Cranking in Wonderland...

This weekend has proven to be the best couple of days climbing since the trip began. The Satuday was the first day back after spending Friday resting.

For our first day back on we headed up to the "Gym" sector near the Restaurant area. This proved to be a bit of an adventure as the map is not altogether too acurate and the trail down is not marked. So we ended up doing a bit of bush whacking to get to the crag.

The gym is a short crag, maybe 8-12 meters at most giving it the height of most climbing gyms and hence the name. To warm up I cracked off a pair of 19s (5.10a) called "Any Objections" and "Monkey Monkey" both overhanging jug hauls. Once warmed up I jumped on a climbed called "Lithium" 24 (5.11d). This climb went up an overhanging wall on good crimps but no feet to the second bolt. Then a high left foot and a hip level high left foot which your rock over on thin crips and a rounded side pull to stand up and back to a juggy finish. I got the flash but the climb felts a bit soft.

To round out the day I got on a slab climb called "The Dark Side" 22 (5.11a) which climbed the steap slab on the other side of the river from us. I have to say, I have gotten out of practice of climbing thin slab as I got spit off at the first and second bolts. I decided I needed practice and should get back on but was shut down again at the third bolt. I did get the red point on the third attempt. Then ended the day cleaning "Any Objections".

Yesterday Klaus, Anna and I went to the Hallucinogen sector up near Tranquilitas campground. We hiked and by 10:30AM we at the base of some of the best looking climbs I have seen in Waterval. The lines are clean and much higher than yesterday's outing standing at around 15-18m.

To warm up I did "Old Crusty's Last Stand" 18 (5.9) which moved up an arete next to an offwidth crack. The climb was a touch technical as it involved laying back off the offwidth.
Klaus climbed Old Crusty's up, down and up again before cleaning it as his warm up. He then moved on to climb "Be Quick or Be Dead" 24 (5.11d) which was right next to Old Crusty. This climb looks to be quite a push with thin and blancy face moves as well as bad side pulls and thin crimps. The draws were put in but not without a few falls.

Still not totally warm I moved on to my second warm up "Doom" 19 (5.10a) which proved to be much more fun because of the exposure of climbing the arete that sticks a bit out from the main wall. I then moved on to climb "Be Quick or Be Dead" 24 (5.11d) the moves were wonderful and thin, requiring balance and good core strength to keep yourself in on the open hand side pulls and thin crimps. I fell at the lower and upper crux but worked out the sequence on the excellent climb up top.

For the button I had decided that the wall where you climb up Old Crusty's was in but after re-reading the description in the guide book, it states that the face is only to be used. So now I had to rework my beta for for the bottom. The new sequence involve a high right foot which rock up onto using a half pad side pull crimp and a one and a half finger crimp which gets you onto a incut 3/4 pad crimp. Another two things moves with feet tracking the crimps gets you to a nice incut flake where you get a shake before moving into the open hand sidepull sequence. Which I fell on. I lowered and made another attempt after a short rest.

My third attempt proved to be clean execution of the sequence and I felt good and in the moment. I moved through the top sequence of powerful high steps and side pulling to finish the route. This is the hardest climb I have red pointed yet on this trip. The only climb I would say I have worked harder on was "Je Suis Un Communist" in France, but this climb certainly felt better.

Klaus red pointed called "Fat Annie" a 25 (5.12a) and then another 24 (5.11d) called "Women Ain't Nothing But Trouble". He left the clips in "Women Ain't Nothing But Trouble". After five attempts at the thing crux off the second bolt I manage to get high enough to dyno for an incut rail next to the third bolt to pull past the crux and then finish with 8m of beautiful laybacking through a series of rooves and the red point.



To cool down I finished with "Rat Palace" a nice 20 (5.10b) which moves through a some thin balancy moves at the start and pulls a small roof at the end.



To celebrate my best climbing day yet we made our way down into the Township of Waterval and bought some "Chicken Dust" chicken which they sell from BBQs on the side of the road.



I hope everyone had a wonderful weekend.

Welcome to Waterval Boven

Picture: Elands Falls and the township of Waterval Boven

This is my fourth day in Waterval Boven and am finally taking a rest. I arrived here four days ago with no partner and a lot of energy for climbing. Its been 20 days since I last touch the rock so I was eager to get there.





The lodge where I'm staying is a climbing lodge and I had hoped to meet some people to climb with there. After arriving it would seem my like would hold as there was only a climbing couple from Austria stay at the lodge and they were more than happy to have one more climber with them. Their names are Klaus and Annalise.





The first day we headed up to one of the crags near the water fall called "The Last Crag of the Century". Gustov the owner of our lodge gave us a ride down to the crag so we wouldn't get lost and the road is rather rough and would be hard on the car not to mention the security concerns.





We abseiled (rapped) into the climbing area and got cracking. Me being the eager beaver, warmed up on "Who's your daddy" a nice austrialian 19 (5.10b) for an easy warm up. Anna toproped it as there were a couple run outs and Klaus cleaned the route.





Next Klaus put the draws in a climb call "Good Times" 23 (5.11c). I followed it and pulled through the crux but got a flash pump and came off about 3 meters from the top. Guess I should have warmed up more.





I moved on to do "Endless Summer" 22 (5.11b). The climb was really nice, with big holds and long moves. A pronounced crux at mid height where you have to step left on small crimps and make a reachy up and left. Then its sustained jugs on veritical wall to the top.





To finish the day and exit from the location I decided to finish on a climb call "Three Mosquitos" 21 (5.11a), since we were leaving the area and this climb topped out allowing us to leave without hiking through the train tunnel.





Since we were leaving I was climbing with my pack on. I headed up and then started traversing diagonally up and left under a crack system when I took my first fall. I was a little off balance from the extra weight in my back. I was clearly tired but continued up feeling I could rest above.





I moved up several more bolts and reach as series of roofs. By this time I was terrible tired but not pumped out (my forearms could still grip). I clipped the bolt below the roof and moved up and left a few moves to a small ledge that I hoped I could rest on. As I was pulling onto the ledge my right foot blew (slipped) and I went for a huge 30ft wiper in which I had to kick off the 2ft ledge that was 25ft below.





Scared but determined I climbed the rope back to my high draw and clipped my pack to the bolt. After some rest and two more big falls I conceded that I was to tired to complete the route. Since I had spent so much time on the route we now had to hike out through the train tunnel.



That evening over dinner we were joined by two native South African climbers from Johannesburg: Paul and Doug. Paul was a retired stats professor and Doug was a software developer residing in Sydney Australia now. Both were friendly and interesting. It would turn out that Klaus and another climbing friend Kyle (AKA Canadian Kyle) had climbed the Nose on El Capitain in Yosemite last summer. After climbing there Kyle had cycled up to Vancouver and we climbed a few days together in Squamish. Welcome to the small world of climbing.



The next day I was so I decided to take it easy and climbs. Since we had left my draw on "Three Mosquitos" we returned to "The Last Crag of the Century". Paul and Doug also wanted to climb here so we all piled into Gustov's car and got a ride down to the crags.



Trying to stay gentle I warmed up on a climb called "Caffiene Jitters" 15 (5.7) then on to do the first pitch of "Electric Avenue" 17 (5.9). I finished warming up by putting the draws into "Who's your Daddy?" 19 (5.10a/b) for Anna to red point (which she did).

Now warm I jumped back on "Three Mosquitos" 21 (5.11a) but armed with some cams to protect the right travers at the roof. I quickly climbed to my hight point only to find that all the cams were too big for the placement midway through the right traverse in a horizontal crack. Instead I climbed above to place at the back of a roof above the traverse, this placement would prove to be my undoing as I didn't have any runners to extend the placement out from the back of the roof. The lack of extension would prove to be the critical mistake that would cost me the climb.

I completed the right traverse by commiting my weight to my right hand moving my left hand into an adjacent crimp next to my left hand. Then making another move far left to a ledge which was just incut enough to move left on then moving up to a good hold next to the third last bolt and standing up.

Clipping this bolt would prove to be a nightmare as the rope had tracked around a corner doing a near 90 degree turn at the TCU I had placed and out of the roof. To make matters worse the rope going from the last bolt to the TCP had sloted behind a flake to add to the drag. Pulling in the rope must have weighed 30lbs to get it clipped.

I struggled up gaining a few feet with my legs to reach the next bolt. The weight of the rope made it nearly impossible to clip but I managed to do it and fighting the pump in my arms. Once clipped I down climbed to the previous clip which I removed to reduce the 90 degree angle to a mere 60 degree with a roof edge and the rope still slotted behind the flake.

With 10ft of climbing and one bolt left I pressed on. I manage to drag myself up to face level with the final bolt, only 5ft below the anchor. I manage to get the clip into the bolt but the rope drag was too much to pull up and clip. I surrendered my red point attempt and sat on the rope to recover my forearms.

We rounded out the day by climbing out of the valley via the warm up climb "Caffiene Jitters" which tops out. We then walked about the hill that the rail tunnel passes through. See picture below.

Picture: Me hiking out from "The Last Crag of the Century" near the Elands Falls, Waterval Boven.

The next day Klaus, Anna and I were to have a rest day. Well, that was what I thought atleast. We decided to go check out the boulder fields at Kaapsehoop, a small town about one hour drive from Waterval Boven.

We drove out of town fairly early after having a light breakfast and arrived at Kaapsehoop after a little over an hour. The owner of our lodge recommended the pancake lodge there so we had only eaten a light breakfast so that we could enjoy the treat at this sleepy town. The mushoom and garlic pancakes were a delight and filled us up before heading out into the boulder fields.

Picture: Annalise and Klaus hiking into the boulder fields at Kaapsehoop.

We managed to find more than enough boulders to keep us happy and entertained for the day. There were boulders as far as the eye cold see, the sandstone was very features as you can see from the pictures. After a short hike in we settled on some promissing looking boulders that offered some overhanging crimpy fun. After a bit of skin punishment we threw in the towel on our "rest day".

Picture: My fingers after the bouldering session on our "rest day" at Kaapsehoop boulders.

Picture: Klaus hiking out from the Kaapsehoop boulders.

I didn't manage to get this posted before my internet ran out on the rest day that followed but here it is now. I now have to catch up on the weekends climbing which was amazing.

Pilanesberg Game Reserve

We were staying in Kwa Maritane, a four star time share and resort. We pulled in here at 9:45AM for a coffee and to find out what time we could check in. I was impressed by how nice the resort was. The complex was actually inside the games reserved and there was a "hide" right next to a watering hole as part of the resort. The was quite interesting since you had to walk down a 200m tunnel to get to it and it was sunk into the ground so you would look at the animals eye to eye while they were drinking. Unforetunately, there we didn't see any animals there but there was an elephant that arrived while we were out driving around looking for game in the afternoon.

The weekend of the 18th, Les and Ros took me to Pilanesberg game reserve for the weekend of driving through the games reserve. We woke up at 7:00 AM Saturday morning so we could get out of the house by 7:30AM. The drive North East to Pilanesberg took around 2 hours and we arrived before the heat of the day started to be felt.

After finding out that our room probably wouldn't be ready for a few hours we decided to head out into the games reserve. Once inside, we only needed to drive for 200m before we came face to face with a several Zebra munching away right next to the road. The details of each and every game siting doesn't make for good reading here online so I won't go into the details.



After a few hours and lots of game later we stopped into the Pilanesberg Centre where you can get out of your car and have lunch and a cold beer. The centre looks out onto a open grass land and I was able to see two female lioness' lazing about in the shade of a tree about 1 km into the open grass plain.

After a nice lunch we returned to Kwa Maritane to check in and for Les and I to head out on a nature safari that Ros had kindly organized for us.

The tour went long and I got a much more upclose view of several animals that I hadn't seen in the drive earlier in the day, the most notable of which were the Giraffe, Rhino, and Alligators. The tour when to the early evening past sun down and we did manage to see the eyes and hear a pair of mating Lions before returing to Kwa Maritane in time to catch the Sharks vs Lions rugby match.

Les had gotten so nice pork chops and some boerewors (farmers sausage) which he cooked up on the BBQ which in RSA is known as a Braai. The food was delicious and Les' team, the Sharks, won their match insuring that they made it into the super 14 semi-finals.

The next day we relaxed in the morning after checking out of Kwa Maritane and then drove back into the games park. This time not 2km into the park we ran into a traffic jam as there was a herd of Elephants blocking the road next to the Lengau dam.

Les and Ros have had experience with the elephants in the past and elected to turn around and drive around them rather than wait till they elephants moved on. This turned out to be a good idea since we managed to drive around for an hour to our picnic destination, eat a late lunch and then driving back we encountered the herd on the road again. Thankfully this time they had moved off the road but were still skulking about on either side.

We return to Johannesburg that night to have dinner with Matthew, Les and Ros' son, and his girlfriend. I set up skype so that we could have a chat with Les Senior, Mom (Margaret), Dad, and Holly that night. It was nice to have a good chat with the family at home and for the RSA relatives to connect with the BC clan.

The next morning I packed up and caught the bus to Waterval Boven.

Welcome to Africa, a few days in Johannesburg.

I have been in Joburg since Tuesday. So far this place has been rather eventful. Within 10 minutes of clearing customs I stumbled around half awake waiting for my luggage to appear and managed to loss my passport. I couldn't find it and nobody had turned it into the lost and found. I didn't want to but had to assume the worst and filed a police report on the missing passport. After wandering the airport for a hour and a half filing reports and checking the lost property, Ros, the wife of my second cousin, and I finally made our way back to their place in Randburg. I checked my email to find that my passport had been turned into the BA desk and being held there for safe keeping. So after lunch we drove back to the airport to retrieve my passport. Les Woops.

Since my cousins' computer was working really slow I decided to help them upgrade the RAM as it was woefully inadiquate. We went out the next day and got some RAM for 1/4 the price that their computer guy had quoted and I installed it. However, it didn't work quite right, the 1024 MB stick was only showing up at 512 MB. I found this strange and check into the current revision of the BIOS (this is the Basic Input Output System; the lowest level of a computer which controls everything). I have upgrade many of these in the past and found that there was an online upgrade program. As per the normal procedure (since this is one thing that can physically break you computer) I made a rescue disk. In the 20 or so BIOS upgrades I have done over the years I have never had to use one of these. So off I went with the MSI (Microstar) Live Update and sure enough, the firmware upgrade finished completely and then failed after 2% of the verification process. No matter what I did, I could not get it to reprogram properly. So I rebooted in hopes of using the recovery disk to reflash the BIOS. Lets just say that it didn't work and the screen wasn't even online all I got was several beeps indicated a video output failured. A touch of panic set in as I had just destroyed my cousin's work computer and it was old enough to be unable to replace the motherboard with a new one.

With the laptop that was still functional I did some research into it. Apprently I was only one of many who had destroyed their BIOS for their MSI MS-7222 mother boards and the forums showed discussion on recovery methods from Feb 2007. You think MSI would have atleast gone to the trouble of preventing more people from doing this but apparently that falls outside their realm of concern for their customers. The forum suggested a few idea on how to repair it using a boot floppy (who has these anymore) and also contacting MSI in the Neatherlands where they might ship a new BIOS flash part which could be place on the board. I decided to follow both avenues for repair. I sent an email to MSI field application engineers requesting assistance (to which I still haven't gotten a reply) and create a boot disk. To do this I would go to the computer store where we bought the RAM.
This morning Ros dropped me at the computer store to attempt the recovery process. I had to remove the floppy disk drive from the dead computer because the shop didn't have any functionat 3.5" floppy drive that worked and when through the process of trying to create the boot disk to reflash the BIOS. After 4 hours of struggling I gave up and called Ros to be picked up.

My next avenue for success would be to track down a replacement mainboard and possibly call MSI for assistance. By this time Ros was starting to get a bit stressed over the status of her computer and with reason. Restoring a BIOS is no trivial task and the prospects were looking increasingly bleak. I didn't think there was a location in the area which would have a programmer and without home ice advantage I didn't even know the names of potential place that might even have programmers.

I decide to use what I had learn of distribution and support from my time at Xantrex and look into who the distributor of MSI was for South Africa. Thankfully there was only one and they were located in Midrand which I had never heard of. I called them and they pass me through to technical support who assured me they had a programmer and could program it but without any guarantee that it would work. All I had to do was bring down the chip and/or PC to be programmed with an image of the BIOS that I wanted put on it. As it would turn out, Midrand was between Johannesburg and Pretoria only about a 30 minute drive.

Ok, so now the situation was under control, we had a solution that could work. The only problem was that the alarm company was outfitting Les and Ros' house with additional security since there had been a crime wave in their neighbourhood so she could go. Les had appointments and was unable to drive me. So they had their Afrikaans employee drive me over there. I got quite the treat spending time with him. He knew quite a lot of history of the area and had mentioned that Ghandi had in fact lived in South Africa and was hiding in some caves near Johannesburg before he went back to India because they believe he was an illegal alien. This is in part where Mandela learn his peaceful approach to change.

Finally, I arrived at the MSI distributor's office and had the BIOS flashed and a sticked of 1GB RAM that worked for the mainboard. The computer all repaired I breathed a sigh of relief an returned to Les and Ros' triumphant.

So far, I have met a few South African and they have been a pleasure to work with. Tomorrow should be interesting and I know that my time in Waterval will be fun. Tomorrow night I go to Matthew, Les and Ros' son's restaurant for dinner. Ironically he is a the owner and chief of a french restaurant. So while I didn't eat much french cuisine in France I will get my chance in South Africa.

9 Days in London

Picture: Tower Bridge

After a bit of an adventure I have almost concluded my stay here in London. I've been here for the past 8 days. I flew in on Saturday and met up with my cousin Nicholas who is going to University here. We walked back to his flat near Cambden market dropped off my gear and then went out for dinner at the market and a pub crawl around his local pubs.

We met two of Nick's friends Nat and Jazz at his local pub and stayed till closing. Needless to say the next day was a little slow off the blocks. Nick took me downtown to see his university and then the London Museum where I got to see the Elgin stones which I missed on my trip to the Parthenon from the Greece 2006 trip.

Picture: Big Ben and Westminster Palace (Parliament Building).

We ate lunch at a student restaurant that he and his friends go to often. He then took me on a tour of South Shore past the parliament building, the Eye and the palace. The palace was particularly interesting since their is an Australian gate, a South and West African gate and a Canadian gate. I think this is the first time I got the sense of the empire and what role Canada had and has.

Picture: Buckingham Palace.

Later on the week I visit Audrey at the Castle climbing gym to get some exercise and see the gym she manages. She took me on a tour before the gym openned. The place is impressive to say the least. Its rightly called a castle as it build inside a pumping station with huge towers. It does literally look like a castle.

I did some bouldering and very much enjoyed my time there. Audrey had to work so we didn't get to catch up to much but it was good to see her and I definitely appreciated the tour.

Picture: The Gurkin framed The Tower of London.

One day I spent visiting the Tower of London and Tower bridge. I would have gone on the tower bridge tour but I got there too late. It might have to wait till when I return.

As you can see, the weather in London has been extraordinary. I have had sun and 24 degrees every day.

Picture: I was expecting Mary Poppins to start dancing with Chimney sweeps.

On Friday I took Nick and his roomate Chris to the climbing gym for their first time. Audrey was good enough to train them both and we all climbed and bouldered for a few hours until Nick and Chris were tired.

That night we met up with Nat and Jazz at the pub down the road. We were joined later by Nick's roomate Chris and his girlfriend Clair as well another friend of theirs. We played foosball and drank pints of Guiness until the pub closed down. Then we all made our way to a bar that they all go too when the pubs shut down. So we continued until 4:30 when everything had all shut down. I am truly getting a taste of being in University life again.

I fly out on Monday to Joburg and I'm starting to get rather excited. I'm being met by my step mom's cousin and going to Pilanesberg Game Reserve. We get two nights there and then on the 19th of May I'm off to Waterval Boven one of South Africa's best sport climbing locations. I'm planning on staying at the Roc 'n Rope, a good climbing lodge.

On the 28th Karina is going to meet me there and we will both be going to meet up with my sister Julie on the 31st in Capetown.

I'm going to leave my laptop here in London with my cousin so I don't know how often I'll be able to update my blog. I hope to have many but it might be more inconsistent without at laptop.

I hope you are all well at home.

Fontainebleau

Since I last made an entry I have made my way from the South of France to the North. I’m now camping in the Forest Domain of Fontainebleau, a 25000 hector forest 60km South of Paris. For those who are not in the climbing circles, this is probably most beautiful bouldering location on the planet.

Adrian and I set up camp in the Musardiere campsite near the town of Milly-La-Foret. The campsite was mostly deserted accept for a couple of climbers from Washington state, a couple of boulders from Calgary who interestingly know Alex and Dani whom I met on a climbing trip to Smith Rock in the spring of 2007 and a bunch of other Brits. After setting up our tents we had about an hour before the rain started and we retired early.

The weather had cleared slightly by morning and Adrian and I set out. Since this was my first time to Bleau Adrian offered to give me a quick tour of some of the closer Bouldering locations. We visited Rochers De Sabots, 95.2, 91.1, and Cul De Chien during the day doing on a few problems at each location before moving on. The combination of hiking and bouldering made for a tiring day. We probably hiked 6-7km moving from the campsite and between the different locations.

Picture: Me Climbing Bilboquet at Cul De Chien

Adrian packed up that night as he was moving into a Formula 1 which is a cheap hotel that has location all around France. Formula 1 are these strange hotels that are made of prefabricated hotel room modules made of plastic and self cleaning. The module then get assembled on site to make a hotel. Think lots of Borg cubes all snapped together but white and made of plastic.

So this marked the first night on my own and the start of the transition of my trip to being on my own. I wondered over to join Eric and Erica from Calgary and the guys from Washington for some card games before retiring for the night.

The next day was Saturday April 25th and the weather was in fine form. Almost no clouds in the sky and the sun was shining. Adrian and I had discussed meeting up at the Rocher De Sabots that day with Audrey but I knew Adrian’s wake up schedule so I joined up with Calgarians and Washingtonians for the hike into the forest. We stopped at the first boulder on the trail from the parking lot. The book list this boulder as an off circuit boulder for 95.2 and it has some wicked overhanging problems on it. Eric was working one of them as his project and I got to work on a beautiful 6a+ and 5c there. Evan you would love the 5c as its has a short dyno which I had to do statically.

After getting through I moved on to the Rocher De Sabots so that I could meet up with Adrian and Audrey. Since Adrian wasn’t there when I arrived I started on the blue circuit (difficult circuit) and quickly made friends with a Parisian who was there working the same circuit. We climbed through the first 20 dry problems when Adrian turned up. He had mixed up the days and Audrey wasn’t coming till that night. I wished my partner in the blue circuit well and Adrian and I moved on to the upper part of 91.1 where we continued to play on the various orange and blue problems till we were exhausted.

I couldn’t stay too late since I was going to spend time at Couchsurfing with a couple in Melun that night and then going to do a hike they had organized for my visit. Adrian generously offered to give me a ride to Annick and Jerome’s house which would have been a mission to get to had he not. We went back to Musardiere where I cleaned up and picked up my sleeping back and a some nougat that I brought from South of France

I arrived at Annick and Jerome’s place around 7:00 and we talked none stop till 9:00. Jerome was a tour guide and travel organizer for many years and had great stories about his trips around Morocco and China. We made dinner together and they fed me quince and apple sauce they had made from fresh fruit from Annick’s parents farm.

The next morning we talked of some of how people have forgotten how to forge for their own food over toasted made bread and coffee. Headed over to Bois-Le-Roi the meeting point. We were joined by Cathrine, Rebecca, Lolita, and Marianne and our hike began. We followed the river Siene 8km to the town of Samois-Sur-Seine where we stopped for a picnic lunch and leisure time. I had a chance to get to know Catherine who is an amazing person. She is originally from the US but now lives part time in France and party time in Mexico. The rest of her time she spends guiding tourists from the US around various destinations in the world. I a truly fascinating life and how she came by is was a tale amazing as well; originally poised to go to Standford she took a summer job with an Italian wine maker and the summer changed her perspective on what was important.

Rebecca was another fascinating person. Quieter than the others at first but she warmed as the day went on. As I would later discover a dancing machine when the music is up and lights low. She was originally from Wisconsin and was teaching English near Versailles.

Marianne turned out to be heaps of fun. She is the couchsurfing Ambassador for Paris and works in IT. Translation she is a nuts and crazy fun as me. She brought the best ice breakers for the hike, lots of those $0.05 candies I used to buy with my allowance when I was kid.

We then continued on for the remaining 12km then we hiked into the Forest to see the ancient fountains there. I got to know Delphine on this section, she is about to head down to South Africa as well and was celebrating her going away party, a Freedom party, for her vacation, American citizenship and divorce. She invited me to the party on Wednesday in Paris.

Lolita and I also had lots of fun. She is a climber and studying geology at University. We played on some of the boulders we hiked past as well as getting some of the geological history of the region, basically and ancient sea bed.

Picture: The CouchSurfing Hike Crew

We finished the day in Fontainebleau at a bar having beers to reenergize after the long trek. I got to try Pastis, the quintessential Southern French drink. It tastes a lot like Ouzo but a bit less sweat. After around our train arrived and we got back to Bois-Le-Roi and Annick and Jerome drove me back to Musardiere. All in all, they set the bar pretty high for future Couchsurfing hosts.

The next day (28th of May) I met up with Erica and Eric (the Calgarians), Andrew and Whitey (the Washington boys) and Steve a doctor from Leeds. We hiked in to “La Gorge Aux Chats”. I got my first font 6b ticked off at "La Gorge Aux Chats" called "Travaux forces". We climbed until the rains and thunder began. That pretty much put and end to things.

On May 29th, I bid adieu to some friends from Washington state whom I met here. They were moving on to Kalymnos so I hyped them up on the routes there with footage from our trip. We then spent some time in the nearby town of Milly-la-Foret watching videos and avoiding the rain.

Eric Erica two boulders from Calgary and Steve and I got together and made a great dinner in the camp ground and then played Asshole till late. After the game I wasn't yet ready to sleep so I went walking out into a wood near the edge of the campground and alone there danced listening to Marginals, an Evan Jones set, on my iPod. I had a smile on my face and recalled the good memories of our times partying out doors in the summer.

May 30th, I went out climbing with Eric, Erica and Steve up to 95.2 which tends to dry quickly. Erica has a project there and we hoped to get here on it. We set out not long after 11 with big grey clouds overhead. It hadn’t rained much overnight and there was a slight breeze to dry the rock. We covered the few kilometers.

Picture: Steve, Eric, and Erica

Erica’s project was on the far side of the Massif where I hadn’t been before. I started warming up on the blue circuit problems near her project. I was fairly tired from the day before and the weather was so uninspiring that I packed in my shoes after only a few problems and decided to take pictures. After three bouts with rain and a thunder shower we moved to the off circuit boulders next to the trail on the walk in. This time we went to a boulder that previously had sticks around it where it looked like someone had been cleaning some new problems. Steve and Eric beginning the strongest in the group set about working some fiercely overhanging problem. I put my shoes back on and took a spin on some easy problems including brushing a new one off the back of the boulder. It was easy but fun non the less as you pulled pair of in-cut crimps through a 4 foot roof. Then up to a jug at the head wall.

I had to leave by 5PM to meet up with Lolita so we could make our way into Paris to attend Delphine’s Freedom party. Both Lolita and I were to stay with Marianne so we made our way to her flat near the Eiffel Tower. After a brief visit we set out on the Paris Metro heading over to the bar which was located near the street where the Moulin Rouge was playing.

The bar was packed and many people were spilling over onto the sidewalk and street. I met a few other couch surfers from Vancouver there, notably Allie who was supposed to come on the hike a few days before but was unable to make it out. She was lots of fun and is intending on heading up to the Shambala in Nelson.

After some chit-chatting with the friends from the hike and the Vancouverites that were present I made my way downstairs. The setup was nice and being in a basement always reminds me a little of the Lotus. The difference is that unlike Lotus the there was DJ was killing me. It was what I would describe as electro pop. I did manage to dance to a few tracks but the story telling was atrocious. He would go from a Tech House track to Remix Pop tracks and then over into breaks but none of it made sense. I shouldn’t be such a critic but I was really frustrating because I really wanted to dance and he seemed to be thwarting my attempts to get into a groove. I did get a few tracks in and found a way to dance but once 2 AM rolled around the bouldering from the day caught up with me. Marianne and Lolita were done for the day as well and so we called it a night.

Even though it was a Wednesday, there were lots of people out because the Thursday was a holiday. This complicated my plans for returning as there weren’t as many trains back to Font. This was further compounded by the fact that there were no Taxis available to get me from the village of Maisse back to Musardiere. So I did the only thing I could, I started walking back and thumbing it.

Hitch hiking is surprisingly still a viable transport option in France as it only took 10 minutes to get a ride and considering no taxis would pick me up (I tried) I really had no choice. A man in his late fifties who was on his way to visit his children in the next town over gave me a ride back to Milly. I then hiked through the town back to the campsite. I was disappointed at getting back as late as I did because I missed wishing Steve the doctor from Leeds. I guess I’ll have to make a point of visiting him when I get back from South Africa.

My last day in Font was May 2nd so I climbed because it was the first sunny day we had in a week so I was definitely taking advantage of it. We headed up to Cul De Chien and Erica and I worked on the 7a roof called Cul De Chien Roof. It wasn't long into the day when some German kid blew off the mono and heal hook and fell with his foot between the crash pads tore his tendons in his right foot. We had to get an ambulance for him so we lost most of the day to that. Erica and I warmed back up and I managed to get close to pulling the crux move off the heal hook to the pocket at the edge of the roof (see facebook pictures if you are curious) before we had to pack it in.

Picture: Me on the Cul De Chien Roof (7a)

I went back to the campsite and packed up my gear. It seems that I have acquired a lot more gear as I was fighting to get all the stuff stowed for the hike to Milly-La-Foret which is a few kilometers away. Thankfully I had the foresight to support of a friend Marianne from couch surfing who hosted me and stored my climbing gear at her house in Paris as well as my laptop so I only had one pack for the hike.

I hitch hiked the 7KM from Milly to Maisse where I got the train into town. Surprisingly still a viable transport option as it only took 10 minutes to get a ride and considering no taxis would pick me up (I tried) I really had no choice. That night I went out for drinks with Marrianne and Delphine, a friend I met on couchsurfing who is going to South Africa after May 20th. The next day I went about repacking and managed to get all my stuff into the packs and worried I was a little over weight as Easy jet only allows 20kg of weight and even with the sports baggage allowance I bought I could only got to 32kg. Once at the airport in Paris I found out that I was carrying 38kg worth of packs plus my laptop which is another 4kg. After repacking at the baggage check in counter I managed to get the weight down to 34kg but had to go back and pay for the extra weight.

Now normally this wouldn't be problem except for the 30 minutes I had wasted standing in lineups that I didn't have to because of the sketchy signage in the airport had left me with a mere 5 minutes to walked back through security cut in line, paid the 18 euro for the 2kg over weight then ran back to the baggage check in counter before the desk closed. Manage to make it with 1 minute left.

Thus, ends an amazing time in France.