A bridge too far!

After finishing with Rodellar we (or to be more accurate 'I') wanted to take a look at an area called Alacandre. Its named after a river that runs perpendicular to that of the Rodellar gorge and so we thought that we could get there by following the path along the bottom. You can't.
The next day armed with some more beta and more psych than was sensible we began the long haul to Alacandre. After talking to Stu we were expecting somewhere in the region of an hours romp. After about an hour we could see the van about 300m away on the other side of the gorge and we still hadn't made any head way according to our map. After even more walking the descent began, a bit of scree, some fixed lines, polished walkways and then to add insult to injury a river crossing which required shoes off. It was freezing and what psych we had at the beginning of the day was rapidly disappearing.

The route that I was mistakenly chasing was 'Adios Pepito', a 45m 8a recommended by Bonjoy which follows the rather obvious shadow in the photo below. No suprises that it was wet when we got there just like everything else. The line looked really good but the sector was somewhat spoilt by fixed ab lines on adios, and tat hanging all over the place to allow you to get to various routes; very messy. The walkout was even less fun.

After deciding (maybe a day too late?) that we were done in this particular area we sped down to Margalef. Whats nice about this part of the trip is that everything is very close together, there only seems to be one big drive left. We were there in no time. Dan & Emma, as well as Stu and Jules had recommended a load of stuff so we knew where to start. Margalef is very much like the jura in style. Small sectors with not a massive amount to do at each but one or two lines that you really can't miss, and pockets. The one exception to this is Raco de Finestra, the jewel in the crown. Here, almost every route is worth doing, the same applies for around the back at Tenebres.

When we arrived at the area it was a French holiday as well as a weekend; the place was packed. We'd been told the area is great for van living and in a way it is, in fact the Spanish cater for campervans quite well apart from one big thing; Toilets. I'm not sure why as everywhere else we've been people are living in the same way but the Spanish crags and parking areas are pretty fowl. There seems to be no place too close to the crag for them to go for a turd and even worse, when you stray past the last climbed on sector on a given path, you're instantly surrounded by a minefield. Watch where you walk!

The other thing is general crag etiquette is extremely poor here, or just manners in general. Although I can sympathise with people suffering from Redpoint interruptus back in Britain I don't think anyone has the right to claim a route for a day and everyone here seems to think they've got a god given right to dog the sh*t out of a route and then bugger off for the rest of the day leaving a hanging (knotted) rope in situ. Its like Malham, only worse and nobody (I hope?) has ever been for a cr*p on the catwalk.
Their damn dogs do my head in as well, twice in the last few days I've been sat behind the steering wheel unable to move my van because some crazed wolf like spanish hound is yapping like mad at my big yellow beast, the owner shouting instructions at it from the cliff 300m away, although thats never going to work as they never trained it to begin with. I like dogs too.

As you can tell van life and motivation has been a tad stretched recently and Spanish 'culture' isn't really our thing. Six months is a long time and its easy to get wound up so bare with me (we know we're lucky buggers).

[Rant Over - Back to the climbing]

We've done some fantastic routes here at Margalef but they all have one thing in common; pockets. The difficulty of the route depends solely on how good the pockets are. Good for your hands and your feet ~ F6, Good for your hands but not your feet ~ F7, etc.

One of the best I've done is this:

Its far from cutting edge at a lowly F7c but it is incredibly fun. Sprints between big juggy pockets to hands off rests and then a pumpy finish. Brilliant. So good in fact that we went back for piccies.

Nat came tantalisingly close to upping her best onisght to nigh on her best repoint grade after employing some pro belaying tactics (staring out from the crag). One pocket more and it was done, unfortunately it was not.
After a while at Margalef, the crowds dispersed and the unseasonly hot weather faded (we used a solar shower around the 1st of Nov!) leaving us even more choice of which crags we could actually climb at. Whilst some were great, others weren't worth the walk and thats the way of it, the topo is cheap and cheerful and doesn't really offer any insight into the quality of a sector. However ,the sheer amount of undeveloped rock in this area means that its only going to get better with time. Due to the pockets our skin was wearing thin in all of the wrong places and a few painful days later we thought it time to move on. It was tempting to stay longer on some of the newly available sectors but our hands just couldn't take it.

As my family are visitng next week for a few days we're tantalisingly close to having a 3day break away from van life. The time before that we decided to spend attacking the more northenly crags left on our list (in case the weather later dictates that we cannot). That left Terradets, Vilanova and Santa Linya.

Yesterday we visted Terradets which was crawling with people, very few climbing, lots of ropes. I was getting pretty close to spitting out my dumby until a few people bucked the trend and offered to pull their rope. I thought I'd misjudged the Spanish until these guys turned out to be Italian and Venezuelan. After only being able to get on one route as a warmup (F6a) I wasn't ready for a good onsight attempt but tried nonetheless making it to just below the last clip before slumping back onto the bolt. I asked for beta and what I got in return wasn't what I really wanted; "You must hand jam between the top two tufa's", yuck. Thankfully after a fair bit of rock mileage I can actually jam and I dogged through the move easily a little frustrated that my head and body weren't in the right place for the onsight. I've now identified what it is that makes me onsight well and its not PMA. When i'm in the foulest of moods, tired at the end of the day and even when I clip a bail out biner onto the back of my harness I crush. If I take a rest day and approach a route professionaly I invariably blow it, weird eh?
We left the crag to our next destination, Vilanova de meia for a light hearted 7 pitch route. The weather was (is) cr*p.

Oh - I forgot to mention Dawin Dixit. I don't really know what to add to Doyle's post on the matter some time ago but bear this in mind: After getting wrapped around the rope getting a hold in the roof I was able to remove all points of contact bar one arm, swing out on the hold to un tangle myself and back in. The mono that you have to pull pretty hard on over the lip swallowed my finger to the last knuckle. Oh and the clips on the lower half are a pain in the ass.

22nd December is the day its all set to end.

26 Points

Since arriving at Rodellar we've been plagued by crowds, wetness and a lot of false starts. Walking through the valley on the first day I was about as psyched as I'd ever been. Huge caves, walls and slabs, covered in Tufa's that look outrageous to claw your way up, but there were people there doing exactly that and I wanted in!

Stood underneath Las Ventanas (a huge roof), I quickly realised that I had some learning to do to get to any kind of chain. I'm not used to climbing tufas and I'm certainly not used to looking for knee bars. A quick trip to the shops and me and my dad have another thing in common. I now have knee braces too, mine are for climbing mind and not just day to day activity after years of playing squash.

As I said previously I got involved with these routes but the wetness had seeped through and I couldn't quite get to any chain. Slightly annoying to say the least. It got worse = we went to Riglos.

On arriving back we were keen to check out the conditions. Most of team England (America, Spain and Sweden) were staying away. The outlook wasn't good. The crag was covered in dark streaks and if anything, was wetter than when we left. We spent our days picking out lines in between the wetness but couldn't help but feel we were missing out on the best bits.
I perciviered in finding something hard and long to capture my attention but failed. Nat however didn't. We met Stu and Jules underneath a route called Lola.

It has two chains, one 7a, one 8a. Stu narrowly missed the onsight (L1+L2), squirming onto a ledge about 50 cm away from the chain only to realise that he couldn't move a hand to clip. He despatched a few goes later. Jules was looking strong working out the sequences. As two spaniards had their unsuccessful and then successful goes I got colder and colder (not to mention slightly grumpy). When it was my turn I wasn't psyched for L2 and I was simply putting up a rope for Nat, even that felt hard as I struggled to re-warm up on the crimpy start. At the belay I made a half hearted attempt at going higher, I didn't go far and lowered off. Next go, Nat was up. She fought her way up the wall (crimpy) to the ledge (scrabble) before powering up the leaning wall above on big fat Tufa's, no hiding just pure power. She fell about 3 moves from a no hands move and no more than 10 moves from the chain. It was on.

A nervous rest day later and we were back. The warmup went well with her flashing her hardest route yet; the head was in the right place. At lola we were lucky the draws were in. I climbed it, extracting beta all over the place and extending the necessary draws before lowering off.
Nats go. Up the crimpy wall she seemed a little nervous. The wall ends with a hard move to a pocket then a slopier than you'd like exit onto the ledge. It was at this point that we realised I'd failed and that the draw still wasn't long enough. Regardless Nat carried on, onto the ledge for a rest before the redpoint crux.

The RP crux involves about 6 moves, RH tufa, LH Tufa etc. and then slap for jug. With me shouting foot sequences she powered her way to the jug and a marginal rest. One more move (the one where her 1st go ended) to go before easier territory, a no hands rest then a few more metres.
The new beta worked. Foot up, twist knee and she was up on the tick marked holds, obviously excited but nervous. More beta and after finding the knee bar there was just the last few metres to go. She hadn't worked this section at all, I was getting nervous that my sequence (newly invented) would fail her at the worst possible time. It didn't and she clipped the draws victorious. Her 1st 7a in the bag. 1st Redpoint. So using Stu's system she scored 26 points in a day; a new record and a total spanking for my score (we won't mention that).

I might check out Adios Pepito tomorrow but its a long walk in and might be wet. Jon says its the best 8a he's ever done, 45m is all I can think. 45 bloody metres?

Riglos

Team Sheffield/England split many ways when the rain arrived in Rodellar. Some to Margalerf, some to Terradets and us two to Riglos. Before leaving Rodellar we tried desparetely to get our hands on the famous Kalandraka Riffugio Lasagne, we failed so made do with a meal at the cafe down the roads. It was rough, and can only be described as some kind of pork product. Later that evening after arriving in the small town of Riglos it became apparent that we couldn't get hold of the guide there and that the food had made me ill. I slept, Nat didn't as she was starting to have the same problem. The next day was a frustrating, mildly ill day driving half way back to Rodellar to buy the guide then getting back to Riglos just short of having enough time to actually do anything. There is some single pitch stuff at Riglos but as it is mostly 8m long at the base of the Pison (the photo is tagged if anyone cares which tower is which), it seems like a waste of time.

On day 2 we set of on a shorter multipitch route up the Volaos tower. Neither of us have ever climbed on Conglomarate and at first it was very disconcerting. The faint sound of rockfall was omniprescent. However, staying in the confines of the rubber/chalk we didn't have a problem. The climbing was fun, obvious holds over roof's and then ledges, roof's and then ledges (rinse and repeat). Nat found it quite hard work as a lot of the crux's involved turning a steep lip. We lowered off in the baking sun wondering how on earth anywhere was wet?
The rest of the day was spent linking the first two pitches of routes into mega single pitches of around 40m. I made it to the ground each time on stretch (the beal 9.4's stretch a lot!). Fun.
The next day we wanted something bigger, either up the Visera or the Pison. Initially the latter looked more appealing but stood underneath it we couldn't be sure we weren't embarking on a jamming epic mega route. We went for the former which turned out to be a mistake.

On arrival at the base of the spire a team was just setting off. It didn't seem like an issue as with their 80m rope they were linking pitches and the leader was romping up the route. We planned to do it normally on our 70 and I set off as the second got to the first belay (which they'd missed out). I arrived as she was hung on the next bolt up. Hmmm. Unfortunately the second above us was way out of her depth and was pulling on everything in sight including quickdraws and more importantly unchalked untrafficed rock. At the belay I was being continually showered with a lot of rock, some small some large. Nat heard the same on the floor in the form of a few clitter clatters and some rather large thuds. Despite this we went upwards but it was the same story further up. We decided to bail as it was getting risky and at this point the belays offered little in the way of shelter from the rock shower above. As we got to the floor we noticed the other party abbing off. Obviously they'd realised the issue and had quit. 5 minutes earlier and we'd have carried on but C'est la vie. Back to Rodellar to check out the wetness...

R'oh dear

From Buoux we pointed the van towards Tres Pont, neither of us knew what to expect and on parking near a busy dual carriageway my hopes weren't too high. I was wrong. Tres Pont probably has the same scope as Kilnsey, the rock is good and it offers climbing for the both of us. Usually routes have three lower off's, one in the 6's one in the 7's and then one in the 8's, just keep going until you pump out. After nearly being blown off the top of one of the more airy routes I was feeling a little wussy but couldn't bare to leave without doing a monster line right through the middle of the steep section and up. I set off knowing that the Maillon we found that day was on the back of my harness and wouldn't be missed ("A Muerta" certainly wasn't my intention). Halfway up something changed, I noticed I was moving well, not at all pumped and just kept on going, at the crux I climbed up, worked out the moves and retreated for a shake. After fully recovering I let out a small power yelp and carried onwards and upwards, celebrating long before the final chain. WOW, I felt fit as fire and that felt good. It wasn't just a good day for me either, Nat had been struggling with her psych and head, she resolved to try something hard and was one move away from crushing a steep powerful 6c, it wasn't to be but at least she took the fall and if you don't try you can never tick (right that down!).
After a long and tedious drive through country roads we arrived at Rodellar, the weather was good and thankfully the dreaded seepage wasn't there, in fact everyone said they'd never seen it in such good nick. Thank god I thought as I walked through the valley, rock everywhere, heavily Tufa'd rock through steep, long terrain. Warming up at El Camino we could both feel the previous days climbing and we should have really stopped but I didn't want a rest. At Las Ventanas the atmosphere wasn't welcoming and after out staring a few people I went on a 7b ish thing on the left hand wings, it was rubbish and I felt even worse. We both decided that the next day we needed a rest. Then the weather broke, 35mm of rain in 12 hours. The next day was a different story, everything was dripping and of the two routes I got on: Pince sans rire and The kings of metal I couldn't finish either due to wetness.
In the evening I sat around with the rest of team england/sheffield wishing we'd got here a week earlier (Nat feeling the same after not finishing off her route of choice). The fact is I was fully prepared to put the effort into learning how to climb Tufa's (the grand total of my tufa mileage being 50 for 5, 50cm perhaps at most?), finding marginal rests with my newly bought knee pads and full on hands off rests and I was gutted that I now can't. Today its raining again, 17mm more although the weather is due to improve. The locals think its f*cked for the winter, we're hoping that a few days away at Riglos might allow the easier lines to dry out and we can re-asses the stuff I want to get on after a later inspection of the pitch. Watch this space.

Buoux 6C

After Bareclona and the break-in incident we were DEFINITELY France bound. I was quite excited to check out St. Leger after hearing quite a lot of positive things from a lot of people. Thankfully theres a great place to park up near (ish) the crag with water etc. and we were a lot more comfortable than before. Unfortunately (maybe I'm getting too picky?) I was a little underwhelmed by the crag. The south side of the crag seems to be cursed with a band of sh*t rock around 2/3 rds height which just ruins any fun you might have had on the way up. I tore off a few too many holds for Nats liking so we decided to hedge our bets on the Northern Face. This was better by far (but dripping wet in places) and we had a good day here. The problem was neither of us had found anything that really motivated us to get on the next day. We needed to go to the local town to get the locks fixed in a few days time and just didn't want to stay any longer. Buoux wasn't too far away and I can safely say its one of the places I was most psyched to visit on this trip. I needn't go into details why, its history alone gives reason.

We arrived at Buoux around 4pm, it was BOILING and driving the length of the crag we failed to see anything in the shade so we sat around killing time. As the sun dropped off we headed up to Styx wall, the name rang a bell but I couldn't tell you why... The warm ups were a great introduction to what Buoux is; heavily pocketed, not overly generously bolted (or graded) high quality limestone. We didn't get time to do much before it went dark.

On a reccomendation from an ex buoux long time resident we decided it was one of the few times we'd stay on a campsite. Bonnieux to be exact (good job as the Apt site closes during low-season). On the way, I was chucking the van around the tight bends imaginig I had dreadlocks and was in fact driving a pug 205 gti when we came to an abrubt stop. A damn dog was laying down right in the middle of the road and our yellow tank had very nearly made a mess. I sent Nat out to deal with the said dog who refused to get up and just rolled over. Thankfully it was a Beagle so she picked it up and chucked it into the back of the van. Clearly it belonged to the Auberge 100m away so we set off in this direction. It didn't and the number on its collar didn't work. It was too late to drive to apt and I was too hungry, instead we parked up and fed and watered our new 4-legged freind who showed signs of being a hunt dog but seemed far too comfortable with people and attention.

The next day we dropped it off with the local (no doubt incompetent) French police and went on our way. Good van guest, and unlike my Dad didn't throw up.

Buoux is a much bigger bit of rock than I'd expected and my intentions to get heavily involved with The Spectre soon fell by the way side when I realised it was two pitches up.
The new guide book unless I'm mistaken is turd; Am I wrong that it was one Ben Moon who first climbed Agincourt and not some frenchy (apart from that it seems pretty good)? From what I've seen its been a long time since Buoux was THE place to be, climbing at the crag we'd barely see anybody else and Bout du Monde remained deserted for the majority of the week apart from a few visits by myself. I was expecting the whole place to be as polished as pinches wall but it simply isn't. Maybe this is one of the cases (like the verdon I'm told) where the crag is recovering from its punishment in former years. In fact, I'd go so far as to say that Ceuse is more polished than the majority of Buoux.

Which routes did we get on? Well that was simple. Each area is named after the best route there. The guidebook therefore makes a very quick hit list the grade dictating whether it was on mine or Nats although I think Nat would have benefited a little more if she climbed just a touch harder. For the first time ever she got involved with a 7a (on TR, TCF one of the best I've climbed) and climbed it well only leaving one move undone - Good for the future I'm sure.
The usual suspects recieved my attention however it was one route in particular that captured my interest:

Nic told me it was the best route of the grade he'd done and everyones seen a picture of the classic move. He forgot to mention that it also has a stern reputation.

The first day I went on it I didn't get far. After the easy stary I got to an incut undercut and failed miserably to boost my feet high enough to hit the pocket. Plus I couldn't touch the cross through, I could get into the drop knee, but as soon as I let go I'd rotate and on the right hand foot hold theres no stopping that motion. The final crux move sequence, a long pop into a slot I just about worked out but I wasn't keen to try too hard as I feared early flappers stopping play. I left feeling like a bit of a punter but was later informed that Rich failed to do it during his stay in Buoux. I felt a little better.

The next day it was time to get the locks sorted and as usual it didn't go well. VW promised to change the front barrels, cut them to fit the old key and all for the sum of 115 Euros. Needless to say when we got back to the van we had two sets of keys. The guy could tell I was a little pissy and promised to rectify it the next day, which he did. I can't understand why he didn't just do it the correct way in the first place but at least its done.

The following day fully rested I ended up back on bout du monde. I didn't have much hope of succeeding at all but I wanted a photo for the blog to go with the "look - how hard does this sh*t look" post. I opted to don my new pair of white Anasazi's and set off. From the undercut I moved up easily and then unwound from the cross over staring at Nat exclaiming that I couldn't believe what had just happened. What a difference a day makes or what a difference a decent edge makes? Psyched. I went back to the van feeling a little less punterish but my happyness was soon quelled when I noticed some pikey had decided to steal my rear fog light assembly. What is more annoying is that the car park only contained VW t4's with petzl stickers etc. It HAD to be a climber.

On the last day at Buoux I ended up back at Styx wall on something in the region of 7a - 7b+, it started up a short steep wall which was hard, followed by turning the lip (again hard) and then a jug romp to the end. However, it wasn't that simple, one bolt from the top (on a runout) I encountered the worlds hardest, dirtiest slab. I can't count the amount of times I went up and down from the last rest but finally I hauled my ass to the chains after what seemed like an eternity, heart pounding.

One route remained that I really wanted to get on, No Man's Land which as you can see takes a striking white streak below a roof.

From a traverse in on sharp pockets and poor feet you join the groove and climb on better pockets and blobby crimps to just below the roof. If you go to Buoux, don't miss out on this one!

We just popped into Volx, some of it has fallen down and climbing is currently banned (and for good reason too looking at the huge blocks and destroyed railings). Thanks to Stu and Bonjoy we now have a solid Spain plan and hope to be at the first venue by tomorrow night.

In Too Deep

From scary big trad stuff it was time to venture back to the south of France where we have a cluster of crags still needing our attention. We stopped briefly in Briancon to invest in a stove top espresso maker; I'd been missing the climbing works so much I just NEEDED some Illy in me.

After that we dropped in at Chateauvert. First impressions weren't great, it looked small and just not that good. The climbing however was surprisingly fun, juggy holds and pretty basic routes although not that great for Nat. The heat however was oppressive and having just spent the last week with our mind on bigger things it all looked just a little too underwhelming. So we hatched a plan.
To change things up a bit before getting back to single pitch sun drenched sport we decided to try and find a ferry to Mallorca for some DWS. I've wanted to go since seeing Gresh', heavily tanned hanging off some juggy holds above bright blue see. After a bit of searching Iscomar came up with the goods with a 'fairly' cheap ferry (note; flying from the UK would work out LOADS cheaper). This involved driving down to Barcelona and hopping on a 7 hour ferry to Palma. A quick rifle through the guides and we had a stop off to break up the drive, Montgrony. The guide belongs to Jon and hence there's plenty of info on whats worth getting on. Stupidly we hadn't really looked into when this crag is in best nick and it can be described as an amplified sun trap offering Tufa after Tufa after Tufa. And then some Tufa. No problemo, we only had to kill a day and I spent that day sliding down Tufa after Tufa in the heat.

The ferry terminal wasn't yet built which maybe explains the relative cost of the ferry compared to its competition. It was a dump, with rubbish everywhere and it stunk. Plus nothing said, and nobody knew where the ferry departed from. We made it in the end and settled for a long boring boat ride to Mallorca.
We arrived to find that the local climbing shop is extortionate and seems to have a supply problem when it comes to chalk. We were low. Decathlon was also out. The weather was terrible for the first few days. Very stormy and the see looked dangerous at all the crags we visited. Leaning over the top of Cala Ferrera and Cova del Diable I was very concerned about what we were both getting into. Thankfully on the first climbable day the sea was somewhat calmer.

We'd written off a lot of the venues as either a) threatening or b) too hard for Nat. Another award for a poor guide book can go to the Mallorca Psicobloc guide. It neglects to mention that the traverses to get to the start of many of the 6's are in fact 7's and that some of the descents are in fact 6's in reverse. Not ideal for Nat. Oh, the maps were also turd, many of them having arrows pointing North that should actually have been labeled 'East', one of the directions actually said drive here then ask around. Fantastic. A group decision was made that Diablo, despite being hard was probably the safest bet for entry/exit etc. Nat didn't quite realise that the traverse in was at half height, F6b and often wet at the start of the DWS'ing day. Half way along with terror in her eyes she took the decision to control the fall and leapt off. Splashing down comfortably in the water and swimming to what remains of the afroman cave ladder (not much). I slipped and slid my way to the sanctuary of the cave where a load of ripped up Spaniards were making little headway with the classic afroman. Originally graded F7b+ by Rockfax and now given F7a by Miguel. Neither of which I believe are correct. A lump appeared in my throat as it was my time to set off. The lower cave holds were slippier than a bucket of grease and left me with Bennett batter pouring off my hands before I even arrived at the start of the route.

Fear drove me upwards, undercut, heal on, cross over, lurch at jug, undercut jug, cross over, cut,

match, campus, up to crimp, foot on, back for crimp (This is when I looked down... Wowza, not quite like conner cove). Lurch out left for a crimp,

match and then rock over terrified. The Spaniards all cheered and started hassling me to jump. You must jump after you do your route.

Words like "on your bike" were muttered back as I topped out carefully. Tearing a crimp off the final 6 inches of the route, left me totally gripped but pretty happy. I climbed back down to find Nat not so happy so we both swam around to the furthest route to the right and exited.
Our home made sangria bottle chalk bags hadn't lasted well so instead we stopped off at Decathlon to fashion these beauties:

from silicone swim caps and of course part of a sangria bottle for good measure.
Next day we headed to Portocolom (a favourite among male doggers the guide informs us). Here you climb on a cliff with a large roof, positioned almost directly underneath a striped lighthouse. The roof stays fairly close to the water so its a little less intimidating, plus to get in, you simply walk around the coast after utilising some private stairs down to the sea.

The cliff itself is about the same height as Diablo but many of the routes finish at the half height ledge. From the previous nights rain many of the upper holds were wet meaning an enforced jump from near the top of the route. We both got on well with the place. Nat trying hard on a F6b and I did many of the F7's that go through the cave on "rock horns"...

(Taken with our new Fuji waterproof jobbie which is great in theory but pretty hard to use in any kind of swell without sinking).

At the end of the day I'd pretty much climbed all of the routes at the left hand end of the crag and Nat had tried hard, greasing off the very wet route of hers. We called it a day. We briefly bumped into Miguel the guide book writer (from king lines) followed by a massive camera crew. I was about to ask a few things but declined.

Back to Diablo and this is where problems arose. Some of you may have been to Mallorca for the DWSing or maybe just seen King Lines. From either of these you'll know there are a particular type of local with which the climbers don't like. The jellyfish. Two types live around the island rock. One; big clearly visible red buggers who don't do you much harm. Two; Nearly invisible see through grey/purple buggers that sting like a bitch, come close the rock and last of all... travel in large groups. You can see where this is headed.

Second day at Diablo, I wanted pictures. Nat was on a line and I climbed like I did before with her snapping the "Gresham eat your heart our pics" above. We then spotted some of the big jellyfish and she declined to climb. I joined some Spaniards and the crazy Germans on the ledge for a spot more fun before leaving unscathed.

The next day Nat and I surveyed the area more closely. The coast (excuse the pun) seemed clear. We both set off on the traverse with Nat going for a RP. She made it to the cave in sheer delight as did I. Good job as we could see some jellyfish from the cave, but only a couple of the smaller kind (at this point we weren't very informed). We carried onto the Lobster ledge with Nat swimming and me embarking on the Superwoman traverse. Which was wet. Nat made it to the fisherman's ladder, I didn't. Swimming over she navigated me past a JF and straight into another. Ouch. The b*ggers were all around, I was sore and a little bit panicky. After excusing myself on the ledge for a quick golden shower, we had a look out. There were tonnes of JF everywhere and we were stuck. I won't bore you with details but the exit involved reversing as much of the trav as possible. Throwing ourselves into the clear water, swimming for a ladder and then traversing out like maniacs. Nat taking another dive for good measure.

From this you might surmise we'd learn? But oh know. We returned the next day equipped (kind of anyway) with another inflatable boat which on the box had a picture of a small child and a KG allowance of 55kg. We went for broke cramming ourselves, two oars and a drybag into this boat and tried to navigate the heavy swell to the middle ledge. It worked, barely where on leaving the boat we realised that once again we were stuck above loads of JF. Doing the manly thing I gave Nat the boat and climbed my heart out over the JF along wet jugs to safety and then out. Once they'd gone however I returned for more with the Spaniard and crazy Germans. Nat sat this one out.

I joined an elite club of people that have climbed Ejector seat statically, and then reversed the majority of the route in blind panic for no real reason at all. I didn't manage to finish off or try all of the routes I wanted to at Diablo, some were just too wet and others were plagued by the JF.

We tried some other areas on the last day but bad weather built up a crazy swell at Cala Sa Nau and the waves were crashing violently against Klems scarily high F8b test piece. We declined and I sat at the top of Diablo willing somebody to come and climb with me. Dunning turned up and bottled it, heading elsewhere for somewhere less intimidating.

I have to say that DWSing on Mallorca is a bit of a mixed bag. Between violent seas, wet holds, condensation, sea spray and jellyfish, not to mention tricky descents for those in the lower grades it just isn't as straightforward as it ought to be. A shame I feel.

Here's a bit of light hearted fun for all those people currently eating salad. I had two curries last week and I drink every night and I'm still loosing weight. My body has ingested my meagre chest to repair a very sore back and biceps.

Now onto the bad stuff. After the ferry back we'd had a long day and decided to stop and sleep at a 24 hours services just north of Barcelona. The area was fully lit with security cameras all over. As usual we covered the windows with our insulating foils and went to sleep. The bouldering mat leaning against the passenger door. We both awoke to a strange sound. The van makes sounds as it contracts and it expands with temperature change but this was different. Some b*stard was trying the door. Us awaking disturbed him and we heard a car start and leave quickly. The van has had both front locks attacked and destroyed by this would be thief. What worries us is that we were clearly in the van (they had to move the pad to get to the lock) and up until this point we'd thought that was good protection against this kind of intrusion, what kind of a person breaks into a van with somebody inside?

Back in France we're a bit happier, the cost isn't too much and we're both looking forward to St Leger and then the legendary Buoux.

Spirit of the Trad

As the weather was starting to turn and we'd agreed to meet my Dad at Bergamo in a couple of days time, we had to leave Gorges du Verdon.

We broke up the journey by visiting Monaco and La Turbie, mainly for the view as we both expected the climbing to be a little under par compared to what we've been used to (or perhaps spoilt with). Anyway, we were right.

Monaco wasn't too van friendly. We didn't fit under any of the height restrictions and that made it a bit of a pain. The final straw was being carved up by one of the most expensive cars on the market (Mercedes Mclaren SLR) for the last remaining open air parking space! On to Italy!

At bergamo we picked up my dad, who had arrived carrying more baggage than we had for the entire 6 months away. It did however contain my Trad Rack, which hasn't seen much use for a number of years for various reasons. It looked small and incomplete (its never been big), but annoyingly it was missing all of my small wires which I lent to a a friend. SHIT.

The plan with Dad was to do the Pisciadu again to get him used to the Ferrata's before heading for La Bochette Centrali, a little more serious an undertaking.

We drove up to Arco, bought him a VF kit and then on to Colfosco. The Sella and Gardena pases looked somewhat different as we drove up. I couldn't quite place what was new but something wasn't right. Then it clicked; SNOW! SHIT.

We'd come from 27' heat to -1 in a day. It was cold, foggy and snowing. In the morning (after my Dad had his first claustrophobic moment sleeping in the roof bed in the van), we decided that the weather looked stable so we set off.

The VF was great and we flew up it without much a do. At the top however it was a different matter. It was covered in snow, our flimsy approach shoes were useless and we were glad to haul ourselves into the Refugio for food. Clever me remembered that beer at this point isn't such a good idea. Thank god I remembered.

The descent route was covered in ICE and snow. About halfway down where the cable stops the group was silent. One person on the way up was stopping to put on crampons and here we were slipping our way down a boulder strewn iced up gully. After what seemed like an age we reached the bottom. It didn't take long before our plan changed. Val di Mello seemed like a better bet but when we awoke the weather was appalling and the forecast showed the same for the south of France and whole of the north of Italy.

A non exhaustive search of the map book pointed us to Verona as "a city of great tourist interest" bingo. Cheap hotel for a few nights and some good food and drink. Plus some culture, of course.

Verona steals the award (away from Innsbruck) for the best looking women so far encountered on the trip. The Italians also steal the crazy driver award from France (its still a close race).

Leaving Dad at the airport after having a great time in Verona but missing the climbing we were faced with a difficult choice; cut Mello and head for the more certain climate of the south of France or instead risk bad weather to go to Mello.

We did the latter and I'm pretty sure we're both very happy about that decision. Val di Mello (and Masino) is a really stunning place. The water is the clearest I've ever seen and I swear that any photo taken there looks like the saturation has been played with to a stupendous level. The grass is greener than green.

We didn't boulder while we were here, instead we turned our attention to what seemed like a more worthwhile pursuit, the huge pieces of granite littering the valley.

To start with we sought out stunning lines with bolted protection. One was a short 2 pitch route up the side of this waterfall. Which contained the largest runout I've ever encountered. A whole pitch without a single bolt or runner available. Easy, but still!

I also encountered one of the hardest slabs I've had to climb. I know I'm not known for my footwork but seriously this was hard and airily bolted. Unfortunately as I embarked on one of the upper pitches the heavens opened and we both knew instantly how the slab was so smooth. When it rains it too is a waterfall. We got drenched.

As we were walking back to the van looking a bit sorry for ourselves an Italian guy who'd helped us out with routes ran over and invited us to join him and his friends for dinner at the rifugio later on "after all it'll be better than eating in the van in the rain", he was right. We joined what turned out to be a private stag do 17 strong (this made up for missing out on the Magic Stag earlier this year due to codfinger). The night was hilarious, we were made to sing along to sweet home chicago and paradise city. We also learned the word for drink "Bivlio" I think. It was sung a lot and roughly translated the song said: Stand up with a full glass and drink it till its gone. So we did. Local meat, home-made pasta, some meat dish with polenta, two types of cake, champagne, wine, coffee, Genepe (which Nat decided to shot) then our very own Talisker and Natalie was ill. Very ill.

After climbing for 3 days on we decided it was now or never. A large route had attracted my attention and some assurance from a local that my rack was big enough gave me the final confidence I needed to go for it.

"Luna Nascente" isn't an overly hard route. The first pitch is F6b then F6a+ getting easier and easier to the top. It follows a large crack feature for 340m over 8 pitches up a massive granite barrel. Probably my biggest trad undertaking and certainly Natalie's (remember 3 months ago she hadn't ever tied on!).

In the morning we both awoke to a strange sound. It sounded loud, mechanical, somewhat like a helicopter. Yes... definitely a helicopter. Extremely loud. Oh. Yes it landed about 50m from the van. Mountain rescue were everywhere for a practise day. We couldn't decided whether or not this was some kind of omen or a very lucky coincidence given my history. It was however comforting to have someone checking we had everything we'd need. Headtorches; check. MR phone number; check.

The walk in was a pain, a fairly steep hill interspersed with scrambles. We arrived a bit hot and bothered but quickly found our route and discovered just how trad we'd gone. This was the spirit of the trad. A few rusty pegs here and there and fixed belays of sorts (i.e. there were rotten slings over flakes every now and again) but nothing with the words "petzl" or "fixe" printed on them like I usually prefer.

The first two pitches went by quickly but we soon lost sight of the fitter stronger German team ahead of us. As it was trad and MP it was my duty to lead every pitch which made us slower than most. The cracks seemed never ending but I comfortably fell back into the trad mode I haven't played with for a long time now. N.B. The best re-introduction to trad is NOT Val Di Mello. My gear got further apart after I stitched up the first crack so well I had no gear for the top half and all was going swimmingly until pitch 6.

I reached a capping arch shaped roof. No way up, no way over and the 3a traverse pitch I was looking for didn't seem to exist. A belay of sorts existed in the form of very rotten tat over a flake and a few pegs showed aid climbers used to go this way. No chalk. No gear. A new sling was put over the flake and Nat was brought up to contemplate our situation. It soon dawned we'd gone wrong. We don't know where but we did. We swapped over the lead and I tried hard to find a way out, the slab to my left was unclimbed, covered in lichen and completely un-protectable. Lowering down 5m or so I could gain a crack. However, this wasn't the correct crack. It was large and flared and I had NOTHING that would come remotely close to protecting it. SHIT. I think we worked out that we'd gone wrong lower down and were 1 pitch from the top but a whole load too far to the right.

A quick vote and we decided that down was the best option (for once climbing on two 70m singles made life easy) and by sacrificing a sling, a maillon and someone else's biner we were back on Terra Firma. A little upset not to have topped out but relieved nonetheless.

Thankfully we didn't need these guys:

Time to leave the big trad for now.