January 24, 2021 - Staying busy without moving.

It has been very wet the past couple of weeks, and I missed out on some of the few moments when it was dry with seemingly good looking conditions. Yesterday, everything was wet again and so was the forecast for today, but to my pleasant surprise, I woke up in the morning with a rising sun and an almost clear blue sky. It was still freezing and everything outside looked crispy.
The weather that was forecasted yesterday evening had moved, and it looked like I had good opportunity for a couple of hours climbing. To get the most out of it, I didn't want to go far and decided to go the boulder of "La Voie Active" in Mont Pivot. Manuel Marquès has opened a few interesting looking variation recently, which gave me another valid reason, on top of the usual motivation, to go back to that boulder.
It was still freezing just below 0°C when I arrived and even though the conditions looked good at first, I quickly realized that I didn't have to expect too much after having a closer look at the key crimp under the roof. The left part of the crimp, the part that absolutely need when coming from the sitstart, looked dark. It felt dry at first, but it was obvious that it was frosted. I briefly tried to work through the move that requires that part of the crimp, but with the energy in my hands slowly warming it up, the frost started melting, making the it feel humid and slippery. Coming from the sitstart was not an option for today, and I could have moved to another nearby boulder, but I decided to stay where I was and only work the second part of the new variations that Manual opened, just to familiarize myself already with the new sequence that only started after the first part anyway. The first part, coming from the sitstart, is exactly the same as "La Voie Active", that I did very long ago, so being able to do the second would be a good preparation for when I come with better conditions to do the whole line.
I didn't have the intention to make a video of it at first, but as the moves of the second part alone are so nice to do, I did it anyway and gave it a grade of what I estimate that part of the line to be.

"La Voie Active (gauche)" normally starts sitting on the right, as for "La Voie Active" and exits between the aretes in "L'Imparfait du Subversif (direct)". The last move involved a bit of luck in the conditions that there were.

Fontainebleau - Mont Pivot - La Voie Active (gauche accroupi) 7A+(7B)

"Le Retour de l'Imparfait" normally starts the same as "La Voie Active", but exits above the start of "L'Imparfait du Subversif". Very nice swing to catch.
I hope to have better conditions soon, so I can try the whole problems.

Fontainebleau - Mont Pivot - Le Retour de l'Imparfait (accroupi) 7A

I am giving some attention to a new brand named "Chalk Rebels", created by some of my friends in Belgium. They make and sell skin care products especially for climbers, as well as their own all natural made liquid chalk, chalk balls and more, all with philosophy behind it that I really support. Of course it's your own choice if you want to click on the link to their website, or not: Chalk Rebels: Use LESS Chalk