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James Xu

@climbingxu

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|📍MOAB | GCSAR | AMGA |
Professional guide since 2013.
Never ration passion!
Learn, teach, be kind.
Join me ⬇️ #slacklife

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Head in the clouds, gravity centered, body afloat, one foot in front of the other. These are the moments that define highlining!

A couple days after we finished rigging the Castleton highline, a snow storm blew through the valley and covered the landscape and the slackline. After ascending icy ropes up to the top in the following day, we were rewarded with a legendary inversion as the snow burned off into a sea of low rolling clouds. There were moments where the walker was completely socked in with less than 10 meters of visibility, a pleasantly disorientating and surreal experience.

🎥 @da_logster (Project Lead)
🚶‍♂️ @slackenglund @balancecommunity
🪢 @slacktivity

#slacklife #dronephotography #castleton #castlevalley #slackline #cloudscape taken in Castle Valley, Utah by @climbingxu

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3 years ago

2 KM - 1.26 MILE HIGHLINE

What a beast of a line! Rigged in November before @ggby_fest, this project took 4 days to rig, tons of planning, and endless yoinking of material across this massive gap in the desert south of Moab.

Talk about pushing the boundaries of slacklining! This was twice the size of any highline I’ve ever seen and twice my PR so I knew I’d have to work for this one.

Fun stats of the 2k
- 6.66 kn standing tension before walk
- Drops to ~5.5 kn after walk
- 20 sections of webbing connected
- Over a dozen crossings, one send!
- Crossings took 1.5-3.5 hours
- Lowest sag point was ~86m below the rim. Didn’t feel all that steep 😆

@schlitt_storm sent this beast, making it the North American highline record!

Things one needs to walk this ENORMOUS line was commitment, endurance, and luck. I felt like I had two of those things going for me out there. This year was probably the least amount of slacklining I’ve done in years due to a knee injury so this felt akin to running a marathon from off the couch.

The commitment felt pretty real as I felt the canyon darken and cool off as I was walking the line, I joked to myself that I was slacking for my life but it rings true to a degree on this scale as a rescue on a line like this would not be easy.

It was incredible to witness everything that led to the culmination of this rig. Shoutout to the efforts of the first team a few weeks back in their proud attempt, thanks for blazing the trail. Gratitude to all the people that contributed thousands of meters of webbing, amsteel, planning, and stoke to make this happen. Thanks to the chill, competent, kind, and hard-working team that worked together so well as a skeleton crew. Love to my partner and to the crew who celebrated my return to earth at the end of my walk. The sum of the parts was truly greater than the whole.

#slacklife taken in Moab, Utah by @climbingxu

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3 years ago

Black Boxes of the San Rafael Trip Report
350 cfs, “class 4 in a class 5 environment” aptly described by Tim Kelley.
Did a 22.5 mile long sneak variation rappelling 200’ into the Upper Box and ran all the way thru the Lower Box to Black Dragon rd. off the I70 in a day. Epically cool and committing technical packraft day trip.
2-3 mandatory portages including climbing/scrambling and lining boats around a riverwide strainer/sieve, lots of land/boat scouting, and lots of beavers (and strainers they made)!
My partner @sylvanslacks floated the Upper Box many times prior and I had creek experience and the combination of skills, local familiarization, and desert knowledge made getting around obstacles manageable.
The Black Boxes, particularly the Lower, was gorgeous but felt very daunting as you are way out in the backcountry with no egress inside either of the Boxes with very real sieve/strainer danger, particularly in a couple of the class 4s and the massive strainer portage. If you swim the small rapid before the strainer portage or fall into the river while traversing around it, it’d be deadly without extremely quick throwbagging from upstream.
The rest of the time outside the Boxes (majority of the trip) was a relaxed and mega scenic way to see the heart of the San Rafael Swell. Felt super good after getting thru the Lower Box, that’s for sure.
Oh, we also did this 12 hours town to town (Moab) with a shuttle driver @wandering.sloth that dropped us off and pulled our rope up 😎
@alpacka_raft @kokopelli @pit_viper #packrafting by @climbingxu

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3 years ago

Monsoons showing off a little 🌈 🌈
#nofilter #doublerainbow #moab taken in Moab, Utah by @climbingxu

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a month ago

smh at all the people that complain about summer in the desert, vol. 5 🏜️ taken in Moab, Utah by @climbingxu

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a month ago

Still happy to be here! taken in Moab, Utah by @climbingxu

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4 months ago

Upgrade your van with the @wolfbox_official G900 Pro 🚐 🎥

I love adventure and taking risks, but often times the most dangerous part is driving to and from the trailhead. That is made worse by the fact you often can’t see out the back, which is where this rear-view mirror dashcam comes in. Now I have no more blind spots, high quality coverage with front and back facing dash cams, and full confidence on the road.

Do your rig a favor and upgrade today with @wolfbox_official.

https://wolfbox.com/products/wolfbox-2024-g900-pro-wifi-touch-screen-parking-monitoring-dash-cam-smart-mirror-with-starvis-678-sensor?ref=ijcxelbb&utm_source=goaff

Use discount code: CLIMBINGXU

#vanlife #wolfboxg900pro #wolfbox #dashcam by @climbingxu

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5 months ago

POV: you’re my backpack in a slot canyon!
Come join me on your next trip @moabcanyontours
#canyoneering #slotcanyon #utah #pov #insta360 by @climbingxu

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6 months ago

Absolutely stunning sunset in the fisher towers last night watching @climbingxu walk Erotic Narcotic.

#sidequest #explorepage #antigravityglobal @antigravity_global by @climbingxu

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6 months ago

Come on in, the water’s fine 😉

An iconic slot accessed by packraft somewhere deep Marble Canyon…

#grandcanyon #canyoneering #slotcanyon #water #insta360 @karasu.tokioka @insta360 by @climbingxu

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7 months ago

this kind soul 🫶🏽 by @climbingxu

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10 months ago

👆———🚶🏻‍♂️———✊
Another beautiful addition to Arizona highlining!
This rig required a strong team to do a difficult hike with over 3500’ vertical gain in 3.5 miles, climb the Finger, and do some complex rigging on both sides on the shortest day of the year. I am so thankful for my friends and family in supporting me in rigging this gap that I’ve been staring at for most of my life from the house I grew up in!
The Finger is the first tower I ever climbed at the age of 17, and is the 8th highline I’ve established on Mt. Lemmon since I was 19. Definitely the most adventurous and physically demanding highlines on Mt. Lemmon, but also one of the most exposed and epic!
@skyygumby @tomgobravo @scooba_steph @xxushiner @tc.bukowski
#slacklife #balancecommunity #deserttowers #slackline #highlining #balance #tucson #mtlemmon by @climbingxu

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2 years ago