January 27, 2018 - When will it stop?

When will it stop?
A question that's on many's mind.
Even older Bleausards say that they have never seen such humidity and plain wetness for such a long time before. I can only agree with them.

For today it was finally announced to be quite sunny again, but when looking out of the window early in the morning, all I could see was a dense fog and a dark grey sky.
Another look at my weather app revealed that the predictions had changed into grey clouds all day.
I had planned to go to Apremont Désert to try "La Corne de Rhino", knowing that it dries quickly, but I had to be patient and started cleaning the bathrooms upstairs. Time passes more quickly when you're busy.

I was pleasantly surprised when Pieter wrote that he and Alberto were having a coffee in Milly-la-Forêt, because I didn't expect them to be in the forest this weekend.
The latest weather predictions they saw before leaving were those when it was still supposed to be sunny and they also were disappointed when waking up this morning and seeing all that grey.
They agreed to join me to Apremont Désert and we met on the parking a while later.
There was no need to hurry, because we all knew that almost everything would be wet anyway.

I was already warmed up from the long walk when I arrived at "La Corne de Rhino", it was already 13h and still the fog and grey sky were ever present.
The small boulder was as good as the only dry one in the area and even in remarkably good conditions as opposed to the previous session when I worked in it.
I took my time working out the moves again and in between tries I didn't touch the holds for a few minutes, to avoid them becoming humid, which can happen fast with this humidity in the air.
Almost an hour later, I suddenly linked all the moves and topped out.

A beautiful problem with some really nice moves! Fits quite my style.

Fontainebleau - Apremont Désert - La Corne de Rhino 7B+(7C)

Pieter, who was climbing some circuit routes together with Alberto to warm up, joined me and noticed that there was still a direct line to left of the start "La Corne de Rhino", called "Le Rhino-Féroce".
A 7A+(7A) with slopers that looked in good condition. I mean, it could have been worse.

I only needed two attempts and Pieter followed directly after.
It was a nice problem, but felt like a soft 7A at most.

Fontainebleau - Apremont Désert - Le Rhino-Féroce 7A+(7A)

Alberto, who is normally not good with slopers also made some promising attempts, but he had to let it go for another time.

Back in the main area, we worked a bit in "Jabbawockeez", but time went fast and I had to leave.

More rain announced tonight and grey clouds all day tomorrow.

When will it stop?

January 19, 2018 - Something new.

The first half of the week I was away for work, but it seemed that I didn't miss out on anything.
Yesterday was dominated by rain, as was this morning, but late afternoon, the sun finally came through.
With the daylight slowly getting longer again in the evening, I still had time to look for something new after work.

Tony (Fouchereau), Thierry (Vasseur) and friends have been busy again lately and cleaned a lot of boulders, mainly small ones, between the classical area of Roche aux Sabots and the 91.1 area.
Enough boulders to create a new small sector called Roche aux Sabots Est.
A lot of new boulders to try in the lower grades, but also a couple in the seventh grade.
One of them is "Le Bélier", which attracted me the most and was basically also the only dry one.

Looking at the picture on bleau.info, I had expected the boulder to be bigger, so it took me while before I found it in the little chaos of small boulders.
"Le Bélier" is a small boulder, but it was new and visually it has something to it.
The typical wave textured slopers make it feel like you're climbing on a turtle's back.

It was quickly done, but I had some fun and at least I was able to climb something new.
Fun little boulder!

Fontainebleau - Roche aux Sabots Est - Le Bélier 7A(7A+)

January 14, 2018 - Sunshine!

What an unexpectedly beautiful day it was today!

It was still freezing when I arrived at Coquibus Rumont this morning, but the sky was blue and the sun was rising, so it was going to warm up soon.
Pieter joined me and we walked to the far end of the area to try "Freestyle".
By the time we got there, I already felt warmed up from the walk and started trying the separate moves.
I ended up doing all the moves separately, climbed the problem in several overlapping parts, but the conditions didn't stay good for enough to do some real good attempts from the start. The holds started sweating after a while and had to move.
Pieter needed some more time to warm up, but made good progress and came up with some nice solutions that suited his style better as opposed to the regular method used.

We found a perfect spot in the sun at "Petit Crocodile" and started trying it.
Last time we were here, we wanted to try it too, but due to lack of time we finally didn't, but now we went for it.

It didn't take me long to send it.
I wanted to repeat it though, because Pieter had accidentally held my swing while trying to spot me, not knowing if I was going to hold on.
I knew that I would have held on in any case, but wanted to repeat it more cleanly anyway.
A very nice problem!

Fontainebleau - Coquibus Rumont - Petit Crocodile 7B

Pieter came very close and did the standing start, but had to give up on the sitstart in the end.
He didn't want to force him too much on it anymore, but still felt like trying something else before leaving.

We decided to spend the last half an hour we still had on "Ça se Mange sans Faim", a rarely repeated wall just below "Petit Crocodile".
With only three registered repetitions on bleau.info, by Steven (Demets) and Ivan (Moreels) back in 2010 and someone else in 2015, it was noticeable by the quite dirty wall.

I managed to top it out on my second attempt, but must admit that I had to go deep on that dirty mantle where there are no holds to be found at all.
It was nicer than it looked!

Fontainebleau - Coquibus Rumont - Ça se Mange sans Faim 7A

It felt great to finally have the sun out again and see some blue sky again for longer than ten minutes!

As it looks like now, the rain will return tomorrow and it will last for a whole week again.

It's a good thing we had today!

January 13, 2018 - Watch your step.

The sky was blue early this morning, but by the time I was able to leave, it was already becoming grey again.
I didn't worry about it too much, because there was no rain predicted and the air felt dry.
The plan was to join Pieter and Bram (Honorez) in Cuvier Sorcières.

Pieter and I arrived first and started warming up in the sector where "Saruman" is.
Last time I was here, the boulders were wet and I could't try anything, but now they were all dry and I warmed up in "Baba Yaga".
An easy sitstart, a little crux move to match both hands on bad slopers, followed by a mantle with only a few tiny crimps that took me while to find them.

Fontainebleau - Cuvier Sorcières - Baba Yaga 7A

Pieter still did the standing start, simply because he forgot to sit down.

Just right of "Baba Yaga", on the same boulder, I wanted to try "Sortilège".
A lot of compression on non existant holds on the top, only very bad slopers. Especially on a day like today when it is dry, but the friction is hardly there.
I can imagine that it would feel easier in good conditions, but now this felt like a good 7B.
Recommended for those who like slopers.
Just watch out when trying to step over some pad there, Pieter proved it can be tricky!

Fontainebleau - Cuvier Sorcières - Sortilège 7A+(7B)

January 12, 2017 - Be quick.

We are still being plagued by an almost constant humidity and without wind, it just will not dry.
Finally today after work, I had a small window of about half an hour, so I had to be quick.
It was a good thing that I ran into a nice small roof when I was walking around Apremont in the rain last week. It turned out to be "Le Petit Phoque", a few boulders behind "Sitting Bull".
As I couldn't try it then because of the rain, I kept it in the back of my head to try on a moment like today when I don't have much time.

Only a few minutes walking from the parking, and barely ten minutes later I was walking back again.
Nice, fun little problem.

Fontainebleau - Apremont Ouest - Le Petit Phoque 7A

January 05, 2018 - No walk in the park.

Everything soaking wet yesterday and the whole morning today.
It was already after 13h when I finally went to the forest after seeing the first signs of dry spots on our home terrace.

I was little bit too optimistic, because when I arrived on the top of 95.2, everything was still wet.
Stubborn or driven as I can be, I continued on to the Gros Sablons area and walked through it all the way to the boulder with "Hurlement" in the far end on the top of the hill. I can assure you that, packed with a big Mondo crashpad on the back, it wasn't quite a walk in the park!

It turned out to be all in vain, because not one single boulder was dry enough to be climbed safely.
I had almost given up on finding anything dry enough, but decided to stop by 95.2 again to see if anything had dried in the meantime.

One of the only interesting boulders that were dry enough, was "Indestructible" on the top of the hill.
I had done it already a few times and even had it on video, but as it didn't look like there was anything else and I was eager to climb after such a long walk, I unpacked.
Out of a habit, I installed the camera, went for it and sent it first go.

Fontainebleau - 95.2 - Indestructible 7A+(7A) (repetition)

On my way back to the car, when I was about to pass the boulder of "Nuit Debout", I decided to have a look at it.
The holds under the steep overhang don't get wet quickly and from the path, the boulder looked dry.
To my pleasant surprise, it was dry enough and I started trying the last variation I still had to do on this boulder, "Nuit Debout (direct gauche)".
Same hard start as for "Nuit Debout (direct)", a huge move from blocking a crimp left hand to a very far tiny crimp right hand, but dyno left to a sandy slopey hold from two tiny crimps.

I still remember that when I did "Nuit Debout (gauche)", I had to avoid using a small very fragile crimp above the sandy sloper, because it looked like it could break any moment when applying force to it.
In the heat of the battle today however, I forgot about it, used it with full force, upon which it broke and I made a hard fall on the ground, next to the big Mondo. Oh the irony to realise I had been carrying it around for  hours and then falling next to it. Yeah well, can happen.

Anyway, I still finished it off, but this definitely was no walk in the park and rather go for the 7B+ if I were to decide on the grade.
Very nice problem!

Fontainebleau - Roche au Four - Nuit Debout (direct gauche) 7B(7B+)

January 03, 2018 - Gone with the wind.

Yesterday evening before I went to bed, as usual, I checked my weather app to check the weather of the day after.
It was announced to be very stormy and rainy, just like all the days before and those to come.
During the night, I was awakened several times by the gushing wind and the rain crashing onto the windows.
I didn't set high hopes for climbing.

When I got out of bed around 8h, the rain had stopped but the wind was still blowing like crazy.
By 9h30, the clouds had been blown away by the wind and the sun came out to shine.
To my pleasant surprise, everything outside started to dry so quickly that I left home around 10h15, being sure to find some dry rock on top of the hill of Coquibus Grandes Vallées where the wind almost has free play.

The boulders high up there were indeed dry and in remarkably good condition and I started my warmup with "Terrain Miné", this time the original start on the left.
I didn't have much trouble withstanding the pain of the sharp crimp left hand and finished it on my third attempt.

Fontainebleau - Coquibus Grandes Vallées - Terrain Miné 7A

Having done everything else up there already, I descended a bit down to the big boulder with for instance "Délit de Sale Nom".
Because of the quite dangerous landing and all the time climbing almost directly above a small boulder, I doubted for a while, but decided to give some tries anyway.

Even though the climbing was very scary, I persisted on and ended up doing some sort of variation on "Délit de Sale Nom", making it substantially harder.
It appears that the original version exits directly, whereas I traversed a bit to the right on the rail and used the sharp vertical crimp with the left hand, forcing you to make some crazy scary, but very nice moves before reaching the top.
For now I will leave it with "Délit de Sale Nom", but I have requested a separate page to be published for this variation, which is at least a hard 7A+ in my opinion.
Well worth the effort!

Fontainebleau - Coquibus Grandes Vallées - Délit de Sale Nom 7A

The forecasted rain was nowhere around and the weather remained beautiful.
Some boulders were a bit condensed, but those that could be reached by the wind were perfectly dry.
I had to embrace the unexpected occasion, but needed a small break after spending a lot of energy in my version of "Délit de Sale Nom". The break came in the form of moving to the 95.2 area.

When I drove passed Gorge aux Châts, it was of course fully parked so I feared the worst.
I was astonished, however, to see that the parking for 95.2 was nearly empty, and so was the area itself.
I took advantage of it and laid the crashpad under "L'Ange Naïf", so I could try the original direct dyno version, without the foot hook left and the mono.

On my third attempt I already stuck it.
To me, the static version doesn't feel easier, on the contrary.

Fontainebleau - 95.2 - L'Ange Naïf 7C

I still played around in some other hard problems but had to let them go for today. The energy was gone with the wind.

January 02, 2018 - From one subject to another.

The conditions this morning were dry-ish, but the rain was only predicted for early afternoon, so I took my time before I left to Canche aux Merciers. I had several options in mind.
One of them was the hard 7B+ "Atome Crochu" in which I made quite some progress and managed to do all the moves separately.
Unfortunately the conditions were not in favour and I couldn't link it all together.
I gave up on it after tearing a big chunk of skin off my right pinky finger and moved on to "Extorsion de Fond" in the back part of the area.

"Extortion de Fond" basically comes down to two hard moves and a fun dyno to a big jug. From there, the exit moves are a walk in the park.
The hardest part is finding the correct starting position, lift your butt off the ground and grab a small but good pocket left hand.
With the dyno it all adds up to a quite hard 7A+ in my opinion.

Fontainebleau - Canche aux Merciers - Extorsion de Fond 7A+(7B)

I had to do some household and "dad-picks-up-son-from-a-friend" duties, but when I noticed at about 14h30 that it still hadn't rained, I hurried to Rocher du Potala.
I wanted to try the 7C "Du Coq à l'Âne" that I stumbled upon while browsing bleau.info earlier today.
The boulder on which it's opened, is the huge imposing one that features many red circuit routes. "Du Coq à l'Âne" is a sitstart variation on one of them, red number 4.

It was a bit of a struggle, but in the end not very hard. Definitely not hard enough for 7C and gave it 7B on bleau.info. The two previous repeaters, the very strong climbers Maxime Baroud and Thomas Perréal gave it 7A+.
In the meantime, it has been noticed and the problem has been correctly downgraded to 7B, even though I can imagine it being 7A+ with better conditions.
Still quite a nice line with that sitstart on the left!

Fontainebleau - Rocher du Potala - Du Coq à l'Âne 7B

I could't come up with a title for this post, but when I translated "Du Coq à l'Âne" into English with Google Translate out of curiosity, it came up with "From one subject to another".

I thought it fitted ...

January 01, 2018 - Start with the end.

The weather was sunny and warm yesterday when I arrived back from a quick trip to Belgium.
It's felt strange walking through the forest with 16°C on the 31st of December, but I enjoyed it a lot, even though I had to drive to a couple of areas looking for the best conditions. With the sudden warmth after a long wet period, there was quite some condensation.
I ended up finding quite good conditions on the windy summit of the Drei Zinnen area yesterday late afternoon where I spent almost an hour working out and nearly doing the classic "Multipass".
I ran out of time though, but was determined to come back soon to this quick drying high boulder.

It was raining outside when we celebrated 2017 turning into 2018 and the weather forecast for the upcoming days didn't look any better.
Luckily I'm far from a party animal, so I was able to see at 8h30 that the hard wind during the night had dried up a lot outside. I immediately checked the weather app on my phone, which revealed that I had about two hours of dry weather left.
With the hard wind, my hopes were high and I drove back to "Multipass" in Drei Zinnen after having my morning coffee.

To my pleasant surprise, the boulder was completely dry and in better conditions than yesterday. After all, it was more than 10° colder.
I couldn't let go of the thought how nice it would be to finish what I started on the last day of 2017, on the first day of 2018.
It gave me a bit of sending stress, but as soon as the first rain drops started falling, I managed to keep calm, find the good flow and top out "Multipass". A "two-day-multi-year" project done.
A bit scary at the top without spotter or extra crashpad, but this beauty got the full five stars on bleau.info!

Fontainebleau - Drei Zinnen - Multipass 7B

It was 10h15 when I arrived back at the car and the small drops had turned into heavy rain. I was just on time.

It all fitted perfectly, and even though we were only a couple hours yet into 2018, I can't think of a better way to start it.

Happy new year!