Sunday, June 4, 2017

June 04, 2017 - Not mainly about bad luck.

My colleague and good friend Harco (De Man) was here this weekend, for the third time being here mainly for climbing again.
He arrived Friday in the afternoon and his bad luck started with showers of rain, limiting the possibilities for some climbing.

We started at Éléphant where we were able to do the 6A "Les Bossettes du Lépreux". A good one mover to test your mantle skills.
After being chased away by the rain, we fled to the big roof of "Splatch" in Éléphant Ouest to keep on climbing at least something.
There, Harco showed his gym climbing skills by perfectly climbing the 7A+ "Équivogue" up to the lip of the roof where it was soaking wet.
I'm sure that if it would have been dry, he would have topped it!

Saturday, we were lucky to have dry weather in the morning and after having seen Harco's gym climbing skills, I took him to try "Vis-à-Vis" in Rocher des Souris. Another problem that is well appreciated by most gym climbers.
Also there he was able to climb the problem in two parts, but linking both with the crux will need another session.

After trying some more harder problems for Harco, he needed a break and we ended up at number 36 of the white circuit to do something easier.
On his first go, he missed a hold, jumped off and badly sprained his ankle when coming down on the crashpad.
When we arrived home, his ankle was heavily swollen and we both knew that his climbing was over for the weekend.
On top of that, he dropped his smartphone, upon which the screen became a disco light, making the device useless.

In the evening, while Harco stayed immobilised on my couch, I took Anthony (my oldest son) and a friend of him to the festival Retour aux Sources on the hippodrome of Le Grand Parquet in Fontainebleau.
We wanted to the see the finals of the Rock Tour bouldering competition and the concert of local reggae band "Fundé" afterwards, but upon arrival, we found out that the concert had been cancelled and the finals delayed until noon the day after due to the rain. Bummer!

This morning the weather looked great, but Harco, barely being able to walk, left back home.
Me, before going back to the Retour aux Sources festival to see a part of the finals, I stopped at Apremont Ouest to try "L'Arcadia (assis)" in the same small sector of "Albator".

"L'Arcadia" is a wall with only slopers and the standstart alone is good for 6C+(7A).
The sitstart adds a couple of hard and explosive moves to make it a 7B(7A+), even though for me it felt more like a 7A+.
I could have done it from second attempt if only I would have gone and have a look where the upper holds are.

Fontainebleau - Apremont Ouest - L'Arcadia (assis) 7B(7A+)




The finals were nice to watch, but after seeing the first two problems, I felt more like climbing myself instead of watching others doing it.
With the long weekend and the first day of dry weather, most areas were crowded, but I didn't feel like walking too far and stopped at Rocher de la Reine.
I wanted to repeat "Plumes au Vent (assis)" for the video. Back in 2009 it was one of my first twenty 7A's and I thought it would be a quick job.

I needed over half an hour and many many tries before I was able to find my method again.
It felt very hard in 2009 and it still did now.
For me this one is well worth 7A+, but then again, the start is quite my anti-style.
Still a nice problem though, a classic of the area!

Fontainebleau - Rocher de la Reine - Plumes au Vent (assis) 7A(7A+)


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