnoff by the time we reached the Ex-Hacienda del Muerto, but the gate was (surprisingly) open so we stopped and took a look around and took a lot of photos. After that we ended up driving around on some gravel roads with no success. Frustrated, we decided to head into Mina and ask around. Since there is a museum called Museo del Bernabe de Las Casas, we decided to check out the museum which was actually really cool - a tour of the formation of the earth, dinosaurs, mankind, and more modern times in the Salinas valley.
Tan grande!
After we finished the museum, we asked if they knew how to get to Boca del Potrerillos, and the guy handed us a map printout which made it very clear and obvious how to get there. In fact, you just turn off of highway 53 when you see the sign. Okay then. We arrived and expected to have to pay a small fee but the guy there only requested that we sign the guidebook. Alright then! What we found was a plethora of what appeared to be basalt rocks just covered in ancient petroglyphs. Que chido!
Petroglyphicos
Next, we booked it out of there and took off on the road for Icamole in order to get to the Termas de San Joaquin, a hot springs pool about an hour away from Hidalgo. I always love going there on rest days; really nice warm water in a beautiful underground pool. After a bit of swimming and relaxing, we headed back to town for some dinner and drinks.
Sunday
Having had a rest day, we decided to tackle another multipitch. I haven't done Black Cat Bone (9 pitches) since three years ago, and it's a really fun route, so we elected to do that one. So we had a light breakfast and headed out. Alexis was nervous because she wasn't sure how she would do on the 5.10d crux pitch, but I was nervous too since I had to lead it. Last time I climbed the route three years ago, I got to follow the hard pitches but this time I was the leader.The first few pitches went very smoothly, swinging leads on the first three pitches to the Garden of Bleedin' (3rd class), and then Alexis led the next 5.9 pitch. I was pretty nervous starting up the 5.10d crux pitch, but kept moving up and trying to keep a cool head as I headed up. Surprisingly, I had no problem with the cruxy thin moves leading up to the roof, but had a hard time pulling the roof. I couldn't find a left handhold that I really liked in order to pull up, and kept going back right to the safety of the bomber tufa pockets, but eventually decided to just go for it not knowing if I would take a fall or not. I didn't, and was super stoked to finish it clean. Alexis followed as I shivered in the sudden shade and wind, and although she had to take a few times she had no problem making it up. Success!
The cruxy roof
We then had only a couple of 10b pitches and a 5.9 to end the route, so I led the b's and Alexis led the last 5.9 pitch and we enjoyed the somewhat uncomfortable yet beautiful summit ledge.
Black Cat Bone summit
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