An apology of sorts

But mostly a laundry list as to why I have not been blogging much. Whereby "not much" I mean not at all (there should be a law forbidding people to start sentences with "whereby" -- MAYBE THERE IS!!)

1. I don't have the Denali photos but I do want to tell that story, and I know I'll be lazy to change the posts once the photos do get here
2. I'm now an associate dean for my faculty. This is scary and crazy (I fooled them. Again!) but also it's very fucking busy - it will be frantic this semester, as my current workload cannot be adjusted by much to cater for this new thing
3. I fell 40m on Denali, hit my head on a rock, cracked my helmet and was out for half an hour. There. I've said it. Note to the interwebs though, I have been talking to my friends about this, but I have yet to commit it to writing -- seems much more final when I write it than when I say it. So, after this, I've taken to spending my free time eating (yes, it's possible to eat even more than I was!), navel gazing, reading, and yes, having, sometimes, a sip of some wine. I haven't been doing blog worthy stuff though, so yeah. I think the fall (among others) also tore my left meniscus, so yeah, more navel gazing for me in the future. 

Climbing is a dangerous sport

Climbing IS a dangerous sport, in which people who do not learn from the mistakes of others do not survive.

This time, I was lucky and survived.

It was a quiet night at the gym. We had decided to climb vertical. There were many of us, including a noob friend of mine. He is very skinny, so Marian's old harness did not fit him, and as such I gave him mine. My new harness (birthday present, thank you, friends!) has an idiot-proof buckle. Regardless, I gave him my harness and explained in detail why we double back a buckle and what are the consequences of us not double backing a buckle.

For those of you that have no clue as to what the hell it is that I'm talking about, here's a picture from the interwebs (you need to replace that flabby tummy with a six pack if you want to know how it looks on me. Also, my harness is much less colorful, but I digress).

(Photos from here)
As I was explaining things to the noob, I must've stopped buckling my harness, which was like the one in the picture (but less colorful, remember).

I then tied in, and started to lead climb a shorter wall at the gym. It had been a while since I had led, so I was, as usual, scared shitless.

I reached the top of the climb, clipped the last quickdraw, and, while holding the last handhold, told my belayer to tight (remember, I was scared shitless, so letting go without being tight was. not. an. option). My belayer got the rope tight, and, as I lowered my weight on the rope (still holding the tile), I heard a massive velcro tear-like sound. I glanced down and my harness was hanging from my quads. I was standing at the top of a climb, with my harness going down to my knees and my left hand (my weak hand btw) holding on to a medium jug.  Dear friends and family, I did not swear. At all.

To my credit, I did not freak out either, but also did not do the right thing. Actually it was, but there was a better solution.

So. I started to buckle my harness while holding on to the handhold, and reached step 4 in the photo. It was getting really difficult to get to step 5 with a single hand. However, had the shit hit the fan, I could have held the loose end and get lowered like that (I did not think about this until later).  At this point, my belayer started shouting at the top of her lungs (and she has a pair, bless her): GO UP AND OVER! GO UP AND OVER! Which I eventually did. The shorter climb at  the gym has a ledge on top that was used a while ago for teaching abseiling. I went up and over, met one of the gym staff who took me down on the emergency ladder.

So. Things to note: thank fuck it was an easy climb and I did not fall. Had it been the roof (which I tried later in the night), I would have probably been disabled (not dead mind you, as the height is not significant to kill you, sadly).

But, most importantly: do all the checks. Look at the knot, the harness, the route, the quickdraws, the backcliping, your feet with respect to the rope while you climb, the rope with respect to your hands,  everything. Do this EVERY FUCKING TIME. 

Kermit's first day out

I got THE ROPE!!! And it's name is Kermit (yet another piece of western heritage that I need to familiarize myself with). We took Kermit to Arapiles this weekend and had a blast!

Here's how Kermit looks on me - apologies for the terrible quality, it's Marian's fault!

Check out the figure 8 knot!

We tried Dribble, 11 (I think) and two (TWO Stars!) Now remember, in the Arapiles guidebook, the number of stars is equal to the number of OMFGs you will utter on every pitch while you contemplate eternity. This was not the case on Dribble however. We had a blast! 

It starts with a glassy slab (GLAASSY SLAAAB!) but otherwise it has a superb, 50m long pitch! More about this later. First, did I tell you about my new awesome rope? It's name is Kermit!

After the first pitch with the GLAASSY SLAAAB! the weather turned crazy on us and it started to threat like it might transform into a gale. Sort of. Because spring. Or Arapiles. Here's me contemplating the fact that I would have to downclimb the first pitch and the GLAAASY SLAAAB! 

Not a very happy camper. Also, in need of moisturizer.  But in a short span (actually immediately after taking this picture - I wanted it to be on my tombstone, with the caption: "Josh gave me his rack"), the weather cleared and we could do the rest of the route. 

The 50m pitch was this beautiful delicious crack that ate up all my gear and then some. At the end of it you end up on this ginormous ledge where two little gifts from the Bolt Fairies await:

It makes sense because after placing 50m worth of gear, you end up pretty naked! 

I'd never thought I'd ever end up saying this, but here's me matching my rope.

I think Kermit is going to make a lot of friends because of its color. Mr Snake seemed a bit confused.

 

Training plan. I has it!

It took me a while to make this because it took me a while to realize that I need to get back into proper shape (snort) and that I will most probably never have a long distance running partner again. Sigh. Add to this the realization that the time and luxury I had during my PhD years will.never.come.back.again. Double sigh.

I need to train endurance and hills and overall bad-assness, so behold my training plan.

Monday
* run 5km
* boulder at BZ (non-friendly) or pyramid pull-ups: 1,3,5,7 times 3 sets on the rim of my office door because, I can. At least I can do 1,3,5 pyramids, so adding the 7 will not change anything, right? RIGHT?!

Tuesday
* run 5 km
* VR Boulder (non-friendly)

Wednesday
* run 5 km
* Mt Lofty trek: 10 kg - 20 kg; increase by 3 kg every two weeks
* start with one summit and progress to two OR run up Mt Loft if weight smaller than 15kg.

Thursday
* run 5km
* VR lead - at least 3 roof attempts

Friday
* run 5km
* pyramid pull-ups: 1,3,5,7 times 3 sets
* 7 seconds hangs: 7x5x3 sets

Saturday - rest day
* friendly boulder at BZ  or the pad
* arapiles or grampians

Sunday
* morialta 10 km run (1.5 loops) OR chambers gully 10km
* if in arapiles or grampians then 5-10km run depending on the overall ball shrinking the day before.
Cannot run if no ballz.
* if feeling like a wuss then can take this as rest day but need to replace Monday run with Morialta loops.

The best anti-depressant

A student commented that (s)he hated every second of my course, without saying why. Two sleepless nights and a grant proposal rejection later, I have come to terms with it. Also, I bought this:

Because there is nothing like color to ward off depression. Also, there's nothing like color to replace rope safety specs.

Arapiles - trip 3!

Day one started out being very very cccccold.

For our first route, we decided on an easy, loong multi pitch route. As the total noob that I am, I carry everything with me:

I reckon this gear weighs about 10 kg (ok, maybe 5). Still, the advantage of leading means that on has a lot of photos of oneself while climbing, some of them accidentally cool.

One also keeps bumping ones head on the rocks, hence the ever always slanted helmet.

We got to the top of tip toe ridge and were met by beautiful views and flowers. Life is better with both.

We also met an echidna, Marian's first and my third!! Echidnas for president!!

Our next route was a more difficult 10, called Xena, which, as the name suggests, is a bit burly. Not a problem though, although to be fair the sight of the rock face is kinda intimidating:

After this we rewarded ourselves with steaks in hippie Natimuk.

We only had time for one route the next day, and this was Eagle's cleft, which, as the name suggests, is kinda airy and a bit runout. I was scared SHITLESS. This May or may not have been because Marian decided to make a super super strong coffee that morning... Anyway, no more coffee before lead climbing for me: to be fair, our last Thai adventures were suggesting this as well: my old heart cannot take both the climbing and the caffeine, sigh.

We got to the top of Eagle's cleft in four hours or so and had an adventurous retreat: you have to down climb through a cave, squeeze through a tiny hole in the wall and then downclimb a via feratta (

and then solo down a wall (beginners MUST rapel)

Everybody, STOP!

HAMMER TIME!

Curtesy of Ionuca (she's blogging about the most awesome coolness of having a climber boyfriend/girlfriend, but all I could think of was OMG the rope!!!). Behold the BEST ROPE IN THE WORLD. I will not stop till I has it!!! (hint hint wink wink: i'm turning 32 next year goddammit!!!)

Roca Rainbow, 9.9 mm, 70m. Lurve it! D., it will probably drive you insane. Dodo, you will loves it I thinks!

Faja de los Flores

The BEST one-day trek I have ever done in my life (and I've done a few)! Here's the link to all the photos.

It is a 16 km, ~1100 m elevation trek that goes through a pasture (A PASTURE!!!) of edelweiss (hence the name flores). Now edelweiss is my favorite flower but this is not the only reason why I'm so psyched: in Romania it is very very rare and it is illegal to pick it - I would presume the same here: it certainly grows in utterly remote areas.

Throughout our Pyrenees treks, I've been carrying two rocks in my backpack, in order to train with weights. Meet Humpty and Dumpty. For this trek, I left Dumpty home as he was a bit heavy.

The start.

The trek starts through a beautiful little forest that is reached if you walk 400m back from the parking lot, at the old information center - Circo de Carriata is our destination!!

The forest is beautiful! Not only that, but it is full of hazelnut trees.

We feasted on the hazelnuts for a while:

And when I say for a while, I mean until we didn't find any more. 

As you get out of the forest, you see this! One sees this from the valley floor but seeing it up close is totally different. I think the peak on the left is Tozal del Mallo.

This is the view behind you.

After we feasted on the hazelnuts, we proceeded to feast on raspberries!!!!

The middle.

We then reached this middle point, where apparently one has to choose between going left on "Clavitas" (iron pitons) or right on "Fajetas" (a gigantic traverse). We r climbers so we took the iron pitons. They were nothing fantastic, but of course, this is in retrospect:

Scramble, scramble and we're up:

We are headed for up there, where "up there" is the most prominent horizontal line towards the top of the wall.

This is how it looks from the side, one hour later (excluding lunch):

In some places the path is really really narrow, but that is not the problem (if you do not have a head for heights)

The problem is the sheer drop to eternity in some places. In all the places there is a sheer drop to eternity, but in some, it is most obvious:

The local fauna is charming:

But what really leaves you breathless are the views:

Of course, in all of this (the balcony goes for 3.7 km of sheer drops to the right, and also, OMG so beautiful - also to the right), we took our own sweet time to fool around and take GPS coordinates of the trek:

And then Marian spotted the first edelweiss and I did not stop squealing, even as we were descending on this stoopid scree:

And then we met the edelweiss pasture and my squeals turned into screams:

At some point we met this Swiss couple who were so scared that they would not make it in time, that the only thing they did when they stopped was to check their map (they were actually kind of freaked that we did not have any map - we had GPS coordinates, because, 2013 bitches!) (also because we were completely unprepared, having only just read the descriptions of the route - in Spanish - but determined to wing it). So the couple were so attentive to their map that they did not see the marmots, the eagles, nor the goats. THE GOATS!

The end.

As we descended into the pasture below the scree with the edelweiss pasture, we were greeted by mountain goats! Waterfalls! More goats!

More waterfalls:

More goats (actually, the same one as before, she was really really curious as to what the hell we were doing there)

More waterfalls:

And then we met the via ferrata traverse.

It was not much but it was exciting. The Swiss couple at this point were moderately freaked and, despite being faster than us (I was carrying Humpty and was soo slow), they were not as experienced scramblers. It starts off with a chainy traverse (The chains were superiorly well maintained!)

But then the chains are augmented by pitons, mainly because of this:

As you can see behind Sandra, there is indeed eternity back there and not many many footholds! This is the only difficult section of the route - the excitement lasts for about thirty seconds, but still, you truly become the chain's best friend:

You descend again through as series of pitons that is behind me in the above shot: no problems for you if you are tall! If you're short like San and I, you will need to free climb in some places, because I think the people that drilled the pitons were giants!

After this, there's a descend through a forest full of dead wood (not so interesting as the first forest), and,  as dinner is in your thoughts (it took us 9 hours to do this!), you are only focused on getting down asap! Which you do eventually, after meeting the start of the route:

And, if you've read this far, this is what was blocking our road on our way to dinner: