Day 14/15 - WTF happened last night?!/Homeward bound

The evening panned out like this: we finished climbing at Rocher Cannon aroun 1900, cooked dinner, m0ved the car to the farthest corner of the carpark and set up hammocks just off the carpark in the trees. We were in bed by 2200 and asleep shortly after. James fell out of his car-crash of a hammock almost immediately and slept on the floor instead. Some time between 2300 and 0000 we were woken up by the sounds of a helicopter circling slowly overhead, getting lower and lower. It kept slowly circling for about five mins and the downdraft from the rotors was knocking the hammocks around. It then seemed to fly away for a min, then return even lower and then land in the carpark next to the car, maybe 30m away from our bivvy!

The noise and the wind and the lights was quite terrifying in the middle of this forest at the dead of night. Chris and I had swung out of our hammocks onto the floor and put shoes on, expecting armed police to arrest us any minute for wild camping (which is illegal in Fontainbleau). The helicopter spent maybe five mins on the ground which the searchlight moving around before it just took off and left! It took me ages to get to sleep after that, every light or sound was a perimeter being set up around us! Best guess is they were looking for someone, checked out our car and decided it wasn't the one they were looking for. I'm sure they'd have seen us bivvying on an IR camera and decided not to bother us. Seriously weird!

Friday morning we were up, fed and packed pretty quickly and got in a few hours bouldering before setting off for Calais. I think were were all suffering for the previous days climbing with aching arms and sore tips so we were on the road slightly earlier than we needed to be and we got an earlier ferry back.

We drove up to my house in Rushden for the evening, had chip shops chips for dinner, a few celebrationary beers and enjoyed our first hot showers for weeks. We've not been able to wash for nearly a week so we all felt super clean afterwards! Sleeping on a mattress felt heavenly.

Final totting up of the ledger shows we spent about £180 per person all in for two weeks. Pretty incredible. Bo)

Day 13 - Boulder, boulder, boulder

Woke up early after a cold bivvy and grooved over to Franchard Isatis and worked through a load of blue circuit problems. I flashed everything we tried which was pretty cool.

Drove into Fontainbleau centre for our final food shop at lunchtime then on to Rocher Canon for more fingertip destruction. All was going well until Chris lightly sprained his ankle landing on a root under the mat and I eventually didn't flash something so we retired to lie in the sun for a while. Got on a few more problems late afternoon before our final dinner of pasta with a ratatouille-type vegetable sauce. We're bivvying here tonight and doing a little bouldering in the morning before driving up to Calais. Tomorrow night we'll be sleeping in beds at my house in Rushden! \o/ I'm going to savour my last night in the hammock though - it's freezing in the mornings now but soooooooo comfortable!

O2 have sent me a text notification that I've spent £40 on roaming data services! =o. Hope you've enjoyed reading!


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Day 10/11/12 Snow/Run Away!/Bouldering

So on Sunday evening Chris and I had scouted the approach to the Trenker Crack on the 1st Sella Tower for a fast and efficient ascent first thing Monday morning. It rained during the night which didn't bode well but we'd chosen to pitch tents because it was getting colder and colder. We drove up to the Sella Pass with big imposing cloud swirling around and the car thermometer reading around zero. We grabbed some coffees in the hotel to see how conditions developed. Then it started snowing, and snowing, and snowing.

Climbing was off for the day so we mooched round shops in the valley as the weather got a little sunnier. The mountains looked beautiful with their dusting of snow but the meltwater on the rock wasn't doing much for the rock climbing plans we still optimistically held! Late afternoon we bought some beers, made our way down to the river and had a really enjoyable, chilled couple of hours drinking beers and building more and more elaborate dams and pools to cool the drinks. I headbutted a concrete bridge a couple of times which left me with a very noticeable lump! It was one of the nicest evenings we've had here, parking around like kids again. =o)

Tuesday we still wanted to climb the Trenker, but when we woke up it was snowing again. Fucking weather! It was obvious that rock climbing in the Dolomites was off for the rest of the week. A backup plan was hatched and we started driving for Fontainbleau - a forest full of sandstone boulders south of Paris. The rest of the team offered me a bottle of gin if I got us to the Font area in a day so 13hrs of driving later we bivvied in a rest area an hour from Font. Everyone was very glad of the earplugs I had stashed in the car cubby holes and we were right next to the main road.

We rolled into the town of Fontainebleau this morning at 0900, and quickly found our plan of hiring a bouldering mat wasn't going to work! =o/ We spent the cash on a mat in Decathlon and bought a French language guidebook and headed for the Bas Cuvier area which James recommended from his Font trip last year.

The climbing here is superb and the setting is stunningly beautiful. We were climbing problems on the orange and blue circuits and I sent quite a few blues quite quickly. I spent a good amount of time working on La Marie Rose with James - the first Font 6A. I got really high, to the very last high move, but couldn't quite pull onto the topout. Working a boulder problem like that is a completely new experience for me and such a different experience to the 400m trad routes I was leading last week but I really, really enjoyed it. I'm super psyched for bouldering till Fri lunchtime now.

Bivvying at Gorges l'Appertent or somesuch this evening. It's warmer up here so back in hammock luxury again! \o/

10% iPhone battery so this might be the last blog post till I return. Will complete the posts and add in all the missing photos. I'm such a n00b for not bringing a backup charger!

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Day 6/7 - Total fail/partial fail

Yesterday was blazingly hot and we spent hours taking the trad gear for a walk up and down a mountain with no climbing whatsoever. The guidebooks for the area are a complete nightmare to use and we got bit badly by them. We walked in to do a route which was an epic up and down a mountain into another valley. Once we got there and looked at the massive walk still to do up the screes on the other side we decided we wouldn't have enough time to actually complete the 400m of climbing and called it off. It seemed sensible to walk out via the closer carpark we should have parked in and walk back up the road to our car. Big mistake. This took up miles out of our way at the bottom of a valley. We left James and Chris with the gear and Adam and I started the walk up the hill trying to hitch as we went. Over an hour later and about a third of the way up we finally got a lift from a kind Italian chap who didn't speak a word of English! Karma was returned when we gave a German bloke a ride back down the road. All the walking had killed us so we spent the rest of the day lounging in the park before grabbing some beers in Cortina and having a wash in the river. Chris our resident chef rustled up an awesome spaghetti bolognaise for dinner.

We pitched tents in a massive carpark overnight and did a very neat job anchoring the tents down with rocks instead of tent pegs.

Today we walked in to do a couple of four pitch routes above a massive lake. All these massive towers and faces look the same up close and Chris and I managed to do some accidental new routing up a completely different piece of crag to where we should have been. The rock was really chossy and I threw loads of rocks up to head size down as Chris as I was leading the 40m slabby first pitch. Pitch 2 was a pretty gnarly 40m chimney, incredibly loose, that I had to excavate on the way up. No gear for the first 10m and I had a bit of an issue trying to furtle gear in at the crux without falling out and hitting the belay ledge. The chimney eased in difficulty but remained loose ad required lots of care to find relatively solid parts to pull on. Topped out on a little pinnacle with awesome views. Route is called Dirty Dancing VS 4a, 4c 80m, very loose. We abbed off and had a really harrowing journey down avalanching scree slopes back to the bags. I'd had enough near-death for one day and the weather was starting to turn so Chris and I headed back down to the car and found a bar while Adam and James finished their first route and went to start the route we were supposed to be doing.

An hour later and a storm broke and Team B had to abb off in torrential rain (James' first abseiling experience) while Chris and I enjoyed wheat beer and chatted to a hot Italian barmaid. They arrived back absolutely soaked through so they'll be having a rest day tomorrow to dry their kit out. It's still raining so we got some takeaway pizza in Cortina for dinner and pitched tents again. Hopefully the weather will improve soon as the hammocks are about a billion times more comfortable than sleeping on the ground! The rain is having a really depressing effect on the whole team - it's difficult to still see the magic when you're wet and cold!

Hopefully a days climbing for Chris and I tomorrow. Think we'll head over to the Sella Towers on Monday - we're all psyched for Tenker Crack!

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Day 8/9 - 12hr epic/rest day

Yesterday Team B spent their day drying out all of their equipment from the day before. Chris and I caught the first chairlift up from Lake Misurina to go do the Comici route on Punta Col De Varda. We got on the route, Chris lead the first slabby pitch then I got stuck into the second chossy corner pitch. About 15m above the belay the corner crack closed up, the rock became friable and the climbing got serious. I tried a move off my little ledge, pulled on what appeared to be the key hold, ripped off a head-sized block and threw it down at Chris! Suitably spooked I made use of an existing piton and lowered off. We abbed down to the ground, had a sandwich, it started to rain so se headed back down the scree slopes with our tails between our legs. Looking back up and consulting the guidebook we realised we'd been on the wrong line again! =o( We carried on down, discussing out options, but it took us to the bottom of the torturous screes to mtfu and head back up again and do it properly.

The weather had smartened up by the time we got to the bottom of the now blinding obvious line so we set on up, me leading as fast as possible, moving quickly and keeping the gear spaced. Four pitches of quality crack, chimney and face climbing were dispatched in short order, it was still very cold and windy but no rain. There was no way we'd make the last chairlift down but we soldiered on anyway. The final pitch was a vague leftwards traverse linking ledges. So vague, I did a full 60m of quite tricky crack and face climbing with not a ledge in sight! That scared me as I was really unsure we were going the right way on the vast face!

We finally got to the top of the route, decided to sack off the 300m scramble to the summit and started abbing off. 150m of scary abbing down a massive choss filled chimney full of loose blocks the size of my torso saw us on the ground as it was getting dark. I'd used all my ab tat, mallions, nicked a rope and had to solo up to free the ropes on the final ab but we were both alive, albeit tired, hungy and covered in cuts and bruises. We walked down a piste by headtorch and got back to the car at 2115. That was Chris' first epic and one he'll remember I'm sure! I've certainly cured him of the idea that abseiling is fun! =oD

Today we drove over to the Sella Towers, Chris and I took it easy, had a good breakfast, dried the tent and had a refreshing wash in a river. Adam and James ran off towards the Sella Towers as soon as we arrived replete with via ferrata tails with a vague plan to find something to climb. Just had a text to say they'll be late back as the descent is tricky so they've got up something which is cool.

Less than 20% battery remaining on the phone, fingers crossed I can keep it off and blog till we start the log journey home on Thursday. It's been an awesome experience here with a good bunch of friends but I'm kinda looking forward to getting home now! I miss cold beer, large pizzas and the healing touch of a woman!

Oh, I've become quite addicted to expressos here, which is strange as I've never been a fan of coffee before!


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Day 4/5 Washing/Climbing

So, the hammocks aren't so good in thunderstorms, but more of that later! I have a technology problem - my iPhone car charger has decided to stop working and being a 'tard I didn't bring a mains charger! I'm going to turn it on and blog every couple of days while the batteries last but no photos unfortunately. =o(

Yesterday we had a rest day as the forecast wasn't too good. We had a late start and relaxed breakfast next to the car before heading into Cortina to do a little shopping. We grabbed some beers and sat on some steps and watched the world go by. Italian women are incredible - we've had to come up with a whole new rating system! Athletic tanned loveliness. And we've seen a lot of leiderhawsen (sp)!

Having not washed since we left on Sat everyone was smelling pretty disgusting, I seemed to be sweating Camembert! We took a walk upriver and had a very invigorating bath in the icey cold glacial meltwater! After some general goading everyone got their head underwater - there's some comedy video footage! We grabbed another beer in town where James angered the barmaid by eating bowl after bowl of free barsnacks until she brought him his own set of snacks to stop him emptying the bar!

We returned to the same bivvy spot in the woods and watched lighting in the sky as we went to sleep. About 2330 it rained. And I mean really rained! Turns out the fancy hammocks aren't breathable, and the zip on mine had water pouring into my face. Chis on the other had was sound as a pound in the cheaper zipless hammock, tightened up his bivvy bag and carried on sleeping. I wasn't liking my hammock slowly filling with water so I grabbed the emergency tent out of the car. As I was wrestling with the tent (and the rain had all but stopped) James decided his bivvy bag was leaking and he'd rather sleep in the car. I have him the keys and he ran off into the dark, in his underwear and shoes, headtorch on his head and dragging his sleeping bag.

A good 20mins went by before we heard panicky shouts from the opposite direction of the car. Shortly after James arrives, still in his underwear! He's run off into the woods, got lost and had some sort of Blair Witch Project experience! The look on his face was the funniest thing I've ever seen - we've all been laughing about it ever since! The car was only 30m away, you can see it in daylight and we've been back and forth loads of times! =oD

Today we went and climbed a 10 pitch VI (about Severe, though the two crux cracks felt VS to me). I lead all but the first pitch. We did it in 7hrs - same time as Mon by twice as high. I absolutely loved it - solid rock low down with involving climbing. And loads of choss at the top which I really enjoy. I've become quite the choss-weasel! Slightly overhanging offwidth about 150m off the ground was my highlight. I'm really into the runout nature of the climbing and covering the ground as fast as possible. We did some via ferratta to get down which included a really eerie suspension bridge shrouded in cloud. Also explored some WW2 tunnels on the way down.

I'm typing this from my hammock - forecast looks good for the next two days so hopefully no rain fail/tent retreat tonight! Aiming for a 12 pitch VI+ tomorrow with a 150m open book corner at the top. Whole route is 380m tall or so! Bo)

Life out here is very simple. We sleep wherever we string our hammocks, wash in glacial rivers, eat very cheaply and climb. The mountains are stunning, it's all so big. And there's so much history here. God knows how people can cook themselves on a beach all day. My cough is loads better and I'm feeling strong.

And we saw a bear today. But it might have been a dog. We can't agree but took a picture!

Night all!

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Day 3 - Cortina, Hexenstein

We awoke rested, cold and very psyched. The hammock city was packed up quickly and we drove on down into Cortina. We wandered around until we found a supermarket and stocked up on a couple of days food, investigated a few climbing shops where James bought a hammock and retired to the carpark for breakfast. Chris brought his chef skillzooorzzzz to bear and fried egg, tomato and cured meat were gratefully received.




We then headed up out of Cortina, into the mountains, heading for a route called Hexenstein. The weather was hot, hot, hot and the very steep walkin was really tough. A popular route it seemed as there were teams on every belay and two queueing in front of us at the base.

We climbed as two teams of two, one ahead of the other. The rock was of excellent quality, compact and not polished but gear placements were few and very far between. Belays were bolted and there were sparse pitons and bolts as runners but it still felt like soloing a lot of the time. Crux move for me was an awkward step into a squeeze over a massive jammed boulder - as I committed, the hex I'd placed rattled down the rope to the belay which wasn't ideal! I ran the end of pitch five and the final pitch together, I placed a hex near the belay and ran out a whole ropelength up a choss-gulley to get to the summit cross on rope stretch! Awesome! Except we took 7hrs all in to do 6 pitches with a ridiculous guidebook time of 1.5hrs. We need to get our speed up if we've any hope of doing the Stella Towers traverse.

Walked off by headtorch down WW2 tunnels and via ferrata, cooked in a lay-by and set up the hammocks in trees a bit further down the road.

Didn't take any pics on the phone unfortunately!


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