It was a beautiful day, a perfect opportunity to trail blaze. During our hike, we stumbled upon a ranchers honey farm.. my hiking partner skipped over to play with the bees. I quickly retreated in the other direction, pleading with the bees not to leave me alone.

Too late. I don’t know why, maybe they smelt my fear and disdain, but before I knew it, I was surrounded, swatting the little beasts who were mistaking my colossal head of hair for a hive.

5 stings later, and one bee’s butt hanging from my forehead, I escaped the mêlée. If the sting from the bees wasn’t bad enough, we arrived back at my car to find that it had been broken into. The driver side window was smashed and my belongings missing. The felons had stolen my purse, my Arabic CD’s and my keys. Luckily, a couple of good Samaritans got their license # and the police were in hot pursuit of the dodgy criminals.

I woke up this morning wishing that yesterday was just a nightmare. But one look in the mirror, told me otherwise. I looked like the Elephant Man, the angry bee had filled my face with its poisonous pollen. Instead of coffee, I went straight to McCarthy’s for a bloody mary, but without my ID, they wouldn’t serve me.. While fighting with the doorman to let me in, I got a call from the Sheriff’s office telling me the perp was in their custody but he didn’t have any of my items, one of which was my ID.

I decided to visit the little bastard that night, in hopes of jarring his memory on the whereabouts of my belongings. If my arguments weren’t convincing enough for him to come clean, my face may do the trick.

Once at county lock up, sitting across from the pale faced scrawny kid in all his orange glory, I asked him where my belongings were, showing him a map. Not sure what did it, but he started to cry and divulged the location of my stuff… everything but the Arabic CD’s..

I spent months preparing for this night. I tracked the falcons. Researched the route. Repelled from my living room. Plotted and planned until I knew The Rock by heart. Headlamp, check. Walkie-talkie, check. Climbing gear, check. Mace, check. Ninja outfits, check. Tonight was the night. I was going to climb Morro Rock.

As soon as we began the ascent up The Rock, we were encircled by hundreds of noisy cackling birds, outraged at our uninvited visit. Darting kamikaze falcons attacked and screeched at us the entire way up, but the overzealous flying rodents were no match for us. We discovered a stairway carved into the rocks, left by the Chumash Indians who used to freely climb up and down the rock to worship their Gods, before the falcon freaks, fear mongers, and local police, deemed The Rock ‘off limits’. The stairs and the dulled light of the moon, led us to the very top of The Rock.

The views were spectacular. I took off my face mask, wetsuit, and harness to bask in the glory of standing on top the elusive off limits rock.. Uh oh, last call was quickly approaching.. Time to go! The celebration is my favorite part