Siebe Vanhee

New experiences are coming!

2012-01-25T17:53:00.014+01:00

Hellow everybody!

A lot of people know where I am right now but still for the ones that don't know. Yesterday morning at 8am my flight from Brussels towards Madrid left nice on time after I said goodby for the third time for a long while (4 months) to everybody at home. From Madrid I flew straight towards Venezuela, Caracas, where my trip is starting.

After my last trip in the US for seven months I've been in Belgium for about 5 months. Those 5 months where some months with lots of movement. After I had found a place to live I started working for Greenpeace Belgium. This was a really interesting job, I learned a lot of it. While working I tried to climb and train a lot for this expedition in Venezuela. In the mean time I also spent lots of time with my girlfriend what was really great. The last month at home I didn't work any more and I prepared for this trip.

The 5th of january I got some bad news. Jorn, my good friend and trainer for 6 years died of his brain tumor after he was sick for about 2 years. This is hard and I've a hard time putting words on this los of an amazing individual in my life! Jorn had a really special meaning in my life, he learned me everything just until who I am right now and even where I am. It's because of him I'm here and everything I'll do and I'll climb the rest of my life is with Jorn. With this blogpost I will start a new way of travelling and climbing for myself and especially for Jorn.

About this trip:

This trip is starting where I am right now, Venezuela! This evening 3 friends of mine are arriving here in Caracas. Those friends are going to be my climbing team for the next month: Mason Kinloch Earl (USA), Sam Farnsworth (UK) and George Ullrich (UK). Our expedition is bringing us towards the Tepuy mountains in Canaima. The Tepuy Mountains are known for the biggest waterfall in the world who is storming down one big Tepuy of 1000 meters high, Salto del Angel. A Tepuy mountain is a sandstone mountain with a flat top, also called Table Mountain. The only natural way up this kind of mountains is climbing steep vertical or even overhanging Big Walls.

So now you know what I'm doing in this country. Our expedition is going towards a Tepuy of 600 meters. The special thing about this wall is that it isn't vertical, it's overhanging! (Overhanging 35 degrees like we heard, not sure.) Another big challange is the jungle, we have to walk some days through the jungle to get to the base of the wall. Once we're there the climbing can begin and we're planing to open a new line in this 600 meter overhanging wall! I'm not going to say more then this about this project.

After this expedition I'll go south towards Buenos Aires, Argentina. From there I'll go to Tuzgle and Bariloche. Maybe more areas but that part of the trip is still unclear. One thing I know, it's going to be amazing! I return the 25th of may, not as long as my past trip but still long enough.

Now I'm in the hotel waiting for my friends. It's really hot here, I think it might be almost 30 degrees Celcius. I went outside just for about 20 minutes and I think I'm already burned a little!

The people are amazing here, everybody is really friendly. People start talking to each other really fast and I feel good around most of them. Just arriving in Caracas was a little scary but not as bad as I expected. If you think about what you're saying and doing there is not much that can happen. The best thing I did to prepare for this trip is following Spanish class at CLT Leuven the last five months. I love speaking Spanish! (the little Spanish I know.)

I'm so psyched for this expedition and I will keep you up to date when I can! In the jungle we don't have internet so a next blogpost shall be in a month or a little longer I think. Maybe I can write something in two days in Ciudad Bolivar. I'm exited to go and get my friends at the airport this evening.

This following small text is for Jorn!

"In 2004 verscheen er plotseling een man in de klimzaal.

“Siebe, stop eens met snoepen en eet minstens 5 stukken fruit per dag en drink 2 liter water.” Dat was de stem van Jorn.

Ik was 13 jaar niet altijd gehoorzaam maar volgde zonder twijfel jouw goede raad op.

Sinds die dag kwam jij in mijn leven en zal nooit meer verdwijnen.

Jorn, je hebt in jouw leven een weg afgelegd waarvan velen in mijn omgeving niets weten. Maar wat iedereen wel weet, is dat deze weg heeft gezorgd voor een prachtig mens.

Jorn , je was geïnteresseerd en nieuwsgierig. Je stapte de klimwereld binnen en werkte je onmiddellijk op naar een waardevolle trainer en vriend van velen. Je had een doel voor ogen en nam dit uiterst serieus. Je trainde mij en vele anderen, las enorm veel trainingsboeken, reed duizenden kilometers door het land en verder voor specifieke trainingen en competities. Kortom, je gaf je volledig voor anderen, je gaf en gaf nog veel meer.

Jorn, ik kon voor alles bij jou terecht.

Je begeleide me in het klimmen, in het trainen, in het leren accepteren, in het studeren, in het omgaan met verdriet en tegenslag , in het omgaan met pijn en ongeluk en in het lliefhebben en omgaan met mensen. De boodschap die je me steeds gaf was dromen en doorzetten om deze dromen te bereiken.

Jorn je leerde me gedurende 7 belangrijke jaren in mijn leven alles tot wie ik nu ben. Van al die kracht en energie die jij had, gaf jij zoveel aan mij door. Jij gaf me kracht, ervaringen, energie en hopen geluk.

Jorn, ik wil je bedanken voor alles wat je voor me betekende. Om je te bedanken zal ik alles wat je me leerde verder zetten en alles wat ik doe zal ik doen met jouw waarden en jouw inzet.

New Climbing Blog layout!

2011-11-09T17:46:00.003+01:00

On my last trip in the US my blog had a lot of views from all over the world so I decided to write everything in English. You can also notice an amazing change in this blog and the layout of it. My blog coordinator Herman Desmet made it more practical with more options but still as easy as the last version of the blog.
New things are the map where you can find all the places I’ve been, my realizations for people who are interested, the most popular post and some media. To have a better overview of the news, the home page shows only the first couple of sentences of the post. To read more you can click on the post.

I want to thank Herman Desmet for his nice work! Now my blog is ready for the next project!

Enjoy!

Siebe Vanhee

Finding a way!

2011-11-09T16:54:00.008+01:00

What to do when you’re a motivated climber in Belgium? I’m still searching for the solution, but I’m close.

Now I’m about three months and a half back in Belgium and this blog post will be more optimistic as the last one! I’m living in a little house with another climber near Leuven. I’m working for Greenpeace and doing some route setting in climbing gyms to earn some money for my next project, I’ll need it!
In the mean while I’m training a little in gym and climbing as much as I can outside; Freyr, Ettringen and Pfalz. To train more specifically for my next project I go running a little and try to go to trad-climbing areas.

Last week I’ve been three days in Freyr (Belgium’s famous vertical sport climbing crag) and three days in the Pfalz (Trad climbing in Germany).
Freyr is some good grey limestone sport climbing. But still I couldn’t leave my cams home! I heard that Sean Villanueva O'Driscoll and Mich Zaman climbed ’13 Boulevard du Vol’, 8a on cams so I had to give it a try to! Togheter with Klaas Willems I went to Freyr with a bigger backpack as usual. It didn’t took me to much try’s, after one try searching for the good cam placements in this quite solid limestone I did the only 8a traditional route in Freyr. Funky! "2 bovenste foto's: Bram Lambrechts"

After that good start of a little week trip, Klaas and I left towards the Pfalz, Germany. The Pfalz is a big climbing area with lots of little crags apart from each other. The sandstone towers or walls are mostly about 40 – 50 meters high. There is a lot of trad-climbing but also some sport. The trad-climbing there is not so hard but really beautiful. If you’ve never climbed trad on sandstone, this is a really nice place to learn it! The atmosphere of the fall with the beautiful trees and the red – brownish sandstone is amazing. After three days of climbing there the humidity was pretty high so we decided to go back towards Freyr!

Our fifth day climbing in a row happened on the small edges in Freyr! Again a beautiful fall day showed us some nice and peaceful nature! Even at the end of November the main wall can be to hot in the sun. But still I decided to try an old project back again: ‘Schwarzenegger’, the classic 8a in Freyr. I was really surprised when I did it first try of the day while hanging the quickdraws. Hanging those quickdraws is no problem compared to searching a while where to place witch size of cam!

Schwarzenegger: "Foto Werner Van Steen - Alpitec/Petzl Benelux"

That same day we returned back home where I rested a day and went running. The next day I returned again towards Freyr to do some more vertical edgy sport climbing. This time I brought my girlfriend with me who started to climb one month ago! Nice! Because of the nice Sunday a lot of Belgium climbers were hanging around on this amazing limestone wall. So the good atmosphere was already there. It was a misty and a little bit humid day in Freyr but we couldn’t complain much.
Again I did some good performances, really unexpected. I climbed ‘Banegger’, 8a on sight, although the first part of it because the second part I already climbed with Schwarzenegger. This was really amazing, I love the technical art of Freyr! When I came down from Banegger I looked at ‘Bayou Minou’, 8a+, the same start as Banegger but another end. When I came down I rested a little and did it first go! I was so surprised, I’m sure it was the good atmosphere and vibes of a nice November Sunday in Freyr.

So this is my way of combining climbing and real life for the moment! It works pretty well!
The 24th of January I’m leaving for an amazing project far away again! I’m still not going to say what it will be!

Keep on rocking and find a way!

Reality

2011-09-01T10:18:00.001+02:00

Almost two weeks back in Belgium! I felt lost in reality, back in this materialistic world. I had a hard time adjusting to this way of living here, harder then when I arrived in the States. I could only see negative things about the life back here. Soon I realized that this was according to the good life I had in the US. One of the biggest reasons why I had such a hard time coming back is because of the lack of structure in my life right now. I arrived back in Belgium without goal, without future plans but with experience! After two weeks of adjusting (seeing friends) and planning the future I found kind of a plan.

So right now I will start working and following evening school Spanish for about 5 months and then I’ll go on a trip again. I don’t know where yet but it will be some Big Wall climbing.

I did not feel ready to study yet. I feel that I need to take my time to find a subject in my life besides climbing where I’m really interested in. If I was going to study right now, I know it would be just because of the society who’s pushing it to follow the regular pattern. I will study, but only when I feel motivated and when I found an interesting subject.

In those next few months I will be working and still climbing! My condition is amazing right now and I don’t want to lose it. I’ll make a couple of trips to Peak District (England), Etringen (Germany) and more. And of course I will be hanging in the Belgian local crack Freyr to do some hard face sportclimbing!

From 3400 meters back to 0!

2011-08-22T14:54:00.006+02:00

Written on the 19th of august:

I still know the moment I was arriving in the United States once. Time goes and doesn’t stop.
One week ago I was hanging at 3400 meters high on a mountain in The Bugaboos, Northern BC in Canada. Right now I’m sitting between all kind of different people in gate C3 in Washington Dulles waiting for the plane that is going to bring me back to Belgium!

My perfect road trip through the US has come to an end. But for me, a new perspective on the world we live in has just started. New plans and goals are coming, self-consciousness and self- knowledge I won. This trip was an impressive experience and unforgettable. I highly recommend young climbers this kind of experience you can find in different kind of ways. For me the main factor is travelling on your own and experiencing everything by yourself, bad and good things. For me the bad things in those seven months turned always out in good things. Is it luck? … Karma? … Coincidence? Or is it just always like that? Who knows!

The Bugaboos

Written on the 22th of august in Nieuwrode, nearby Leuven, nearby Brussels in Belgium in Europe:

The last week of my trip I went towards the Bugaboos with Mike Martinson. The Bugaboos is a world class Alpine climbing area. The weather is not all the time very good but me and Mike where kind of lucky! The base camp (Appelbee campsite) is a 4 hour hike steep uphill. Most of the climbers camp on this flat rock area although climbers have also the option to overnight in the Kain Hut where you need to pay 25 dollars a night.
We’ve spent 4 climbing days in the Bugaboos. The first day was an easy day when we did ‘Mec Tec Arrête’. When we arrived on top of this 6 pitch classic a thunderstorm came in and threw tons of big balls of hail on our heads. We raped down and ran to camp where we saw our tent (only outside tarp) full of hail on the inside. No climbing for that day anymore.

The next day we climbed the ultra classic ‘Sunshine Crack’ on the Snowpatch. This is really an amazing climb and we were lucky because there was nobody in front of us. I linked the upper two pitches, who are really amazing! The second last pitch is the real Sunshine Crack, it’s a #3 to #4 BD Camelot size. I climbed the pitch with only two #3 and one #4 and I never bumped a piece up with me. So … run outs in da house!

Our third day we decided to go and climb over the Snowpatch col to see some more spires in the Bugaboos. We past the Pigeon spire, saw the backside of the Howser towers, the Minaret and the Pigeon Feathers. We walked for about 3 hours through the snow when we arrived at the Feathers where we did ‘Fingerberry Jam’, 5.12-. It’s a short climb of 6 pitches on the Fingerberry jam tower at the Feathers. This is one of the best climbs of my trip! The first two pitches are 5.11 where you follow flaky cracks on a face and stemming moves in a stem box! The third crack is the 5.12- where you follow it to the point the crack gets to narrow to climb. Then you make a hard face traverse to the left to another crack you follow to the top of that pitch. I fell in the traverse and figured out the moves after a couple of tries. Suddenly a realized that I probably was traversing to high when I saw an easier way 3 meters lower. The traverse I was trying was probably a little harder cause of its sideways dyno to the other crack!

After the 4th pitch, 5.10 beautiful corner, we decided to go down and rap the route because of the last two pitches that didn’t look as good, they looked really chossy. We rapped down also for another reason, apparently the rap of the top was hard to find and you need to leave lots of gear. That’s what we heard from another party on there before.
Use a double rope to rap off the route itself and take maybe some extra webbing. The anchors are some fixed gear. We left a shitty carabineer and a piece of webbing.

Left picture: Me and the Sunshine crack in the back!

Because our next goal was the ‘Becky Chouinard’ on the South Howser Tower we left our gear that evening for the next day at East Basin camp. Then we walked all the way back towards Appelbee campside. At 10:30pm we went to bed and we woke up the next day at 4:30am to do the hike a third time towards the South Howser Tower. At 9am we arrived at the base of the Becky Chouinard, we were already exhausted after three climbing days and all the hiking. A big long route of 20 pitches was still waiting on us. The first 3 pitches we simul (how do you write this word?) climbed. The pitches are very easy so everything goes pretty fast. The climbing of the whole route is nice but the reason why the route is so popular is because it’s a nice and exposed easy climb and it goes all the way to the top of the South Howser. We arrived at the top when it was getting dark. We found the rap station on time to do the 11 raps to go off the Tower. Those we did in the dark with a nice amount of moonlight of the full moon, beautiful! We arrived back at camp at 1am! This was a hard 4th day in a row, that’s the reason we decided not to climb the next day! We made the decision to pack all our stuff up and go for the hike down towards the car. We left the Bugaboos completely wrecked on Sunday and did the drive back to Squamish on two days. This was the last bit of climbing of my seven months trip and it was amazing!!!

This Bugaboos trip was the first time I did some alpine climbing and I really like it! The long snowy approaches are hard in the beginning when you’re not used to them. It was the first time I walked like that through the snow and over cols with ice axes and crampons! New experience and en amazing time! I’ll definitely do this again!

When we arrived back in Squamish I cleaned up my car and left the next day towards Seattle. There I could stay with Hannah who I met in Indian Creek! Thanks for that Hannah!
In those last 3 days in Seattle I sold the Van. I had some stress at the end because of the buyer who hesitated at the last second to buy the car or not. I gave her a day of thinking and then she decided to buy the Van! I was pretty happy with her decision! Otherwise I was definitely going back to the states in a couple of months! Not a bad thing!

Now I’m in Belgium with a nice jetlag and a head full of questions and thoughts about what next in live! This is the first time I’m really without a plan. I’m pretty excited to find a way to do some kind of small study to do in combination with some work here in Belgium. New climbing trips are also flying around in my head but that I still keep for myself!

Moonlight over the Appelbee camping with under the moon a lightning storm on the other side of the mountains!

Me in the hail-storm walking back to camp

Am I really Cobrasexual?

2011-08-05T20:33:00.010+02:00

Only 12 days left! It’s really not long anymore! I’m pretty sad to think about it but it is the truth! The plan was to go to the Bugaboos but Mike and I are hesitating about it. Finally the weather here in Squamish is stable, nice and sunny. Compared to the weather in the Bugaboos where it is really snowy and rainy. Mike and I are also both psyched on Squamish for the moment so we are not feeling like leaving for the moment.

Last couple of days I did some random climbing. I tried El ChupaCobra again one day with Mason and yesterday with Alex Honnold. Both really inspiring climbing partners! Mason had again a really good try up to the last move where he fell, he is getting really close and I’m excited for him sending The Cobra! He took two rest days and is going up today to give it the final try! I’m excited for him!

Yesterday I warmed up in ‘Warriors of the Wasteland’ with the Petzl mini-traction. This time I tried to climb as fast as possible! I did the 5 long pitches in 40 minutes! This is a really good training. In the afternoon I did the 45 minutes hike to the Cobra again, this time with Alex who hasn’t tried the line in a year. I gave it a really good top rope burn with only 3 hangs! So exciting.
After that Alex gave it a lead burn with me yelling beta at him. His reason of starting to lead was to maybe send it and bitch about it to Mason! The good old competitive friends! He didn’t send it as expected because he hasn’t tried it for a year! After that I gave it another burn and this time on lead! It went pretty well but in the first crux I fell and ended up with a huge flapper on my pointer finger. Fuck! I hate my skin and it has been a problem for so long already! The Cobra Crack you only can try once or twice a day because it’s so pain full for the joints of your fingers as well as the skin! After every day trying this project my fingers are swollen as hell and I need a day off to recover just those joints!

I have been hanging out with Dean Potter as well. Really interesting personality! Dean also gave the cobra a try but he thinks of giving it some more time before fully trying it. Now I compared my hands with Dean’s and Alex’s and it turned out I really have big fingers and hands! Fuck! The cobra is really finger size dependent and is a real struggle with bigger fingers. But yeah, no worries just a little more challenging! I discovered in this line how strong my middle finger is. I take the mono with just the first knuckle in and I’m able to completely pull on it! So exciting! Yesterday I could link all those crux moves really good!

Now I have to wait until my skin heals! Fuck!

I’ll probably go bouldering a little to get some strength back, because I lost a lot of pure power!

Here some pictures of Horn Lake to give an example of the climbing.

El Cobra!!!

2011-07-31T21:52:00.004+02:00

Slowly everything is coming together at the end of my trip. I found a buyer for my van; I got Ice axes, crampons and boots for the Bugaboos (Thanks Fred) and I’m climbing some awesome climbs here in Squamish! After playing around in Zombie Roof I took a rest day followed by a hard and interesting day on the backside of the Chief.

Finally I tried the Cobra Crack on the backside of the chief! This line is so impressive, one of the most esthetic lines I’ve ever seen in my live! It’s amazing that Squamish has one of the best sport climbs (Dreamcatcher) and one of the best trad climbs (Cobra Crack) in the world! I went up there with Mason Earle, a good crack climber from Colorado. He worked ‘Die Kobra Krakke’ already for 3 seasons and has the entire beta dialed! That day we went up there mason fell at the really last move; he’s getting close to beat that snake up! I tried it twice on top rope and could do all the moves. I had to take a couple of rest but it worked! I really felt pretty good in it except for the painful joints from all the small finger locks! Too bad I’m leaving soon; I might plan a next trip for this amazing line!

The day after I did ‘The Feather’, an amazing 5.11d of 5 pitches. I did this one with Mike, the guy where I’m going with to the Bugaboos. It was lots of fun and will be good at the Bugs for shore too!Today we are waiting for the rock to dry and this afternoon I’m going up to the backside again with Mason! I’m excited!

It was ..... Zombie roof!!!

2011-07-28T01:30:00.006+02:00

It’s been a while. But here it is again! A new blog post with tons of positive energy!
During the rainy days we climbed two days at Cheakamus, the sport climbing area between Squamish and Whistler.
After the rain it was clouded for 3 days where I did a handful of easier cragging and also a nice fixed rope solo. In one hour I went up 6 pitches of ‘Warriors of the Wasteland’ with the Petzl Mini Traction on some fixed ropes they used to clean the climb! It is amazing to climb alone on a wall that high but still save. The only thing you have is harness, shoes, Petzl mini traction and a grigri to rappel off.

A week ago Matthieu the French guy left the States and went back home. So now I’m back to looking for climbing partners. What is not difficult here in Squamish, social climbing Mecca of the lonely climbers!

The day after Matthieu left I left Squamish with an American girl (Holly), an Austrian girl (Nina) and a Canadian GUY (Nick)! We left earth for a while to go climbing on Vancouver Island for about two days! This because of the rain in Squamish. We went to ‘Horn Lake’, a small limestone sport climbing area. The big cave is really overhanging and reminded me to a mixture of Rifle and Rodellar. There were some tufa’s but not as many as in Rodellar. I did a couple of nice 12’s there and one 5.13c (8a+) trough a big roof! Amazing and interesting climb! It felt good again to do some sport climbing. I see that the sport climbing strength returns pretty fast!

Since we’re back in Squamish I climbed a lot, a lot of hard meters! The first day I returned back towards ‘The flight of the Challenger’, hard 5.12c trad! Without any expectations I gave this beautiful line another try! I only tried it once more than a week ago. This time I returned fresh with the right gear. I did it that try with a good fight and some nasty screams! Trad-climbing is so scary sometimes, but so satisfying! I was really happy and felt ready for another hard single pitch!

Yesterday the clouds were there again but without rain! They brought some wind and sending time with them! I found a belay buddy for the whole day (Thanks Holly) and went to ‘Zombie Roof’, 5.13a crack in a roof! The first try was all about finding beta in this weird featured roof crack. The movements are power full on hand jams and finger locks. The gear is good but takes power to place! The crux is at the end to come out of the roof, where I fell twice. I did it on my 4th go leading and placing the gear! Amazing! I’m so excited to try more and harder!

I only have a little less than a month to go here in the States and Canada so I’m enjoying as much as I can! The 5th of august I’m going with Mike Martinson towards the Bugaboos for the rest of my trip. Now I’m still stressing and searching for some crampons, ice axes and other gear I need for the cold weather! I hope I find a way Five Ten and Beal can support me with new shoes and ropes what I really need.

I’m excited to try out some alpine climbing and doing some big walls on high altitude.

I’ll keep you up to date!

Zzzzzombie ... Ro.....

2011-07-27T06:28:00.003+02:00

Hang On!

New blogpost is coming!

Good atmosphere is keeping us 'dry'!

2011-07-16T22:34:00.002+02:00

Sitting in the Squamish Adventure Center with a bunch of climbers next to a big window that looks out on the Chief! Beautiful you’ll thing but not when it’s raining. Definitely not when it’s already raining for four days.

After our last day up at ‘U-wall’ we took a long rest day, preparing for another 5.12 multi-pitch the next day. We went up ‘Warriors of the Wasteland’. This is an impressive line of 7 pitches at ‘The Dihedrals.’ After talking with some local guy we heard that this line hasn’t been done in 7 years. Luckily some other locals just cleaned the first 5 pitches that are the best and hardest. The two crux pitches are a thin long crack (5.12a) followed by a short bouldery 5.12b with 7 bolts. Amazing I’ll say! The thin crack is going on for so long and demands a lot of footwork. The short pitch that follows is really boulder and in the beginning a little scary because you can easily fall on your belay buddy! Right: Matt in the 5.12b following
I fell leading the short pitch but I’m shore next time it’ll work. All the other pitches are really long, obvious and natural. Great day!

The next day I did some cragging trad-climbing with Sam Van Den Driessche. He is here since 3 weeks with Tim De Dobbeleer, they are both traveling in US and Canada for 3 months!
Me and Sam went to Murrin Park and climbed at Nightmare Rock and Petrifying Wall. At nightmare rock I did some classic 5.12’s, one really nice small finger crack (Century Box). This was the first time I did a move off only my pinky! So nice! It’s really small and better with small fingers. It’s a famous climb for girls and I can understand that.
Afterwards we went towards the Petrifying wall where we tried ‘Flight of the Challenger’, 5.12c. This is an amazing line through an overhang that ends in a slab flared crack you can walk/balance on. This is the hardest part because of placing the gear! I only tried it once and I’m definitely trying it again if it’s dry!

Above: 'Flight of a Challenger'

Next day was a rainy rest day so I made some crazy American pancakes in my Van the whole day! Getting fat on rest days, that’s the key to a successful rest day!

The two last days we climbed with 30 people in Cheakamus, the sport climbing area between Squamish and Whistler. There we could climb well for two days but it isn’t trad climbing ey! I did almost all the 5.12 and 13’s at the Circus and did one nice 13c (8a+) on the Big show! The Big Show is a big overhang with a couple of hard, long routes! Really nice for a rainy day.

Except for the rain this place is still one of my favorite places of my trip. The campsite is perfect because all climbers are together every morning and evening. After 3 days you know a lot of new interesting people. Squamish is one of the most social and fun climbing areas I’ve been. This social aspect here in Squamish makes me stay here even in the rain.

Left: 'The Big Show'

For the moment the SMF (Squamish Mountain Festival) is going on this week and I already went to some presentations. Tonight the SMF party is going on and I’ll definitely be there with lots of other climbers/friends! I’m ready to party!

This blogpost is written while listening to: DJ Cam => http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WM2wW_oNXRc&feature=related

Back in Squamish! Feels great!

2011-07-10T23:08:00.006+02:00

We spent three more days in Index before we went to Squamish! After that last rest day we climbed some more classic pitches at the lower and upper wall. The last day we climbed in the
morning and did some rafting in the afternoon!

The rafting was amazing! Because we spent a lot of time in the ‘River house’, the café with all the rafting people, we made a lot of friends over there. The kayakers and rafters are all really nice and friendly. They have a mentality really similar to a climber’s mentality. At the end we knew everybody in the little village, every kayaker and guides! They gave us an offer to do some rafting for a good price, so we took that chance! Our guide was our good friend Pat who gave us a pretty funny rafting tour. The guides told us that the river was extremely high because of the wet spring this year. It was almost a 5th class river and it was quite hard for beginners! That’s why we also flipped our raft in the hard part, called Boulder Drop. There are some really nice pictures. At the one below you can see me hanging on the vertical boat trying to save someone else while we all were capsizing. So the saving didn’t work very well! Those pictures made a good ambiance at the bar that same night.

The next day we left to Squamish. The weather seemed good there so we where psyched to change place again. We climbed two amazing days here in Squamish! It also feels really good to be back in a big climbing area with a lot of people I know from my trip the last few months. I keep on meeting people who know good friends of mine. Squamish is a great area for social contacts. The camping is really fun and social because everyone is eating and chilling together at the same place. After two weeks of climbing in smaller climbing areas with less people it feels good to see so many climbers again! Squamish = good atmosphere!

So our first day here we did a route of 10 pitches called ‘The Northern Lights’, 5.12a. This is a combination of the first 5 pitches, ‘Alaska highway’ (5.11d) and the last 5 pitches, ‘The Calling’ (5.12a). This is by far one of the best lines I did on my trip; I really enjoyed the perfect splitters and corners! Like this perfect corner ( on the picture left! There are lots of structures and different dimensions; I think this is typical for Squamish. You need to look around you and use so many different crack climbing styles in this one route! I on sighted everything free and we made it good to the top.

Yesterday we went up ‘The University wall’; this is the most known multi-pitch in Squamish of his grade (5.12a). This is one of the hard older classics here, a real test piece! Because of the rain last weeks the route was still a little wet. The first two pitches (5.12a) where actually really wet. I on sighted the first pitch, even through the wet part. The second pitch I followed but I fell at the end, really strenuous and the hard layback was also pretty wet. From then on we did a good job to the top. This is a really beautiful line but I think it was still a little bit dirty at the top because we are still early in the season.

It feels good to be in a place I already know for once. It makes some things easier and more acceptable if you’re on the road for a long time. A week ago I had a hard time being on the road because it’s getting long right now. But now here in Squamish it’s going well and the motivation is coming back. It's also nice to come back to the same place where I learned how to place gear! Exactly one year ago I asked Fabian Schillings (The cool German) how to place gear in cracks!!!

Today we had to rest because the muscles where sick of working. The weather forecast isn’t so good for the following days, but I hope we find a way to climb somewhere!

Trout Creek Belgian style - Index is going French

2011-07-03T21:46:00.009+02:00

So! How was Trout Creek?
I’ll just say it was an amazing, quite and inspiring climbing area that reminded me a little to Indian Creek (what is still my favorite spot of my trip!).
The evening of our rest day we arrived in Trout Creek where we illegally slept between some trees near an expensive fisherman’s campground. Trout Creek is in the middle of nowhere but still there are a lot of people in the small valley. All those people are old fishermen. It’s a famous place for the fishing sport. But no worries, the climbing area is far away from the river and high up.
The morning after our arrival we left as early as our bodies wanted to up to the crag. We went early to climb in the shade until 2pm. The hike is steep and hot! Completely melted we arrived at the paradise of splitters and stemming lines! Without a guidebook we looked for the nicest looking splitters and jumped on them. We did a perfect #2 BD size splitter to start. This was the first real splitter Florian did what is really intimidating in the beginning. Definitely as us Europeans who don’t know how to jam properly. But now we can! It’s almost as perfect as Indian Creek. We did a couple of other splitters and stemming lines. One line is called ‘The Space Between’ where you just stem between two walls with on the left and right a crack. Really weird style to get used to. We did as much as possible before the sun made the wall like an oven. After 2 pm we baked a little in the sun and walked back to the car.
Back at the car I took my scissors, put it in Flo’s hands and said: ‘Fuck man! I’m sick of this woman hair, I feel like a bitch! Please cut it off!’ (Maybe a little exaggerated) Flo first made me some dreads and then he trimmed my doggy head!

Then next day we woke up early again to enjoy the shady climbing. This time we tried some harder stuff. First we did a nice corner 5.12-, ‘Alchemy’ on top rope, hereafter I lead it to the top. As second hard line we tried ‘Winter Sustenance’, 5.12 on top rope and after that I tried it again on lead. I couldn’t do this one and after that one lead try our shady time was over.

Too bad Flo had to leave 2 days after that last Trout climbing day because we were just getting used to the style. I could stay at least 5 more days in that place. It’s not a big climbing area, but it is really interesting and technical.
There is a high quantity of thin and hard cracks, even projects! It’s also really quite and the nature around is beautiful and peaceful.

When we left Trout Creek that afternoon we went towards Portland where we slept on a crowded Wall-mart parking lot. The next day we visited Portland a little bit but we weren’t impressed by the city. There are a lot of poor people on the streets and all kinds of different subcultures. We decided not to stay there to long and went further up north towards Seattle. We slept 1.5 hours South of Seattle because we didn’t want to sleep in a big city again! It’s a real shock sometimes to hang around in a packed city after living in nature for so long.

Florian’s last day started and we went up to Seattle where we visited the city. Seattle is pretty big and also really crowded. It’s a real typical American city how we Europeans imagine it. Stressed people running around with suitcases to get on the bus, spilling there coffee all over there suits! Typically! But it also has his charms and can be an acceptable place to hang out.

The next morning really early I dropped Florian off at the airport! Was a weird feeling after chairing a Van with him for a month. I had a really good time climbing in the states with someone I know. Definitely doing big walls was handy and lots of fun with Flo!

After I dropped Flo off I went to pick up another French speaking guy. But these time not a Belgian but a Frenchmen! I met the Frenchmen, Mathieu Mercier, in Zion almost 2 months ago. He climbed there with his partner, Nicolas André, who is injured now. So they decided to separate there ways and Mathieu contacted me to climb with me in Index and Squamish. After I picked Mat up in Seattle we went straight towards Index. Index is an hour east of Seattle. We arrived in Index in really rainy and shitty weather so we went on to Leavenworth an extra hour more to the east. Leavenworth was dry and sunny. We climbed there the next day but didn’t really like it. It’s really blocky and loose granite without much real splitters. But I’m talking just about the one area where we climbed that one day. There is probably better stuff to.

We checked the weather that evening and saw that it was going to be sunny in Index so we drove there immediately that next evening. Index is a little town in nowhere with a big river running through it and some nice granite walls on the side. This town is mostly living from the water sports like rafting and kayaking. The climbing is still not so popular yet although it is high quality granite here! You can even compare it with Yosemite but smaller. Because of the rainy weather here almost all year long, the rock is in some places really mossy but apparently during the summer it cleans up pretty fast. The granite is really solid and not much of it will break, I like that!

We climbed two days in Index now and I’m a big fan! The rock is good, a lot of hard stuff, and some different styles if you want to. We did some of the classic lines last two days to get used to the style. The grades are comparable with the hard grades of Smith Rock. This is definitely not a beginner area! It’s really hard and technical. We got our as kicked by 5.11b’s who are in Europe for shore 5.12b! And don’t forget that I’m talking about trad climbing! So grades are already harder!

The last days’s we met some local climbers and kayakers and have been hanging out with them. Yesterday we went to a local party so today is a rest day for shore! We even have to rest because of the rain today. Tomorrow it’s going to be good and sunny again!

Smith Rock basalt fest!

2011-06-24T20:20:00.006+02:00

After our last car adventure the car showed some good behavior and didn’t let us down anymore! We’ve been climbing in Smith Rock for three days now. It’s an amazing place. After Yosemite it looks small but it isn’t, it’s still 6 times bigger as Freyr.
When we arrived we were immediately invited to a BBQ of a friend of Ryan. We walked around in Bend and had a nice and easy afternoon.

In Smith Rock State Park you can do a little bit of everything; sport climbing, trad-climbing, bouldering and even multi-pitch trad or mixed. The Park is not only for climbers, there is also a lot of tourist walking around. Mostly they walk around where most of the sport climbing is, if you go to the upper and lower gorges to do some trad-climbing you’ll be alone!

Sport Climbing

Our first day climbing was really easy and we discovered the area a little bit. We also had to get used to the heat. After Yosemite we arrived here in a heat of 90°F ( 32°C).
We did some sport climbing the first day. Really funny to do that again, it is hard to get used to it again. Definitely here in Smith Rock where the grades are really hard and the holds small. The climbing style is really special. It is all vertical or slightly overhanging walls with small crimps. The rock type is basalt but way different of the basalt in Jailhouse. In this basalt there are a lot of little rocks of another kind sticking out, a little like conglomerate. So you’re climbing on small pockets or on small crimps! No jugs, that doesn’t exists here.

Because of the old age of the sport climbing here the grading system is pretty hard and tough! Also the first 8c+ of the US you can find here. Some of you probably heard of it, it’s called ‘Just Do It’. It’s an amazingly hard line on the Monkey face, a big loose pillar that looks like a monkey face! Can you see it?

Trad-climbing

The second day we went to the Lower Gorge. This is one of the two big Gorges in Smith Rock. Without much planning we walked into the gorge and saw that the side we were on was completely in the sun still. So we decided to cross the (high) river, which was not an easy job! After trying to cross that river for an hour we gave up because the other side was also slightly getting in the sun. We chilled in the river for an hour more and waited until our side of the river got in the sun.

The basalt in this canyon is again completely different than the sport climbing in Smith or Jailhouse. The crack’s are all between big columns/pillars 1 meter from each other. The climbing is really technically with lots of face holds and stemming between the pillars. I’ve put some pictures for you to get a better view of it! I did two 11a’s (6b+) who where both crazy technical and scary above small nuts! I tried one 11b (6c) but fell on the end, it was really hard to place gear and the moves were incredibly technical. I’ve never climbed on a rock where you need so much technique. If you thing Freyr is hard, this is 3 times as difficult and technical. Crazy that I’m talking about 6’s instead of grades around 8a/b. I’m getting lots of respect for the older generations!

Multi-pitch

Yesterday we did some single pitches sport first. After that we went up the monkey face. We did the line called ‘Monkey Space’ It’s only 3 pitches but it’s exposed and in a beautiful surrounding! On top of the Monkey Face we hanged out a little and enjoyed the exposure and the incredible view!

Today we did some necessary rest day activities like changing tires of my van and laundry. I hope to get some good second hands tires!
This evening we’re going towards ‘Trout Creek’ to do two more days of trad-climbing, again on basalt splitters!
On top of Monkey face! Oeh! Oeh!

Me fighting with a baby ratlle snake! The most dangerous! No joke!

Flo = Tourist and photographer of all! Me = loosing my head in the chevy engine while replacing the radiator hose!

Friendly old man number 2 and I!

Yeah Flo, thanks a lot for all your pictures!

Car adventures and playing around on El Cap!

2011-06-21T01:42:00.016+02:00

The big and tiring days weren’t ending last week. After our Astroman ascent we took a nice and easy rest day. The two days after that we did some cragging and hiked up the Yosemite Falls trail to enjoy the view as you can see on the pictures. We ran down the Yosemite falls trail in one hour! Tell me if you can do better!
The next day we took another rest day because we felt really weak. That rest day we planned our next goal for the next day. We prepared our self to do ‘West Face’ of El Cap in one day! That rest day we went to Sonora to do some groceries and to do an oil change. Groceries went perfect; the oil change was another story!

We went to a wal-mart to change the oil because there was no other place available that day. I’m not a fan of wal-mart but the oil change had to be done. After 1.5 hours they were finally done (it takes normally 10 minutes). I go inside, pay the bill, get my keys and go to my car. When I tried to start that old piece of driving metal it just didn’t do anything, no reaction, no life. I was alone because Flo was still surfing pretty hard on the internet. So I said to myself: ‘Fuck, those wal-mart shit holes fuck up my car!’ I went back inside and asked for some more information. I even talked to the manager and tried not to be the most annoying customer! When the manager finally moved his obese ass he told me his workers are no mechanics and only change the oil and check tires and the battery. I taught it was suspicious because they recommended me to buy a new battery. So after some discussion I got sick of them and tried to cal another garage or mechanic nearby. It was already 4:30pm so everything was closing soon. With some stress I called around but with no success. Then suddenly an older man who lived in Sonora saw we were foreigners and asked what was going on. I explained our problem, he was willing to help us out of that chit we walked into an hour before. He was with the triple A (AAA) and was willing to give us one of the four AAA services he had in a year! After he called them, a big truck was coming to pick up my van. The triple A looked at the problem first and found out what was wrong. A metal cable in the starter was broken and he told us it was easy to fix. The helpful guy, John, bought the supply’s to repair the car. After the triple A guy started the car we drove to John’s house where we first were served with a nice and cold beer. While drinking we crawled all under the car and fixed the starter! At 7:30pm we could finally leave Sonora. We want to thank John a lot! It’s so nice as a foreigner to be helped if you’re having problems in another country. We wanted to go back to the valley to do West Face the next day. So this was again a car adventure that belongs to my trip.
West Face is one of the more popular 5.11 free-climb’s in the valley. It’s also a shorter Big Wall on El Capitan. With his 18 pitches you can do it on one day and climb everything free. That day we woke up at 4:30am to get ready for West Face. After a long and steep hike we left the base of the route at 7:30am. The first two pitches, the 6th and 7th are the crux pitches, after that it’s all 5.10 or less. The first pitches we lead very well without any problems. I fell once in the 6th pitch, my foot slipped off, didn’t saw the right hands. The quality of the rock was way different compared to the rock quality of the nose. It was slicker because of the water who runs down there more often.

We arrived at the summit in the dark at 9pm with a full moon shining in our tired faces! The descent of El Cap is hard if you don’t know it and even harder in the dark. We enjoyed the summit for a while. With the amazing full moon we could see a lot and tried the descent for about an hour until we decided it was way too dangerous to continue. We went back up to the summit where we decided to sleep underneath a tree in an amazing open rock land space. We weren’t prepared to sleep at the summit so didn’t have much up there. We both slept on our rope spread out with long pants, T-shirt and a sweater. We had one down jacked for both of us!
A little away from our sleeping tree we found some snow we used to drink a little! It wasn’t a first class night, but it was a beautiful full moon night on top of El Capitan we’ll both remember for a long time.We slept about 3 hours (or less) when we woke up because of the sunrise. We couldn’t wait until the sun arrived to give us some warmth. This was one of the most amazing mornings in my life. We were both super tired but it was too beautiful to be sleeping. That morning it took us 3 hours to go down. Back at Camp 4 we ate for about 3 hours before we chilled out in the hammock or tent. After sleeping and hanging out the whole day I got prepared for the next goal. I was going to climb up to El Cap Spire in the famous route ‘Freerider’ with Niels the rescue guy. Flo was taking an easy day of climbing and did a couple of pitches with a German climber, Andreas.

So Niels and I played around for about 16 hours in Freerider! This amazing day started at 3:30am, after making a good porridge and cutting an apple with a machete we left Camp 4. At 5am we left the base of the climb with just enough light! We cruised the first ten pitches really fast up to the Mammoth ledges. The rhythm we had was really good and fast. It’s nice when things go efficient and fast. Most of the time you lose time at the belay stations. But with a good system you can go more efficient. After the mammoth ledges you make a small rappel and traverse a little. From then on all the ‘wide’ stuff is coming. Big offwidth’s and unprotected chimneys at 200 meter high are waiting for you. Niels (offwidth master) lead the Hollow Flake and I followed. Scary and not much protection, there are pitches you just don’t want to fall or you’re in bad shit! The pitch after the Hollow Flake is an almost unprotected chimney with an easy grade of 5.7! Crazy…, in sport climbing I warm up in 5.12’s. Here I was almost crying in a 5.7! ‘Falling is no option!’
Two pitches after the chimney, Niels lead ‘The Ear’, another chimney but even more exposed! In this one I found a BD # 4.5 (same size as the new BD #5). Awesome!
After this pitch the real deal was coming! The ‘Monster Offwidth’ was ready to eat our body parts! This is the most impressive line I’ve seen in my whole life. A huge crack straight up for about 60 meters with on both sides just a smooth face without any structures or holds! And all this really exposed 400 meters of the ground! Perfect and intimidating line. Not much people are fan of this kind of climbing but I like it. I still think it is the most physical climbing that exists! Respect for the good offwidth climbers! (Niels!)

Me at the end of the 'Monster Offwidth'
After chilling out on El Cap spire we raped down the whole route. At 9pm we arrived at the ground and were both completely done climbing and really tired. I wasn’t really on earth anymore and felt more like a ghost! Everything was hurting and falling of my feet was possible. Never felt like that.The next day only eating and sleeping was accepted. I didn’t move from my crashpad and slept with my head in the bear box! I was lucky to have a Flo next to me who could feed me a little! Thanks man.

After a nice and amusing evening at YOSAR (Yosemite Search and Rescue) Camp we left the Valley yesterday. Now we are on our way to Smith Rock, Oregon, for some crimpy sport climbing!

Yesterday we didn’t do much of the route because we had again some car troubles. When suddenly the car reacted strange we pulled out at a rest area. When I stopped the car the whole engine was smoking like shit! A little stress came up but we both stayed calm and reacted well. By now we know we have a good karma around us and optimism works the best. When we led the engine cool down, again, a nice American man saw we had some problems and was willing to spend some time with us to fix the car. He found out there was an obvious hole in the hose of the radiator, that’s why all the water escaped and the engine overheated! The friendly American gave me some tools from in his car and told me what to do. I’ve disconnected the hose and cut where the hole was. After that I’ve connected the shorter hose again. After that the engine worked perfect again. But because I didn’t want to drive around with so much tension on the hose we went to an Auto parts store and bought a new hose. After I’ve put the new hose on, the car drove perfect and we continued our journey!

Now we are sitting in some grass at a coffee shop in Bend, a city at Oregon. Tonight we’ll sleep at Rian Palo’s place that lives here in Bend. I know Rian from Rifle on my last trip through the states. I know Bend is a beautiful little town. We’ll probably walk a little bit around here before we go climbing tomorrow.

So this was quite a story but I hope you enjoyed reading it!

From roof crack to mega offwidth!

2011-06-12T02:10:00.007+02:00

Sitting in a chair at El Cap meadow looking at El Capitan, searching for our next projects. We’re completely worked, I feel every body part screaming for some rest and telling me to never do an offwidth again! But I will!
This is how we’re sitting here right now! Florian sais like he always does: On est bien là!

So why are we so tired today? We had three perfect and beautiful days of trad-climbing! When we got back in The Valley we did some cragging (single pitches) at the Cookie Clif. We tried some harder typical technical Yosemite routes. Perfect preparation for on a multi-pitch.

Our third day we had an easy but a mythic day! We went to the most famous single pitch in The Valley: ‘Separate Reality!’ The approach is funny because you need to rappel down from the top of the climb. First we rappelled down a slab, so we had no idea how the climb would look like. Suddenly the slab ends and you’re hanging in a high open space! Like you can see on the picture below! Before we could climb we had to wait a little because some Japanese climbers where just before us. I tried this mythic line when the Japo’s where done! First you start in a wide crack size #2 – 3 BD Camalot. It was still a little wet but that first part is not too hard. After that the roof starts immediately. The first part of the roof crack is size # 2 – 1 BD Camalot. Perfect hands in a nice roof splitter! What do you want more? …………… The crux at the end!!!
At the end the splitter gets thinner to size #.75. From there you make a big move to a jug and swing your feet over and place a toe hook at the lip of the roof! This move is amazing! In that position you place gear than you reach the lip with your hands next to your foot.

I succeeded doing this line in my first try! I did it flash because I had some Japanese gear-beta: #3 - # 2 – Sushi - #1 - #.75 - …

We also had some time to make a little movie of Separate Reality! Check it out! Definitely watch the last 10 seconds of the movie, the real end!

Yesterday the big and tiring day! Flo and I did ‘Astroman’, 5.11c! This is a perfect line of 12 pitches on ‘The Washington Column’. This is one of the most popular multi-pitch routes next to ‘The Nose’ in Yosemite! It is the free-climb test-piece in the valley, famous for ‘The Enduro Corner’ (4th pitch) , ‘Harding Slot’ (7th pitch) and ‘Changing Corners’ (9th pich). We prepared everything the day before sending! We woke up at 5:45am, ate some bananas and eggs and took off of Camp 4 to realize our goal. The approach took us longer as expected, at 8:30am we found the base of the climb. At 9:00am we left the ground!
Here are all the pitches. I lead most of the harder pitches because of the jamming style that goes well for the moment.

Pitches:
1. 5.7 Lead: Flo
2. 5.10a Lead: Flo
3. 5.11c ‘Boulder Problem’ Lead:Sieb
This short pitch is just two hard moves in a tiny corner crack.
4. 5.11c ‘The Enduro Corner’ Lead:Sieb
This one is a really famous pitch of ‘Astroman’, a long right facing corner that seems to never end.
5. 5.9 Lead: Flo
6. 5.10c Lead:Sieb
7. 5.11b ‘The Harding Slot’ Lead:Sieb
This pitch is by far the hardest pitch of the whole route. It’s an offwidth/ chimney through a roof. Every body part is necessary to send this monster!
8. 5.10c Lead:Flo
9. 5.11a ‘Changing Corners’ Lead:Sieb
The Changing Corners aren’t so hard if you have a sport climbing background! Really technical slabs combined with a thin crack on the right!
10. 5.10a Lead:Sieb
11. 5.7 Lead:Flo
12. 5.10d Lead:Sieb

I on sighted the whole route free without falling or pulling on gear! This is by far my proudest free (on sight) ascent on multi-pitch trad!
The Harding Slot was for me by far the hardest line! It’s a crazy offwidth, really exposed and without any little horizontal holds! I took my helmet off twice because my head was just stuck in this wide crack. I think it took me 40 minutes to climb this bitch!
After I did this line without falling I knew I could send the whole route! I was psyched!

Thanks to Flo for the fast following and for leading some pitches after the physical ones. It’s also really nice to have a fix climbing partner I know. We could move fast and efficient!
At 8:10pm we arrived at the top! The descent we did in the dark, this was still quite an adventure. Hiking down scary slabs at 300 meters high, in the dark. I’m glad nothing happened and we found our way to the Chevy Van!

The harding Slot in Astroman!

Find me deep in there!
On our way down we had good luck we past a small mountain water fall where we could drink some water, because we ran out of water at the summit of the climb. We're not sick now so the water wasn't poisoned.

The first thing we did when we came down at 10:30pm wasn’t eating. We bought our self a doctor pepper and took a 45 minute long shower! Perfect!

Today we take it really easy and are going to make some new plans!

Enjoy the pictures and the movie!

Gypsie power all around!

2011-06-08T01:32:00.017+02:00

Salut tout le monde – Hello everybody!
It’s like this in my head and in conversations since Florian arrived. Switching languages all the time! But it is a good thing because my French wasn’t as good anymore.

After that last rainy day we made an attempt to do ‘Moratorium’, 4 pitches 5.11b. We ended up doing only the 2 first pitches and I tried to lead the third pitch but the crux of this pitch - and also the crux of the whole route – was wet and dripping in my face! So we decided to bail and do something else the rest of the day. We did ‘Serenity Crack’, 3 pitches 5.10d. I already did this route on my second day in the valley but it is such a beautiful line that I didn’t mind doing it again. Flo lead the first and third pitch, so he could feel how it is to lead a perfect and pure crack. He still had to get used to the pure crack climbing but I’m sure it will come soon!

The day after we gave ‘Freeblast’, the first 10 pitches of ‘Salathé Wall’ (=32 pitches on El Cap) a go. We only did the first 6 pitches because we were quite tired. Those where the best pitches of Freeblast. I lead all the first pitches when Flo followed. The third roof pitch I said take, really stupid, but I did the crux in the thin roof first go! After that there was one pitch in a corner with some scary stemming and technical moves! The fifth pitch was first 5.10d scary in a tiny crack with offset nuts as large as my pinky nail. After this section in pitch five the beautiful slab is coming at you! It’s a 5.11c slab and it’s all bolted. So it’s less scary but still pretty hard I fell twice in this section! But I’m sure that I can do it next time!

Those days we didn’t do big stuff but still we both were worked and ready for a rest day! The next day it rained really hard so we couldn’t climb. We saw at the weather forecast that it was going to rain for about 4 days so we pieced out of that bitch-hole! Flo and I left the valley joined by my dear German friend Fabi! We didn’t climb that day but we went to Jailhouse, 1,5 hour out of the valley. Jailhouse is a small overhanging climbing area who stays very dry when it rains!

We slept at a nice and quiet place near Jailhouse on some BLM-land (Bureau of Land Management). The next day we all really enjoyed the sport climbing! It feels good to do a little of sport climbing to let your head relax a little after being high above small gear all the time! I did a couple of 7’s (5.12+/5.13’s) and was surprised that the physical sport climbing went so well. The next day we dropped Fabi off in Stockton where he took the train to San Diego where he is going to study one more year! Crazy that German!
So that day we didn’t climb much, just 4 hours I think!

Jailhouse is a little local crack with big overhang, there are just two 6c’s I thing and all the other lines are harder. It’s definitely a really nice spot to do sport climbing when its wet weather because of the big overhang and it never seeps! The rock is basalt and really nice and sticky to climb on. It’s comparable with Rifle, Colorado, but the rock is stickier and the moves are less complicated. I had to take out my kneepads again to some technical knee bars in the big overhang! This is a really nice training wall if you’re living close to it. It is definitely worth it to visit is to for a couple of climbing days!

Today we took a rest day because the rock in Yoyo-mite will be dry from tomorrow! I also showed Flo how to drive my big Chevy cow! It was so funny to see someone ells having trouble with the wideness and the lose steering wheel of the car!

Tomorrow morning we will go to Yosemite and do some cragging, single pitches all day. One of the single pitch projects is ‘Separated reality’, a nice hands/roof crack! Famous one!

Here a little movie of my Slovenian friends and I in Hueco Tanks and Joshua Tree.

Desert fox from Gašper Bratina on Vimeo.

Yosemite - up to the Big Walls

2011-06-02T02:35:00.003+02:00

Now it really has been a long time ago since I’ve let you know I’m not a fat-ass yet! So after I was in Las Vegas to clean my car, clothes and myself a little I went to Sequoia National Forest. It’s a really impressive and big forest, the trees are huge and massif! I’ve been standing under the biggest tree in the world for about half an hour until my beard was frozen of the icy cold.

The next day I drove in to Yosemite National Park! Beautiful and so impressive. I’ve never thought it was possible to see so much climbable rock, so high in one eye view.
When I arrived at Camp 4 I was a little disappointed because of all the restrictions!
In the summer season you can only stay 7 days in the park and so only camp 7 days. On top of that there was no space available anymore at Camp 4 when I arrived. Free camping just in the woods is pretty hard sometimes with the rangers patrolling trough the forest, looking for dirt-bags like me. Stories are going around that when the rangers find you, they even kick your ass and give you a fine over 200 dollars! Shitheads!

So the day after I arrived I woke up at 6 am to go and wait in line to check in for a campsite. I was seventh in line and I could conquer a one! I also slept 2 nights at the search and rescue camp in Niels’s hut! Thanks for that boy!

In this first week here I climbed 6 days and did already a lot of classics!
- Hardd (2pitches)
- Outer Limits (1 pitch)
- Serenity Crack (3pitches)
- Sons of Yesterday (5 pitches)
- Central Pillar of Frenzy ( 5 pitches)
- Kor- Beck (only did the first 4 pitches because was the same day as Frenzy)
- South by Southwest ( 6 pitches)
- The Nose up to Dolt Tower (11 pitches)
Of this last one I lead all the pitches (almost free) and Kevin followed up with the ascender! This was a super line! I’m ready for the whole 32 pitches!
- Generator Crack (1 pitch) My first Offwidth I tried! I did it almost first go on top-rope! This is so hard! The most physical style in climbing. Bouldering is nothing compared to offwidth.

So after all this I found three guys to share the gas to go to San Francisco where I picked up Florian Castagne from the airport at Saturday evening! I had been looking forward to this moment and am so psyched to share the trad-climbing/ multi-pitch experiences with someone I know!

On Sunday we visited San Francisco in a nice and sunny day (rare for this city), we were lucky! We checked out the most touristic places like China Town, The Golden Gate Bridge, The Pyramid Center and The Fisherman’s Warf! All this was amazing, I really enjoyed this time and it felt good not to do all this alone but with some good company!

After a tiring day of being a real tourist we still didn’t have a fat-ass and did already one part of the drive to Yosemite. The next day we did big groceries before entering the park and I had to fix my left lower front light of the car. After that, Flow (like those silly Americans call him) and I continued our way to Yosemite. That same day I showed Flo around and we even climbed tree easy pitches!The next day we were really motivated to wake up at 5:45am to go and do East Buttress of Middle Cathedral. We woke up this early to be in front of the crowed, and yes, we were the first ones on the route with 3 parties behind us! It’s a nice and easy line of 11 pitches and good for Florian to start in Yosemite to get used to the style.

Today we tried to climb but the rain showed us the way to the launch in Curry village where tons of people are escaping from the rain. After I finished this blog post I’m going to wake up that Belgian who is having a jetlag in my Van for the moment!

Enjoy the pictures!

Joe's Valley - The movie!

2011-05-24T23:43:00.004+02:00

Here is a nice little movie of Joe's valley, edited by my colorado friend Thomas Seymore!

Joe's Valley from Thomas Seymour on Vimeo.

Some climbing done!

2011-05-19T17:53:00.005+02:00

Last Sunday evening I’ve met two French guys where I was camped. Nicolas André and Matthieu Mercier. They are on the road for 6 months, first they will spend 9 weeks in the states, after that they’ll go to South Africa and New Zealand.

On Monday I climbed with Matthieu, he is more a multi-pitch climber and he even does some alpine climbing. Nicolas is more of a boulderer, and a really strong one to.
We tried to climb ‘Monkey Fingers’, an 8 pitch long 5.12b. The 12b pitch was the third one witch I tried to on sight but it didn’t work. It was a really small finger crack in a corner, even the book says harder for big handed folks! I felt it!
The rest of the route we could finish without any problems! It was a real adventure again those multi-pitches.On Tuesday we climbed with three, it was going really slow because of all the rope organizing but it worked. We tried ‘Plan B’, a 6 pitch long 5.12b. This one was definitely a little bit harder! The second pitch was a nice Indian Creek style splitter witch I lead without problems because of the Indian Creek experience. The third pitch was pretty dangerous, Matthieu lead it very good.

After that I and Nico followed. Just before the anchor was a huge pillar the size of a fridge that moved 5cm backwards when I was hanging on it. I kept my balance and leaned forward again to put my weight of the fridge sized rock! I screamed pretty loud because I thought I was falling with that fridge in my hands! Luckily nothing happened and I could continue in the 4th pitch. This was the crux pitch of the route! It was a 12b roof-crack, but long and big! I liked it a lot but I fell twice! If I would try it again I think I’m able to do it. After that Matthieu and Nicolas followed, but because it was a big roof there was a lot of friction. We also lost one Camalot #1, we bought a new one together afterwards.
Because of this crazy friction in the roof, the rope was getting used! At the end Matthieu fell and I just heard him screaming pretty loud. I had no idea what was going on because I couldn’t see him. After we did some crazy rescue style I saw that the mantle of the rope 2 meters above his nut was broken and you could see the core very well. That last part of the roof I belayed him on a thin rope we had to haul up our bag! Luckily everything worked out pretty well and we didn’t have an accident, we’ve just lost a cam. After Nico tried to get the Camelot back for 30 minutes we were tired of all the shit that had happened and came down. Too bad because it was a really nice line! Just not a line you want to climb with three people.
Afterwards in the coffee shop we looked back on the day and had a lot of fun. Those days need to be there, that’s how you get experienced!

Yesterday we wanted to climb again but the rain made us leave Zion national Park. I came to Las Vegas to pick up my title of my car and stayed at the house where my car is registered. Rian, the owner of the house, let me wash my clothes, clean my whole car out and finally wash myself in his house! It feels awesome to have everything clean. I’ve vacuumed my whole car, really everything. This all because I’m scared a bear is going to yank out one of my doors to get in for food!

So now I’m going to leave Las Vegas again and go to Yosemite! I’m really excited because I know a lot of people over there right now! And in 10 days Florian is coming!

I also doubled my rack! I've almost two full racks from 0.3 up to 3!

In Zion, Utah but without climbing!

2011-05-16T04:33:00.005+02:00

I’ve spent two days in Zion right now! I still didn’t climb because I can’t find a climbing partner. The guy were I normally should have climbed with today, Arturro from St George, fell with his mountain bike yesterday so he can’t climb anymore.

Yesterday I walked around trough the whole canyon, I saw the climbs I would like to climb. Moonlight Buttress looks amazing, it motivated me even more!
I’ve already a lot of contacts now here in Springdale. Now it’s just a matter of time to wait until some local has time to climb.

Today I went to Bryce Canyon, 1.5 hour north from Zion. It was beautiful but I still feel frustrated because I couldn’t climb while I’m in an amazing multipitch sandstone area! Enjoy some of my pictures from the view of a tourist!

Joe's Valley and heaven food!

2011-05-14T17:10:00.005+02:00

It has been a while ago since I wrote a blog post. I’ve spent the past five days in Joe’s Valley with Tom, Mike and TJ. Mike left after one day to take a little break in his one year climbing trip. He went back home for two weeks, really long I think! So I had to say goodbye to Mike for a long while, because from now on our future destinations are not the same anymore!

I’ve had quite an adventure with the car on my way to Joe’s Valley. When I just past Green River my van acted really strange, it was something with the transmission that was clear. I stopped at a rest area where I saw that there was steam coming from underneath the car. I let the engine cool down a little and filled up the transmission oil, it was completely empty. There was definitely a leak somewhere. I realized that I had to go back to Green River to see a mechanic. After an hour waiting I left on the highway the same way I was going until I saw a place where I could make a U-turn. This U-turn was illegal so I was happy no cop saw me. Towards Green River it was all downhill so I’ve put the car in neutral and just rolled down 15 miles, pretty slow. In Green River I saw a mechanic who told me I probably could drive toward Price the closest ‘bigger’ city where they probably could fix my car. And I did those 60 miles with one quart of transmission oil in the engine. When I arrived in Price it was already 9pm so I slept there at a Wal-Mart parking lot. The next day was a Saturday and almost every mechanic was closed, I was almost crying when I found a little mechanic named John! Mechanic John was my hero for the day! He found out where the leak was and showed me everything. Now I know my car a little better and know what was going on. He even fed me some cinnamon rolls and coffee. At 10:30am I left Price and drove 35 miles towards Joe’s valley.

That same day I climbed on my own a little because the others took a rest day. It was strange to boulder after 1 month of trad-climbing but it was a good thing for my body and strength.
The second day I did already a nice V9 named ‘Worse case scenario’. I felt I had to build up my pure power again but it came back fast.

Next day we took a rest day because of the rain, it was raining and even snowing pretty bad! We went to town and later on TJ, Tom and I watched Watchmen in the bus. That was a perfect rainy rest day activity! The next day the weather looked better in the morning. We could climb the whole morning until it started to rain again. We did some beautiful slabs on a boulder half in the river! Really beautiful climbing there. It reminds me a lot at Fontaine Bleau! Doing some nice V8 slabs with tiny footholds and big slopers. So the heavy rain sent us back to the bus to watch another movie. Rain is annoying when you’re psyched!
My 5th day at Joe’s valley was amazing, I flashed 5 V7’s and one I did second go! Everything was just flowing and going! I also did a nice and powerful V9.

Joe’s valley was a nice relief from all the dessert climbing I did during this trip. Although Joe’s is still high dessert it was still nice to climb between some trees who give that awesome smell you forget when you’re in the low dessert all the time. Most of the boulders are some amazing quality, the sandstone is pretty hard and you can find a lot of different styles. From overhang crimps to hard slabs on slopers! The boulders have a nice bleu color with orange strikes. I could stay here definitely longer but I had to leave if I still wanted to climb in Zion before it’s too hot. I’m sure it was a good thing to do some bouldering for five days in combination with all the trad-climbing. Keep my strength on an acceptable level.

Now I’m in Zion for my first day. I haven’t been in the canyon yet, I’ll do that in an hour! I’m excited. I just don’t have a climbing partner for today. Tomorrow I will climb whit Arturro Calvo, he is a climber who lives in St George. A friend of mine, Lauren Lee, connected me with Arturro. He doesn’t speak much English, most of the time he speaks Spanish. So good for me, I hope to learn a little bit Spanish. I’m planning to try Moonlight Buttress one of these days. Before I try that 10 pitch V 5.12d I want to try something easier to get used to the style!

In Joe’s valley I made my best dinner ever! It was so good that I’ll give the recipe on my blog!

- First you learn how to make a campfire if you don’t know how to do it yet. Wait until you have a lot of nice hot red cols.
- You wrap a whole sweet potato in aluminum foil and throw it in the cols for about 40 minutes.
- Wrap some onion and carrots in some foil too, add some pepper, garlic salt and olive oil! Throw this package of heaven in the fire for about 20 minutes (depends how good your fire is.)
- When the vegetables are almost cooked you take them out of the fire and add some honey and cheddar cheese. Now, throw the package of ultimate heaven back in the fire for 2 minutes!
- When both, potato and vegetables, are ready you take them out of the fire.
- Now you take your time to make heavens bites! First you take a salty cracker, put a slice of sweet potato on top of that cracker. On top of that you put a piece of smoked trout (river fish). And as final touch you put the honey, cheese vegetables on top of the tower of happiness!
- Take that piece of happiness and enjoy your life!

I hope someone will try this because it’s really good! I feel definitely a better person right now!

Send of 'Air Swedin' 5.13R

2011-05-06T19:07:00.005+02:00

Bitch yeah! Life is good!
After the really nice rest days at Tom’s dad Condo in Moab Kevin, Liesel and I went back to the lovely Creek! Tom and Mike left to Joe’s Valley to do their boulder thing again!

On Monday Kevin, Liesel and I woke up early enough to go and try ‘Air Swedin’ again! I tried it once more in top(gay)rope and then gave it a real try with all the gear! This was my second try on lead and my 4th try in general. I felt way better while I was climbing but I screwed up my beta just before I could place the C3 #0 BD and I fell, I fell deep, really deep! I was psyched! Not scared at all, just really concentrated! I love that feeling, that’s why I climb! After that try, the line was too much in the sun to try it again! So I waited the rest of the day. I wanted to climb but I had a pretty bad headache so a just slept in a little place of shade behind a little boulder. When that headache was a little better I climbed a little to stay awake and ready for a second try in the late afternoon when the line was back in the shade.
At six pm I tried it again! And guess what? I flew up that line like it was nothing! I was in the best focus ever! And it’s pretty necessary to be in a good focus if you do the crux of a 13R 3 meters above a tiny piece of gear! I love this line and am glad I could do it!

The day after that Indian Creek for me was open again! We went to the 4x4 wall where I did my first 5.12+ (‘Hydraulic Pump’) only in my second go! It’s a nice .5 to .75 BD splitter with some lay-backing and two difficult corner switches at the start and in the end!
Those two last days where great and I feel I’m really getting in to crack climbing!

On Wednesday I had an easier day of climbing but a lot of hiking was involved! Ken (One of my favorite Canadian!) and I did the North Six Shooter! This is one of the two obvious towers in Indian Creek! The hike took us two hours but it was worth it. We did the line called ‘Lightning Bolt Cracks’ (5.11-). This is only a three pitch line but it’s at the highest point in the Creek and it’s nice and exposed! Ken lead the first pitch and I lead the second and the third because of the rotten anchor at the second pitch. The last pitch is a 5.9 unprotected squeeze chimney! For the ones who don’t know what a chimney is, just think about a crack in the rock that is too big to place fingers, hands, arms, feet or legs! But the crack is big enough to crawl in to! So I got as deep as I could into that crack and used my feet, knees, back and hands to go up! You can see at as two opposite walls with nothing to hold on and you just compress your body between the walls and struggle your way up! And the squeeze of squeeze chimney means that it’s pretty small. My head and helmet got stuck a couple of times! Really scary climbing because once you relax your body, you just slip down! Even this was an awesome experience and I’ll do it again!
The view from the top of the tower was amazing, we could see all over the Creek, Canyon lands and the Abajo Mountains.

Yesterday I found somebody to go to Zion National Park but this morning he changed his mind and decided to go home today according to his original plan! So I still don’t have a climbing partner for Zion! I really want to do ‘Moonlight Buttress’ (V 5.12d), a hard but classic 9 pitch climb! It is hard to find a partner for this climb because I want to free-climb it. Two weeks ago Lauren told me that she news some people who lives near Zion where I maybe can climb with! I’m going to try to contact them because I don’t want to leave Utah before I did some big walls on sandstone! Today I left Indian Creek for real; I’m going to join Tom and Mike at Joe’s Valley for a couple of days! It was really sad to leave this place! Indian Creek is by far my favorite place in America until now. I’m really going to miss this place! Everything was perfect! Tons of different walls, beautiful free camping, far enough from civilization, nice people, all climbing grades, beautiful environment, high quality sandstone and easy to gear placements! You see? This place is amazing!

This is a little tick list of my best climbs out here:

- Air Swedin 5.13R
- Hydraulic Pump 5.12+
- Tenderloins 5.12
- Slice and Dice 5.12
- Not That Funny 5.12-
- Comic Relief 5.12-
- T-Bones Tonight 5.12-
- Swedin-Ringle 5.12-

Taking some Air!

2011-04-29T21:19:00.008+02:00

Last week was quite a mixed week. The first few days after my last blog post it rained a lot and all the areas were pretty wet. So we took two days off. We all crawled in our cars and read our books. Another activity was to get all in my van and find as much gear placements as possible!

After two of those rest days we tried to climb a little, I did four routes but we needed to be selective with the lines we did. Some stuff was still wet and it can be dangerous to try hard stuff that is climbable but still too wet to place your gear safely. So we did some easy lines. The next night it rained the whole time nonstop, so for sure the routes where wet. So that following day we climbed in the late afternoon. I only did two lines, but I was happy to put my hands in some cracks! That same evening Tom and Mike arrived in the Creek. They’ve been in St George for about two weeks where they bouldered in Moe’s Valley. It was so great to see them back after only 3 weeks. I wish our future destinations were the same but unfortunately we have different plans. It was their first time in Indian Creek and also the first time they were going to climb some cracks with trad-gear.

The next day we all woke up with tons of sun in our dirty faces! Awesome, I was well rested and ready for a nice and long day of crack climbing! The motivation was high and the fingers and hands where healed. I went to ‘The Scarface Wall’ with Sam, Tom, Mike, Kevin and Liesel. Kevin and Liesel have already been climbing in Indian Creek for two weeks. I met them in Bishop a month and a half ago.
It was the first day for Mike and Tom to climb some cracks. First Liesel taught them how to make tape gloves like you see on one of the pictures. Pretty funny, I laughed a lot with Mike because before he could even tie his tape glove on his hand he dropped his construction of tape a couple of times in the sand. An hour later their hands where finally mummified and the torturing could begin! They tried some lines first on top rope before the trad-climbing challenge could begin.

I did two new 5.12-‘ses. They are both nice, thin and overhanging. The first one I did was ‘Not That Funny’. First, I had no idea where that name comes from, until I did the second 12- next to it. That line is called ‘Comic Relief’. It is a line with three roofs in a corner. It’s pretty funny to see people climbing that line because most of the time your scrunched up in the roof and you’re hands are moving blindly to come out of the roof! I did both of the lines. I needed three tries on ‘Comic Relief’ because I placed my last gear before the crux over the last roof where I needed to smear my foot afterwards. So I fell pretty funny trying to place my foot in the corner where the gear was. No problem, I loved to do the whole thing again five minutes after that second go.
Tom and Mike were dead tired (like everybody on their first day) from this first day of crack climbing. Like they said before they went to bed at nine pm; Everything hurts!

The next day I was even more exited to climb! Me, Kevin and Tom woke up at 7 am to go climbing at 8 am. We started so early because I was motivated to try ‘Air Swedin’ 5.13R again in the morning before it got too hot. With the song ‘Bad Boys’ of ‘Inner Circle’ blasting through the speakers of my van, all singing out loud, the day started!

We went up to the magic line. I put up a top rope on it reaching the chains from another line on the right. After Kevin and I tried ‘Air Swedin’ on top rope I gave it a go on lead with all the gear, ready to fly! While I climbed, Tom went up on a fixed line I prepared in the warm-up on the right to take some pictures.

The first part until the chains was going really well. It’s a nice splitter size .75 Black Diamond. At the chains of the first part (‘Swedin-Ringle’ 5.12-) I placed three pieces of gear size C3 #2 BD. This is a crack a little bit bigger than one centimeter. After placing that gear, when I was already a little bit pumped, I reached to the left slopy rail.

Then you go up for about 3 meters without placing any piece of gear. This three meter section is the crux. I fell there on my first lead try that day! The reason for not placing gear in that section is because it’s just too hard to place gear. The next piece you place is a C3 #0 BD, really small! To place this cam you need to do a tricky move, on top of that you place it without seeing the crack! It’s a blind placement, just hoping it’s good and clip it! After that the hardest part is over but it’s still tricky and scary. After that last C3 #0 BD you go up for 2.5 meters without placing gear until you can place a C3 #1 BD. Also pretty small gear. From then on you can start placing some bigger gear again! I fell once in the crux! It was really exciting, I was just so happy the gear placements stayed in the crack!

I’m glad there are some nice pictures of this climb. I’m definitely going to try that line again!
That afternoon I did two more easier lines and went to town in the evening with the whole group. After 1 month of cooking in my car, going out to a pizza restaurant all-you-can-eat was so luxury.

After 2 hours of dumping pizza in our stomach Tom, Mike and I went on a mission through Moab to sneak in one of the hotels’ hot tubs and swimming pools! At the first hotel we failed but at the second hotel I asked some people who were in the hot tub to let us in because we completely forgot our room key card! That worked easily! Just do the stupid Belgian thing: Me from Belgium! Me and friend forgotton key!

We could chill out the whole night in a nice hot tub! After that we went to the condo of Tom’s dad and his friends. It’s a house they rent for several days when they are in Moab. They are here to do some mountain biking.
This morning we took a nice and long shower at this place, we are all clean now! Feels really good! Or like Mike said when we first walked on the street all clean: Oh whaauw, this is crazy! I just want to dance right now!
You see what a shower can do for a dirt bag!

Enjoy the many pictures and check out Tom and Mike’s Vantasy!

Some crazy morning faces! I love it!

First 5.12's!

2011-04-23T22:48:00.011+02:00

The day after the last rest day we woke up in the morning after a rainy night. In the morning we decided with our group of loners to go out to canyon lands for another hike of 11 miles! We couldn’t really climb because of the wet sandstone. It was an awesome group activity on a nice windy rest day. Check out my new tourist shirt, only 3 dollars in the thrift store!
The day after that a was pretty tired of the hike through Canyonlands and of the sun that had hit my face all day. We went to the optimator wall where I tried ‘The Optimator’ (5.13-). This thing is pretty hard and 40 meters long. I might try it later on this trip in the Creek.

Our second day on we went to the tenderloins wall where I tried again the route of the wall named ‘Tenderloins’ (5.12). I did it on my second go! It is an awesome straight line. The first part goes through a pretty overhanging part and is size BD .5, so okey fingers for me and then it goes up for about 25 meters of size BD .75.
Those are all finger locks for me, finger locking is a pretty hard size but I’m getting pretty good at it! I like it a lot. Every line I try I learn a new style. So this was my first 5.12 and yesterday I did my second! I’m pretty psyched! I did ‘Slice and dice’ a nice .75 size crack through an overhanging section. I did this one also on my second go. I’m ready for some harder climbs!
The grading system in trad-climbing is completely different. There is no lettering system behind the numbers. It goes just from 5.7 up to 5.13, between all that you have +’ses and –‘ses. It’s nice they divided the grades like that because every route is so hand size dependent.

I climbed all the harder and smaller cracks with the new Supermocc’s that five Ten gave me! They are so great for size BD #1 and smaller, the tip of those shoes really get stuck into the smallest cracks if you place them well and twist hard!

I’ll be in Indian Creek for maybe 10 more days. This place is so big and I’ve still so much to climb and new area’s to see. Crack climbing is really a new style of climbing that motivates me so much again! I’m also very psyched for Yosemite to do some Big Walls with Florian Castagne who is coming for one month to the States to travel with me. I’m looking forward, it only gets better!

Pain, technique, endurance and fun! Lot's of Fun!

2011-04-18T20:18:00.012+02:00

I already spent two weeks in this beautiful Indian Creek! The first days it felt like I needed to start from zero again. Slowly I pushed the grades and tried harder routes with my meat hooks. The day before my last blog post I tried some 5.12’s on the fingers. I twisted my left middle finger to much in those thin cracks and he was a bit swollen. So the day after that rest day I had to take it easy and just did one big hand crack. It’s the same finger that I broke 5 years ago. I know what kind of pain it was then and it was exactly the same 5 days ago. I used some crazy cream called ‘Herbal Heat’. It’s a completely natural cream whit lot of arnica in it. It’s a cream made by two climbers who live in Bishop, they also make the skin repair cream ‘Sierra Salve’ that works really well! I’ve tried the ‘Herbal Heat’ in the evening, the next morning my finger wasn’t swollen at all. This cream really works a lot. It was still a sample but I hope they keep making this magic salve!

After that day I took another rest day and went hiking on my own in Canyon Lands. I hiked about 10 miles (16,09km) in the afternoon. This was one of the best hikes I ever made. The view is amazing, just check out the pictures.

Then last Friday I went climbing again! I was completely rested a super psyched to crush those cracks (and my hands). That day I did my first 5.12-. It was an amazing hand-crack corner that goes through a roof at the end! This line is called ‘T-bones Tonight’ and located on the second Meat wall. The first 17 meters the crack is pretty small and easier with small hands.
I laid it back until where it was size number two BD Camelot where I could jam my big hands in! The roof was size number three BD Camelot what was still a really good size for me. I love this kind of big hand cracks through a roof. I fell on my on sight in the roof and did it second go afterwards. I was even more psyched to climb after that day!

Next day I had an easy day again to rest my finger a little bit. The high point of the day was when I did ‘Fist Fuck’, a long overhanging 5.11 with a roof on fists (for normal people). There are not that many people that try this one because fist cracks aren’t very popular! The funny thing was that I did it with only one fist. Al the other moves I just jammed with my big hands, sometimes I had to use cupped hands.

Yesterday I went climbing with Joe, a local here who lives in Moab. This was really nice, we went really early and he took me on some hard climbs! I did my second 5.12- named ‘Swedin- Ringle’ I did it also second go. First go I fell on the anchors. This is one of the best lines I’ve climbed here, although it is a hard size for me. It is size number one Camelot, what is really good for people with small hands. I learned in this line how to place proper ring-locks with my fingers. I really love it, I start learning how to jam different sizes and I can flow through some nice lines now. The crux is clipping the anchors with a left hand finger-lock and the tips of your toes jammed in the small crack.

I also tried the second part of this line on top-rope, this is called ‘Air Swedin’. The name tells what it is all about. After the anchors of the first part, which you don’t clip, you place two or three small Camelot’s size .4 and .5 and you go into a small crack with you right hand and a slopy rail with your left hand. You go up about 2 or 3 meters above your last piece of gear and that’s the crux. The grade of this awesome line is 5.13R. The R means that it’s pretty dangerous. But it’s still better then the X (= chance to die).
I’m really psyched about this line, I really think I can do it! Just get some bigger balls and go up high!I learned so much about crack climbing last two weeks here. Every crack is so different and always such a different style depending of the size. The most important thing I learned is that the grades aren’t saying much. Everything is depending of the size of your hands. If you have big hands a fist crack will be good and a thing finger-crack will be the hardest struggle ever (I already experienced)! I saw good crack climbers struggling on ‘Fist Fuck’, only 5.11, just because they have small hands. So what I need to do right now is searching for a nice crack on my limit that fits my size! And then I’ll do the opposite, I’ll search a hard line that isn’t my hand/finger size at all!

By now there are a lot of people I now here in the creek. We are with a nice group of people now that are here on their own to. Having a lot of fun. Climbing wise I think this is my favorite spot until now! It’s big here with so many beautiful lines! I’m also psyched to try an off width. An off width is a crack larger than a fist-size crack and smaller then a chimney. I hope to have some pictures of some off width climbing by next week.

When I was in Bishop, Five Ten US had sent me some crack climbing shoes that I’m trying out right now. It’s the new Moccasim, called SuperMocc. It’s basically the same but the SuperMocc is a little bit thinner on the tip and has extra rubber on top. I love those shoes for cracks size thin hands and smaller! Smearing is great to because of their flat and wide surface!

Enjoy the pictures and keep following my blog!

This is a little list from what I did until now:

Date:	Grade:	Name:
6/04/2011	5.9	Twin Cracks
	Try 5.10	No name crack
	5.10	Keyhole Flakes
7/04/2011	5.9	Unknown
	5.9	Spam
	5.10-	Wavy Gravy
	5,10+	Dirt Cheap
	5.10	Where is carruthers?
8/04/2011	5.10-	Generic Crack
	5.10+	Unnamed
	5.10	The naked and the dead
	5.11	Right of the naked and the dead
9/04/2011	Rest
10/04/2011	5.10	Unnamed
	5.10	Cube Steaks
	5.11-	Meat Machine
	5.11+	Meat ya later
11/04/2011	5.8	Unnamed
	5.11	Power Play
	5.11	Power paws
	5.11+	Unnamed
	5.11+	Electric
	5.11+	Tip Layback
12/04/2011	Rest
13/04/2011	5.10+	Hay U Take
14/04/2011	Rest
15/04/2011	5.10+	Tube steakes tomorrow
	5.11-	At Your Cervix
	5,12-	T-bones Tonight
16/04/2011	5.11	Fist Fuck
	5.11-	Unnamed
17/04/2011	5.11	Three strikes You're out
	5.12-	Swedin-Ringle
	5.11-	Think Pink

One line world!

2011-04-12T22:48:00.005+02:00

Long time ago! A week ago I arrived in Indian creek, Utah. Because the nearest city is Moab and is still one hour drive away from Indian Creek, this is the first time I can use the internet.

I need to make it short because of a lack of time, belief it or not!

After leaving my good friends, Tom and Mike, behind in Bishop I got in my car for a 12 hour drive to Indian Creek. I did it in two days because it’s a bit safer when you drive alone.

Once I arrived in Indian Creek I was just blown away and so impressed about the nature and the environment. I think one of my favorite places in nature is the dessert, it’s just so silent and peaceful!

I climbed first three days on and then two days on. Hard! I’m really tired now and my hands are completely destroyed! But I like the crack climbing so I don’t care about pain now!

I love crack climbing, it’s more than always the same moves. There is more variety in crack climbing then you would think. The first day I tried a 5.10 hand crack of 40 meters long. I fell a couple of times and had a hard time! Grades are a different thing in crack climbing compared to sport climbing. It’s way harder. By now I already did some harder cracks and real finger cracks! I love it, it only hurts. Every day my hands and fingers are swollen. I tried a nice thin hands to finger crack called ‘Power Line’ 5.12. It was pretty hard, I need to be a little more experienced to be able to do that crack.

Yesterday I did a couple of 5.11’s and 5.11+’es. Hard day. Slowly I’m pushing the limit. I feel I’m already jamming pretty well when I find a nice big hands crack. Everything depends of the crack size, I have really big hands so a lot of the thin hand cracks and finger cracks are really difficult with my giant meatball hands (like they call them)!

I don’t have much time any more so the closer experience of crack climbing I’ll tell you on my next blog post in a couple of days!

See y’all

Crazy atmosphere at the Buttermilks!

2011-04-01T21:11:00.013+02:00

Climbing in the Buttermilks is sharp, technical, intense for the fingers, beautiful and inspiring! If you’re on the road a lot of things about climbing and living become clear. Last days I concluded a couple of things. The most important conclusion is that climbing is my excuse to live and learn all the time! In other words, I need climbing to develop myself in life!

It becomes more and more clear for me that it’s not only climbing styles, grades and the physical aspect of climbing that makes me climb. The things that are getting more important in my climbing life are strangers who become friends, environment, nature, good atmosphere, developing myself in all possible ways, dealing with people you like, dealing with people you don’t like, etc…

All this becomes clear really slowly and I needed Hueco Tanks, Red Rocks and Bishop for this! Knowing there is more that’s coming is making me want to travel like this for a long time!

Last days we’ve been camping in the Buttermilks near the boulders! It’s just so amazing to wake up every day and just enjoy the little things. I know I sound like a hippie but I don’t care! Since I arrived here in Bishop I’ve been spending my time with one nice group of people! Four of them left a couple of days ago and today three others left. So now it’s Mike, Tom and I again on our own. Kevin and Liesel, the couple of the group, are on the road for one year. I’ll definitely meet them again in Indian Creek. That’s the next stop!

It has been a long time since I hung out with such a nice group of people. It reminds me of last year in August where I joined a group of people on their own in Rifle. It’s always strange when people leave.

Let’s talk about climbing! Since the day I tried ‘Stained Glass’, a sharp V10, I have been climbing with four cuts in my fingers. This caused a lot of frustration. I tried ‘Evilution’, V10, again but I couldn’t stick the first move (the crux) anymore! I know I can do it but it became a mental game! On top of that I was climbing with four fingertips completely taped. Projecting is for me still the hardest part about climbing. Failing over and over again and accepting to fail. Now I’m waiting for my fingertips to recover completely before I try Evilution again.

Besides Evilution I did a lot of easy boulders and enjoyed the climbing!

Picture above is 'Evilution'!

Five Ten US has sent me the new ‘Supermocc’ crack climbing shoe. I received them today and I’m ready to test them out in Indian Creek! It is a better version of the old red Moccasin. It has mystique rubber which is really flexible. The Supermocc has a great surface and rubber on the top of the shoe. Despite the rubber on the toe it stays really flexible. The Supermocc is made for thin finger cracks and is supposed to be really useful in Indian Creek! Siebe Vanhee is psyched!

I think I’m staying in Bishop for a couple more days and then I will leave to Indian Creek! I want to learn a new style of climbing and become better and better at it.

Enjoy the pictures!

This isn't the eighties! It's Tom in 2011 oldschool climbing with the moustache and the bandana.

Sun! Sun and more Sun!

2011-03-28T21:17:00.005+02:00

Lots of pictures! Hell yeah! Last days were awesome! I’ve met a whole new group of people to climb with. It was a lot of fun. Now half the group left bishop because of different reasons. Work, real life, friends or other obligations!

Last rest day I went to the natural hot springs near Mammoth (a famous ski-village) with Niels, a nice guy from Utah. It was awesome; this was the first time in my life I’ve been in a hot spring! I ate 500 gr of carrots with some hummus and drank some homebrew beer from Niels! What a nice rest day!

Last two climbing days where painful! I tried ‘Stained glass’ V10. I fell on the last move really close on my second try! I tried it 3 more times and then my fingers were fucked like you can see on the picture! I didn’t try it anymore to save the skin!

In those days I did a lot of beautiful more easy classics to save some skin. I woke up every night from the heartbeat in my fingers! Really annoying! I flashed a lot of V8’s. The nicest one was Checkerboard in the Buttermilks! Perfect high line! I love high boulders!

I’m too lazy today to write a whole story so enjoy the pictures!

Top class boulder in the buttermilk! V1 sitstart in a hole. Don't need your shoes for this, just your ass! It's called the 'Birthing experience'!

This one above is a nice but really hard arrête V6 next to the famous boulder 'The Mandala'!

On our new campsite at the Buttermilk we only found one tree. So my Van was the second tree and we could tighten it easy by driving forward!

Here my fingers after only 5 try's in Stained Glass! Super sharp!

This is Stained Glass! Super small and sharp crimps who ends in a dyno to a sharp jugg!

Three pictures above: Niels and I in the amazing hot Spring in the middle of nowhere! Still lots of snow!

PS: We were not naked!

This was my lazy blog post!

Wonderfull Time in the Buttermilks!

2011-03-23T20:53:00.008+01:00

Picture above: Steve Marcil
Again, over and over again, I have so much new stuff to tell you! I’ll start again where I ended my last post! Last Friday the Red Rock Rendez-vous started in Red Rock. I stayed there one day and then left at Saturday to Bishop, California, because of the windy weather in Red Rock. I arrived in Bishop late at night and had another rest day because of the rainy weather. Really disappointing. But last two days we could climb really well!

I went to the Red Rock Rendez-Vous where I met the sales-rep’s of Five Ten and Petzl. All really friendly people. Five Ten could put me on their athletes list so I could enter the Rendez-Vous for free! Thanks for that Five Ten. The Rendez-Vous is a famous event here for beginner climbers. A lot of brands come to this event to represent their brand, they all take some athletes whit them. During the whole weekend the beginner climbers can get lessons in different climbing disciplines from pro athletes! The different disciplines are sportclimbing, trad and bouldering. They learn the beginners different techniques like how to place cams and nuts in trad climbing, how to climb a crack and way more. I think this is one of the nicest events for the development of the climbing sports! At night there is a lot of free beer and some party’s ands slide shows!

Saturday morning I woke up at the Rendez-Vous with a lot of wind, I was normally going for a climb at Mt Potasi but it was way too windy up there! So I decided to leave to Bishop! I felt like leaving so I did that same day! I said goodbye to the friend I made over there and left. Mike and Tom where already in Bishop and I was joining them again! Before Leaving Red Rock I met some really nice climbers at the Rendez-Vous. I have some good contacts now for Indian Creek! I’m looking forward to it.
Five Ten just made a new crack climbing shoe. It’s called the Supermocc. It is a better version of the Moccasims. It has soft rubber on the top of the toe for jamming it into small cracks. I’m going to test those shoes in Indian Creek! I’m psyched!

The drive to Bishop was 6 hours! My car drives really well now so I could drive like another car, no more trucks that pass me like the flying devil! It also uses les gas after they had put a new air filter and more new stuff in the engine.
So the drive was nice, I drunk some coffee in my King Mobile, ate some cookies, listened to some good music and I arrived at the boulder Mecca before I could imagine! The last 2 hours of the drive where going through the mountains, it was already dark and unfortunately I was running out of gas! Quite an adventure! I still had my extra gas bottle next to me but I didn’t want to stop in the middle of nowhere without one single human being and fill up my gas tank of the car in the dark. I was so happy the last 10 miles before the next gas station were downhill, so I didn’t need to touch the gas pedal anymore!

Next day we woke up with a shitload of rain so we spent our day in ‘The Black Sheep’, the local climber’s coffee shop! Because we (Mike, Tom and I) were bored really fast we went to the buttermilks for a walk. We drove with my car when we suddenly saw tons of snow on the road, I tried to go through it but my Van(hee) master didn’t want to. We stopped where the car was stuck and made a nice but short walk through the snow. I concluded: The buttermilks are awesome! After the walk I drove the whole dirt road backwards!

The next day the weather was better. I woke up in my van (aka pimp mobile) with my backdoors open and the sun in my stupid face. This was also the first time I really saw how beautiful the environment was! We camped near the Sad boulders in nature! This felt so amazing! After sleeping in parking lots for three weeks this felt like sleeping in my little heaven! The three nights we slept there I slept really well and have much more energy as last weeks.
Picture right: Steve Marcil

So the first climbing days we climbed in the Sad boulders (also called the table lands). I didn’t like it so much. It looked like a bad Hueco Tanks. Yesterday the weather was good so we could go to the Buttermilks! This is the area where Bishop is famous for. It is a beautiful place between big snowy mountains! I loved it! This is the best place I’ve already been to in the states! Just look at the pictures! I can’t describe it! Waah, I’m so excited when I’m writing this now!

I tried Evolution, a V10 on the biggest boulder I’ve ever seen! The V10 problem stops at the lip and then you need to drop off. The V11 problem goes up the whole boulder! I might try the V 11 version!

This place is wonderful, it’s just so mind blowing!

Now it is bad weather again and we are taking a rest day! Drinking coffee and we might go to some Hot Springs in the mountains!

Right Picture: Steve Marcil

More pictures on Tom and Mike's Blog!

Me, on top of a 5.9! The right side of the boulder, on the left side is the scary downclimb.

This is how I woke up with that supid face in the sun!

Where is the Chevy Van?

Schoolbusboys burning their bacon because they like it!

Real Shit Bro!

2011-03-18T06:57:00.004+01:00

Time is going fast hé? A sign things are going well! Already 5 days ago that I wrote something on my blog! I had some great times last days. Everything is coming together.

What’s up Ho? Mount potasi is going on!

Tuesday I went with David Gibbons, an awesome guy who lives now in Vegas, to Mt Potasi. It’s also near Vegas. It’s is a big limestone cave on the top of a mountain. The dirt road to it is really aggressive; I don’t think I can drive there with my van. Or I need to change to a redneck with too much money and put huge tires and hydraulics underneath my Chevy. If I do that I also put a nice tattoo of a wolf on my back and carry a shotgun. :)
So where was I …?
Suddenly we needed to stop Dave’s Honda Element and walk further. The walk in total was one hour. In this one hour, 40 minutes is steep uphill. We were only dying a little bit.

The cave is really big like you can see on the pictures! (pictures are coming) A lot of the routes are chipped. The style was really bouldery with lots of pinches. It took me a while to get used to the limestone again. This style reminds me to Rifle, so it felt quite hard. I prefer the sandstone and crimpy style in Red Rock! I had an easy day and just did a 7c and a 7c+.

SMOG Master becomes SMOG Buster!

Monday and Wednesday I drove my ass around with my smoggy mobile to do something about that smog issue and to get my license plate!
Monday I brought my Van to a garage where they could do something about the smog, so now I passed the smog test! The engine has a lot of new stuff in it. He uses less gas too now!
While they were working on my Van I went doing some Frisbee Golf (Frolf) with Tom and Mike. Such a funny sport, I suck at it so I’ll keep on climbing.

Wednesday I went to the DMV office and received my Nevada license plate! Yeah, I’m so happy now! Driving around without worries (I hope). Just climb and live!

Just win a comp, whatever! :)

Wednesday night there was a boulder competition in Red Rock climbing gym in Vegas. I met a lot of nice new people and found some new climbing partners because my Colorado friends Mike and Tom left to Bishop. I won the comp by doing almost all the hardest boulders in the gym. I don’t know what happened but I’m in good shape! I won a hundred dollars, good because I needed it for the car! The climbers here in Vegas now know the Belgian! (That’s how they called me at the comp.)

Doing routes from left to right!

Today I went climbing in Red Rocks with Heather and Chris, two nice people I met on Mt Potasi and on the competition. I had such a funny day, laughing and when I wasn’t, I climbed! That’s how it needs to be!
We went to the Trophy wall where I did almost all the routes. Started with 7b and 7b+ on sight. After that I did a 7c flash and a 7c+ third go. Yeah last one wasn’t so good. Then on the end of the day I did another 7c+ on sight and one 7c+ flash with only 5 minutes rest between them! Awesome training/sending day! Have nothing else to do anymore here.

Couch surfing!

For the moment I’m staying at David’s place. He’s living together with some nice other climbers. Really guest free. It feels good to watch television, sit in a couch, cook on a real stove and the best …. take a shower.

Tomorrow I’m going to try a roof crack trad climb in Red Rocks! I’m psyched!

Climbing - Car - Climbing - Car - C...

2011-03-13T19:36:00.004+01:00

It has been a week since I wrote a new blog post. The climbing last week was as good as that last day when I posted something. I climbed with Mike last week because of Tom who left for a week back to Colorado because of his foot injury and his waiting girlfriend. It was a nice week and we did a lot of good climbing. Almost every climbing day we went to a new crag with new routes. The rest days where really shitty because of some car problems.

Chevy Van SMOG master! (I’m not proud of it)

Let’s start with the bad news of the car. I’ll start with the very beginning.
I bought the car in Texas, where I first was planning to register and have insurance. That didn’t work out because as a foreigner I wasn’t able to register in Texas. I could have a temporary license plate every 30 days but then I couldn’t go out of the Texas state. I made some research on the internet until I found a good insurance company in Nevada, where I was planning to go to. Insurance and registration most of the time needs to be in the same state. I took the Nevada insurance for the car and called with the registration company DMV. They gave me a temporary Nevada license plate so I could drive over to Nevada. Now I’m in Las Vegas where I’m trying to get a real Nevada license plate. I have an address here of a friend I use to register the car.

So now the problems are coming. To get that Nevada license plate I needed to do a smog test. My car failed for this test because of two reasons. The first reason is that the car doesn’t have an air pump, what causes more smog. But this car was officially made without an air pump so if I could prove that to the DMV smog-lab that was no issue anymore. The second reason why the car failed the smog test is because is just has too much smog. Simple! I went to the DMV smog-lab where they were really unfriendly first. They told me to go to a garage to do something about the smog and to get an emission label that says the car never had an air pump and don’t need any. So I went to a Chevrolet garage where they wanted to give me a new air pump and wanted to charge me 160 dollars only to make research. When they told me this I jumped really fast in the smog machine and drove away really desperate. I decided to go back to those unfriendly people at the smog lab. With a really desperate face I went inside and told them the problem. Finally they were friendly enough to give me that emission label themselves. They were too lazy the first time to do an effort to give me that label. So one problem was solved.

Now I needed to do something about the smog itself. I went to another garage where they were really friendly from the beginning. They first asked 100 dollars for the research, I agreed with this and decided to wait until it was done. After 1.5 hours they told me they needed to take out the front seats of the car because of the engine that is completely inside and under the car. For this they asked 200 dollars. I didn’t saw another way out so I was ready to pay this amount. I also told them the whole story that I’m travelling, just only for 5 more months and that I want to register to travel around the country. After one more hour they came back to me and told me it was going to cost over the 1000 dollars, maybe even thousands of dollars if I wanted to do something about the smog. So they gave me some new advice to register the car somewhere else. They saw that I was just a bum without so much money and they told me really friendly to sign some papers and get my poor ass out of there without paying. I was really happy with this and at the same time I could cry. :)

So after all this waiting and crying I went to my DMV agent and told him the whole story. So now I have two options:
1. I go to a garage and offer them 100 or 200 dollars if they give me a receipt that I paid them 450 dollars for doing something about the smog but it didn’t work. The law here is that you need to past the smog test to get the registration. If you fail you need to spend at least 450 dollars for your smog. If you tried to do something about it and can prove you paid at least 450 dollars they can give you the registration for one year. So that’s one plan.

2. The second plan to go to Kingston, Arizona, on my way to Indian Creek. In Kingston, only 1, 5 hours from here, they don’t have smog tests. The only possible problem would be that they want me to have also Arizona insurance. If this is going to be the solution I hope the insurance is not a problem.

So this was my Chevy Van story. I’m getting a little bit sick of it right now. Today it is Sunday so I can’t do much. I’ll do my best tomorrow again!

Happy climbing is my sport!

Between all the hassle of the car, believe it or not but I climbed! Almost every day we climbed in Red Rocks we went to a new crag with all new routes to try. Only last three days we went to the same crag, called the 13 wall. Because there are a lot of 13a’s and harder. I did every day an 8a or harder.
I on sighted almost two other 8a’s, instead I did them second go. Then I tried a route called ‘Where Is My Mind’ graded 8a+ but really hard. I’m wondering if there is nothing that broke in that route. It felt like the hardest 8a+ I’ve ever done. But it was really nice. The long crux was really boulder with some extreme movements. Although is felt really hard I did it on my third go. On the end of that day I also on sighted a 7c+, ‘Ambushed’. The 13 wall is a nice overhanging wall with two 7c+’es, two 8a’s, one 8a+ and one 8b. I tried the 8b but apparently the holds are worse than before and it wasn’t even so nice as the others on the wall.

So last days I had some good days and enjoyed the climbing a lot! Now I’m looking for a trad climbing partner to explore the trad climbing over here.

Back to sportclimbing buisness!

2011-03-06T05:23:00.007+01:00

In total I’ve climbed only two days and a half in Red Rock. It is just great. Coming from the desert right into another desert with more shape is a nice switch. I just love how quiet it is here. I already said it after climbing in Krohntal, Vogezen or Annot but I love climbing on sandstone like this. I like the small crimps and the nice ledges! The moves in those kinds of routes have so much variety.

Today I had an awesome climbing day. It has been a long time ago. I climbed like I did long time ago. Not too much stress, just chilling and going A Muerte!
I did ‘Monster Skank’ 8a second go and then I did ‘Sunsplash’ 8a/+ on sight! If this last one is 8a+, what the locals say, I did my first 8a+ on sight! It was just a great feeling. The end of the day and I was still so motivated, I just wanted to work out the moves for tomorrow but I climbed that thing! I needed to fight for it what gives me a really satisfying feeling. Thanks to the Colorado boys Tom and Mike for the good encouragements and vibes! Read their blog!

I just love this style so much. The rock is soft for the skin, lots of crimps and slopey rails. The style is defiantly really technical. It's all about good body position and good footwork. This area is really highly recommended!

Because 8a+ is the hardest thing here in Red Rock I’m planning to do some trad climbing in a week. It really motivates me; I already found a nice roof trad climbing project I want to try!

Sea of experiences

2011-03-04T22:06:00.006+01:00

It has been only 5 days ago that I wrote on my blog. But all the information I want to share with you is huge! I saw a lot, I did a lot, I thought a lot and enjoyed a lot. Actually I experienced a lot!

Road kill!

The day after the Hueco Rock Rodeo when I wrote my last news was a lazy hangover day. Good, sometimes I love those days. In the evening I searched on the internet for the best way to go to the Grand Canyon and from there to Las Vegas where my Colorado friends, Thom and Mike, where waiting on me to crush the red sandstone.

Monday morning at 4 am I left the Hueco Rock Ranch with a Slovenian guy, Gregor, in my Van to bring him to the airport. Always lots of fun with those Slovenians!
After I dropped Gregor at the airport I bought a map and a lot of gas and I was ready for the road! I first drove up to Albuquerque (New Mexico) and from there to Flagstaff (Arizona).

It took me the whole day to do this drive with my car. I drove between 55 and 60 ml/h (70 and 100 km/h) to save my car from braking down and also to save some gas. A normal car would drive this distance in 8 – 9 hours. It took me 15 hours with some stops and rests! But I’ve the time and enjoyed the landscape during the ride!
The scariest thing on driving alone is the fear that the car is going to break down. But I take care of my car; I changed the engine oil and checked everything! It is going to hurt in 6 months when I’ll need to sell my car.

Another scary thing are the big trucks that passed me all the time, they drive 75 ml/h (120 km/h) or more! You can see this on the pictures!
Once I arrived in Flagstaff, I parked in front of Wal-Mart and slept well in my king-size bed!

Being a real tourist in Grand Canyon!

The next morning I made my porridge, search my way out of Flagstaff (beautiful city by the way) and left to the Grand Canyon. I was so psyched!
When I arrived to the gate of Grand Canyon National Park I could get in for free with my National Park Pass I received from Bart Den Das in Leuven! Thanks for that Bart!
This national park even has an airport, school and little village. This was all really nice. When you drive through this forest everything is so flat! But suddenly you arrive at the canyon and you’re in a complete different world! Because I already drove a lot those days I took the bus tour to see all the viewpoints. I also walked a lot between the viewpoints, it was just beautiful. On the bus I was the only young man, the others where all grandpa’s and grandma’s! I took a lot of pictures as you can see, it was amazing.

At 5pm I jumped back in my Van and drove straight to Las Vegas. I arrived at 10 pm on my destination! It was mind-blowing when I was on the hill and had a view of whole Las Vegas! I was getting way too psyched behind the wheel.

On some strange and lucky way I found the Colorado school bus boys on a nice parking lot. They just gave me the street name and I found there bus without a map of Vegas or anything. It was a street who went through whole Vegas, so I had good luck to find the right parking lot. We chilled out at our vans and went to bed, I was tired of being a tourist.

Red Rock Rules!

The next day we left to Red Rock with a lot of motivation. I hadn’t climbed in three days so my hands where sweating whole night. Red Rock is just outside of Vegas, we could see it from the parking lot we slept on. It is really red, fire red! Amazing structures to!

We did some sport climbing. It has been one month and a half since I’ve been sport climbing. But my endurance is still there, I did a couple of 7c’s and 7b+’es on sight! I feel I gain some power in my body! The style suites me to! The structure reminds me to Krohntal but nicer! A lot of flakes and crimps! Love it!

Las Vegas night life!

Sounds great ey? Night life! But I couldn’t taste of this too much because I’m only 19 and they always ask your ID! After the climbing we went to downtown Vegas where we stayed in a hotel! Two friends of Thom and Mike came to Vegas and rented a room in MGM Grand. This was a really nice and huge hotel and casino with a big pool and everything on it.
Like you can see on the pictures. I parked my van in the garage of this hotel and slept in my van. But they let me stay and hangout in there room to. So I could use all the possibilities of the hotel. Thanks for that guys!

So that first night we went to the casino of the hotel and those guys gambled a little bit. I couldn’t gamble because of my age. But I didn’t care too much because it didn’t attract me. It was just really nice to be there and see in real life what all this gambling is. I see why it is really addicted. Once you win money, you think it’s easy and you want to win more! Once you lose money fast you thing you’ll be lucky for once and try to win your money back! I saw people losing some hundreds of dollars and still playing. Really special world. After that a guy offered us a free entrance to a nightclub with a free ride in a limousine. Two of our group did it. Me, Thom and Mike stayed at the hotel. I just wanted to ride in a limousine, which could be nice. I wasn’t really psyched for the nightclub.

The next day we hung out at the pool (like you can see on the pictures). In the afternoon I decided to walk through the city together with Mike. We saw hotel and casino New York New York, the fountains of Bellagio, the small Eifel tower and way more! Take your time and look at the pictures. Really funny culture here. When you walk on the sidewalk there are at every intersection at least 8 people who give you flyers and publication for nightclubs, strip clubs and hookers. After a while you get used to them and ignore them. After the culture walk we went back to the hotel. A friend of Thom could get free VIP tickets for all of us to go to a party on the roof of a nice hotel. You could also drink everything for free! Too bad I’m only 19 and needed to stay at home. It was a great opportunity. Instead of going with them I took my van, drove to a parking lot and had an easy evening.

If I need to summarize Las Vegas it would be like this. It is all about money and the needs of people! Las Vegas includes everything the new but weak human being wants. Las Vegas is one dirty trick and uses all the weaknesses of humans to earn money! But on the other side I don’t think this city is going to last for a long time. It is all fake and for the eye.
I can say more but I’ll definitely keep that for myself. It was a nice experience to see what money does to people!

Now I’m waiting on my hangover friends to go climbing!
I need nature and rest back again!

Hueco Rock Rodeo

2011-02-28T00:49:00.005+01:00

On Friday I finally got my registration of the car. So I was able to leave Hueco. But after a lot of thinking and hesitating I finally made the decision to stay 2 more days in Hueco Tanks because of the Hueco Rock Rodeo. This is a famous outdoor rock climbing competition in the US with a lot of strong climbers.

I planned to leave 6 days ago to Red Rocks, Las Vegas, but I was obligated to stay in Texas because I didn’t have a registration for the car yet. But I decided to just stay two more days for the Rock Rodeo. I thought it would be a nice end of this trip in Hueco.

The event started Friday night. They showed the movie ‘Core’, which I like a lot. There was a Fuddruckers truck who sold some junk food for the real American atmosphere.

On Saturday the competition started at ten in the morning. There were 165 competitors who signed up in the morning. They made a list with all the problems the competitors could do. The list was divided in two areas; the backcountry (East- and West Mountain and The Spurr) and North Mountain. The competitors needed to chose where they wanted to climb, it wasn’t able to climb in the backcountry and on North Mountain. The problems who were on the tick list for North Mountain where until grade V10. The problems on the tick list of the backcountry were harder with a couple of V14’s. So if you wanted to compete in the higher category you needed to climb at the backcountry. The goal is to do as much problems you can. The harder a problem is the more points you get for it. If you do it first go it has more points. For each fall you count 10 points less. The people where you climbed with were judging, that worked perfect. The results list they device in 4 different categories for women and men. The first three of each category got some nice prices.

I did 4 new V8’s, one V9 and a couple of V7’s. With this category system there was a lot of chance you got a price. So I was thinking to maybe be in the second highest category. After the awards I found out I ended on the fourth place in the highest category. Mutants! This was really unexpected. Daniel Woods won the comp and Sam Davis was second. The head sponsor of this big event was Five Ten who gave away lots of free stuff. They just threw all this free stuff of the sponsors in the audience, and it was a lot!

They also showed the new movie of Dave Graham and Jon Cardwell, ‘Reach’. I liked it because it was so unusual. The movie made them look human and not perfect! The movie showed those top climbers like who they are. They were frustrated sometimes and had also a hard time in projects like everybody else.

The party was really nice with an awesome atmosphere! There was also a big fire with lots of wood the whole night long! Today it was a lazy they at the ranch and tomorrow I’m leaving to Red Rocks, Las Vegas!

Just before the competition I had a short but nice day. I did ‘Dirty martini on the rocks’ V10 really fast without too much try’s. Thanks to the rests I took last days to work in the Van my fingertips health well! Climbing feels also way easier without all the tape around my fingertips. I think I should try some harder things while I’m here.

I’ll keep you up to date!

Here some more pictures of the Van. :)

A funny day in Hueco!

2011-02-22T06:38:00.004+01:00

Today I climbed with Enzo Nahumury. We did some bouldering in the morning. That was all normal. The funny thing was the nice classic 5.10 route we did today. The name is 'Sea of Holes'. I'm not going to say to much about it! Just watch the video.
The bad quality is for the faster upload.

Chevy Van Edmerald Edition!

2011-02-20T07:38:00.011+01:00

I haven’t been climbing for two days now. But it isn’t a big problem. Two days ago Jan De Smit and his girlfriend Natalie left Hueco after a three month trip living in a Chevy Van.
From the beginning I knew that I was going to buy that van when they were leaving. The van was still a family van with two front seats, two big back seats and a couch you can fold down to a bed.

Last 5 days I have been calling around for the insurance and the registration of the car, it was quite a hassle. Now all the paperwork for this month is almost finished.
Yesterday I went to a home depot to buy some wood and other supplies. I threw all the seats and the couch/bed out and cleaned the whole van.

Today was the Hueco Tanks Clean-Up day. With a lot of people we went from 9 am until 1 pm in the park and cleaned the park. We needed to collect all the garbage, what wasn’t a big deal because the park is really clean. Climbers here are really clean people!

Another thing we needed to do and what we did the most was cleaning the rock with water and a brush! Yeah you read it well, cleaning the chalk from the holds! It was a joke, because the chalk comes back when the water dry’s. But the state park people wanted it like that. And we got free burritos and beer in the evening at the Rock Ranch.

After the clean up, at 1 pm, I went back to the Rock Ranch to work in the van. In the park I met a nice and friendly Dutch guy, Enzo Nahuymury. He had a rest day to so decide to come with me and help me in the van. We worked from the afternoon until halve past ten. Really slow but we had fun! I made a nice king size bed! Tomorrow I’ll make a little table!

On all those pictures you can see how it looks like!

Pulling Plastic

2011-02-14T17:12:00.003+01:00

The last few days were some moving days. First I did my third V10, ‘Black Mamba’. It’s a small boulder problem with only two moves. It’s a totally different style compared to the typical Hueco style. Two moves on flat slopers, a real Font problem. To see something different in Texas I joined the camp hosts, Natalie and Jan to a climbing competition in the Texas Tech University in Lubbock. The camp host, Corbit, has his own brand of climbing holds. ‘Dirty Birds’ is the name! He made some new holds for that competition, with great success.

From Hueco it was a 5 hour drive to Lubbock trough the dessert. Quite boring and flat. We past a lot of oil pumps, it's funny to see that in real life. We past little poor villages with a lot of old small houses.
Once we were in Lubbock we rented a room in a hotel, I slept great in a real bed again. In the evening we went to see the Real Rock Tour movie 2010 in the university. This was for me a really inspiring movie, because I know I’ll go to a lot of the places I saw in this movie. I’m looking forward to do some trad climbing!

Next day the competition started at 1pm. Bouldering and route climbing were the general disciplines. You can compare the competition with The Vertical Event in Louvain la Neuve. Every route or boulder had a judge and every climber had a scorecard. The 5 routes or boulders with the highest points you could do counted on your scorecard. If you flash them, you have even higher points. I flashed the 4 hardest routes and one boulder and I won the competition. Jan and Natalie became both 3th. So the Belgians win!
It was really funny to climb in an American gym. It’s not like in Europe where you follow one color to the top. They just have all colors spread out over the wall and make up routes by sticking tape on the wall. So it was confusing for us Belgians to follow colored tape instead of the color of the holds.
It was not that hard to win the competition, there were not so much strong route climbers. And by doing routes you got more points. But it felt so great to do some routes again, even on plastic.

In the evening there was an after party in a house of one of the staff. Most of the people who were at the party were staff from the competition. I had the feeling I was in a movie on a house party of students in a small neighborhood. I had a great time and met some nice people.

Today we climbed again in the gym before going back home to the Hueco Rock Ranch.
I saw this little vacation as some rest days for my skin and getting pumped on some routes again.

In 5 days I have my Van and I’ll leave to the next spot! Where that will be, you’ll see!

Cold times!

2011-02-08T04:22:00.004+01:00

It’s been a long time right now. After my last post we’ve been thru a really cold time here in Hueco. We couldn’t climb for three days because of the cold weather, so we were obligated to grow some skin. At night the coldest temperature was -20°C. Luckily the camp host invited us in the house where we could sleep for 2 nights. We stayed in the house playing a lot of games like the swiss game, Meier. Some game with dices. I lost like I’m used to losing in games, my punishment was making a nice snowman. Guess what, I did it. I made a nice onsite ascent of a 2D snowman!

The cold brought a lot of bad luck for a lot of people in the US. In El Paso and here the electricity went out a lot, all water pipes in a lot of houses broke because of the frozen water inside it whereby a lot of people where running out of water. Even all the water in the supermarkets was sold out. They say it where the coldest days in history!

After those cold days we went climbing, there still was some snow on top of the boulders and all-around. Because of the cold and three days of sitting on my ass it wasn’t a perfect climbing day but I enjoyed it!
The second day we all went to East Mountain to see some new boulders! It was amazing, each mountain is new and full of boulders.
Me, Jan, Nico and Thierri tried one of the nicest boulders in the park, called Sunshine (V11). None of us could do it but I’m sure next time it will work. This is a nice boulder that’s completely my style on some nice slopers. After that I almost onsite ’10-10’, an easy V10. I did it some tries after it.
I did a whole bunch of new easier problems and another classic one named ‘Something Different’, V8. For me it felt really hard for the grade, but it was worth it.

Sunday it was the last day for Nico, Tim and Thierri. They climbed a little bit and went to the airport to look for an hotel to spent the night. In the hotel we could finally take a shower. For me it was 8 days ago I had showered. No problem, nobody who smells it here!
It was even better than a shower, we could take a jacuzzi and swim in a nice warm outdoor swimming pool.

Today was a great climbing day. The jacuzzi had made my muscles ready for a new climbing day. I went on a tour on East Mountain and The Spur with two nice guys who are living in a mini school bus for seven moths like me. Those are the guys I’ll probably will join to Flagstaff and Red Rocks.
First I took revenge on the boulder where I fell and twisted my ankles 10 days ago. It was a V9 called Hector. I did it first try of the day. After that I on sited two long V8’s and did an other classic problem. ‘The Egg’, V9, super nice line on slopers on a boulder that looks like an egg.
I’m ready for another good day tomorrow!

Yesterday I took a look in the guide book of Indian Creek. That place looks amazing. I’m looking forward to go there and place some gear in nasty cracks!

Crimping, pinching and falling!

2011-02-01T02:09:00.005+01:00

The first day after my last post we’ve been one day to The East Spur, also with a guide. The day started really well with a nice and hard V8 on crimps named ‘Better eat your Weetes’. After that I tried ‘Hector’, a nice V9 but dangerous. I fell bad on my feet and twisted my ankle a little bit. That day I couldn’t climb anymore and took an obligated rest. I don’t want to have something serious with 7 months of climbing in the future!

The day after it went well. I went climbing with some Canadians what was a lot of fun! I did a lot of nice and hard problems. One of them was ‘Choir boys’, a V9 on slopers with a crimpy ending. The hardest V9 I ever did! The other problems I did that day where:
- V7 Daily Dick Dose
- V7 Choir Boys Light
- V7 Baby Face
- V7 (a new boulder, really high one on crimps)
- V9 Choir Boys
- V9 Pumped Full of Semen
A nice and long day!

After another lazy rest day we went with all of us on North Mountain in a new area! I and Nice did a nice V7 and V9. The V9 I did really fast, it was completely my style! After that we tried a V11, ‘Anal Intruder #10’. The name comes from the nice swing you make with the pointed rock behind your ass! Where number 10 comes from I don’t want to know!
I’m moving really good in this one and think I can do it! I just need a fresh day with good skin and it will work.

The weather forecast for the 3 following days is not so good. They expect snow and really cold temperatures going to -10°C at night! So we aren’t going to climb that many those days.

If the weather gets better I want to find myself a nice project to work. Something that doesn’t eat too much skin!

Some good times!

2011-01-27T04:41:00.019+01:00

After a good first day of climbing and a lazy rest day, two days of hard bouldering followed
We climbed two days on North Mountain, there where you don’t need a guide and just can climb like normal. North Mountain is a really nice place, you can walk up the mountain and find a lot of caves far from each other. So you can always look for a nice quite place to do some problems without to many people. I also love the Hueco’s in the rocks. It are big holes in the ground, some of them are filled with water. Crazy because it’s right in the desert!
The mountains are only rock and you find those nice cactuses and other dessert vegetation who are all green in the orange environment.

Picture: Tim Brijs

In the first cave we had climbed I did a nice V9 with a lot of pockets and towhooks what induces a lot of body tension. It’s called ‘Big Nose Meley’.
The next little project was a perfect V10 called ‘Loaded with Power’. I did it after not to many try’s. It was a quite high boulder with a crimpy ending. We were lucky we had a lot of crashpads because of the high boulder and the cactus who was laughing underneath us.

That evening we went eating tons of vegetables at ‘Souper Salad’ for only 7 dollars. Some people say you can’t eat healthy, but that’s a lie. It was an ‘all you can eat’ restaurant with tons of healthy food.

After the usual morning coffee and the porridge we went to the top of North Mountain where we did an awesome V6 and V9 with a great ending of 12 meters high. It was an easy ending but a little bit chossy. I love those boulders!
Nico did a special V12 called ‘Tequilla Sunrise’. And Thierry did the stand start V10 ‘Dirthy martini on the rocks’.
On the end of the day I did one of the most exciting boulders in those 3 climbing days. It’s a V10 with a lot of slopers to a roof. In the little roof you need to turn your body 180 degrees with your back to the rock. From there the crux is following. This problem is called ‘Dean’s Journey’.

We already filmed a lot of nice problems so there is coming a nice little climbing movie!
Picture: Tim Brijs

If I look back at those climbing days I had already some good days. The hardest boulder I did before this trip was a V9 in Squamish. Now the boulders are flowing!
- V9 Big Nose Meley
- V9 Fun Roof
- V10 Loaded with power
- V10 Dean’s Journey
- V11 The Flame (V

The style of climbing is lovely! A lot of round pinches and flakes you need to crimp. It’s really morphologic and the movements reminds me at the gym. But you still need some more technical insight. The most of al I like the fact that we’re climbing in the dessert on some big boulders in the sun in winter!

First day of a climbers life!

2011-01-23T05:44:00.007+01:00

Yesterday evening at midnight we arrived at the Hueco Rock Ranch (US time!) in Hueco Tanks! After a flight of 15 hours and some waiting time of 7 hours and always awake I was really tired. When I and Nicolas Mathieu arrived on the airport we had Jan de Smith and his girlfriend Natalie waiting for us. But there were even more Belgium guys, Tim Brys and Thierry Hardy where comming with us to!
The time Jan and Nat came to pick us up I finally saw the Chevy Van I'm going to buy the 18th of February.

Our first climbing day was really nice, we had a lot of sun and some nice little wind. Hueco Tanks is a state park and there are some rules we need to get used to. First of all climbers need to reservate to go climbing in the park. There are some different tours you can take, each tour has his drifferent guide. The guides are just climbers who have some more information about the park. Yesterday we took the commercial tour where you need to pay 20 dollars for. The other tours we'll take will be 1 dollar.
Yesterday we went climbing on "The Spur". I did some V6 and one V7. I did also "The Flame". In the guid book it's a V12 but I think that its more like a V10/V11. If it's really V11 or V12 I did my first 8 in bouldering!
After that I was quite tired like all the other climbers of our group and we did it easy the rest of the day.

Today we took a rest day because of the weather. At night there was a dessert storm comming up! We all woke up with our head in dust in our tent. Tomorrow we go to North Mountain.

I'll keep you up to date!

Interview ZAP!

2011-01-11T22:10:00.002+01:00

In oktober gaf ik een interview aan het jeugdtijdschrift ZAP over het leven als gemotiveerde klimmer! Het interview is nu uit in de editie van Januari. Je kan het lezen in het tijdschrift zelf of op hun website: http://www.zapmagazine.be/MAAND/Pages/Siebegaathelemaalopinzijnsport.aspx

ZAP is een tijdschrift voor jongeren over voornamelijk 'gezond leven'. Het thema van Januari is verslaving. Om een positieve verslaving te bespreken interviewden ze mij in verband met de klimsport.

Veel leesplezier!

Afscheid drink Siebe, Tim & Marthe

2011-01-05T21:30:00.002+01:00

Het is bijna zover. Ik moet nog enkele laatste weekjes werken en dan vertrek ik om in Amerika het leven van een outdoor klimmer te gaan verkennen en in een auto te gaan wonen!

Om aan iedereen ineens 'Daaag' te kunnen zeggen is er een afscheidsfeest in Klimzaal Hungaria op zaterdag 15 januari om 20u. Dit afscheidsfeest is niet alleen voor mij maar ook voor Marthe en Tim die ook voor een half jaar naar Zuid-Amerika vertrekken.

Iedereen welkom en met het gratis vat zal het feest zijn!

2011 - A year of climbing starts!

2011-01-01T15:38:00.005+01:00

Alvast aan iedereen een geweldig (klim)jaar toegewenst!

Voor mij ziet 2011 er totaal anders uit dan andere jaren. Ik vertrek op 21 januari 2011 voor 7 maanden naar de VS. Voor deze roadtrip te kunnen financieren heb ik afgelopen maanden veel gewerkt en gespaard. Met een goed resultaat.

Ik begin mijn klimtrip in Hueco Tanks (Texas) met Nicolas Mathieu waar we Jan de Smit zullen vergezellen. Na een dikke twee weken keren Nico en Jan terug naar België waarna ik verder zal reizen. Ik zal waarschijnlijk de Chevy Van van Jan overnemen, dan heb ik onmiddellijk vervoer en een slaapplaats om een half jaar in te leven.

De gebieden die op mijn lijstje staan zijn Hueco Tanks, Red Rocks, Bishop, Indian Creek, Red and New River Gorge, Yosemite, Tensleep, Squamish en Bugaboos.

Hoogstwaarschijnlijk zal ik nog in vele andere klimgebieden klimmen. Ik zal zien waar de mensen die ik tegen kom en mijn busje me heen brengt!

Om de tien dagen zal er zeker een post komen op mijn blog, dus voel je vrij om mijn blog met regelmaat te bezoeken.

Finale BK Boulder 2010 - Het zijn de klimmers die de wedstrijd doen leven, niet de jury!

2010-12-12T12:02:00.020+01:00

Foto: Hube
Gisteren vond het BK Boulder 2010 plaats in Klimzaal BLOK in Hoboken. Met 9 klimmers bij de mannen en 9 bij de vrouwen begonnen we aan een mooie klimwedstrijd die voor enkelen in mineur eindigde vanwege een juridische beslissing.

Vanaf dat we de boulders mochten lezen werd de motivatie en het enthousiasme in me alleen maar groter. De organisatoren en routebouwers van de zaal hadden een heleboel nieuwe structuren gemaakt die ze in drie van de vier boulders gebruikten! Dit zorgde voor totaal nieuwe en onbekende mogelijkheden in de nieuwe boulders.

De twee eerste boulders waren niet zo moeilijk waarin de meeste eigenlijk net hun opwarming konden beëindigen. Ik klom deze twee vlot en zonder problemen van de eerste keer uit. De derde boulder vroeg wat meer moeite en vooral doorzettingsvermogen, want vallen in de eerste poging was voor mij geen optie. Ik ging tot aan de bonus greep waar ik een tijdje kon rusten en de volgende beweging drie keer op rij probeerde zonder te vallen. Dit had ik te danken aan het lengte klimmen dat nog steeds in me zit. Uiteindelijk zag ik een andere methode om tot aan de eindgreep te raken, wat voor spanning in het publiek zorgde, en kon ik deze boulder weer eens van de eerste poging uitklimmen. Na deze boulder was de strijd tussen mij en Nicolas Mathieu duidelijk. :)
Foto: Joris Aerts

De vierde boulder was zeer technisch met kleine greepjes wat me toch wel goed lag. Ik kon dit probleem weer à vue oplossen. Dit met resultaat dat ik alle boulders van de eerste poging kon uitklimmen! Het was alleen Nicolas Mathieu die nog na mij moest klimmen. Hij viel in deze boulder door een spijtige voetfout waardoor ik, en heel de zaal, (bijna) zeker waren van mijn overwinning.

Toen kwam voor mij het slechte nieuws van de jury president dat ik zogezegd twee poging zou nodig gehad hebben om de tweede (makkelijke) boulder uit te klimmen. Hierdoor kwam ik enorm uit de lucht gevallen. De jury beweerde dat ik bij het starten van de route met mijn linker voet niet de juiste 'plaats' heb geraakt. Het zat namelijk zo dat er voor de rechter voet een verplichte voetgreep was, die ik gebruikt heb, en voor de linker een plaats tegen de muur die je moest tikken om te vertrekken. Ik zal blijkbaar mijn voet niet tegen die muur gehouden hebben.

De jury beweert mij er te hebben op aangewezen dat ik een valse start maakte en liet mij daarna gewoon doorklimmen! Dit is waar de jury in fout ging. Ik had helemaal niet gezien dat de jury een teken deed dat ik in fout was, dit is ook duidelijk te zien op beeldmateriaal (dat niet wordt geaccepteerd door BCCC). Zelfs nadat ik de boulder geklommen had werd er me niet op gewezen dat dit zogezegd een tweede poging is. Maar als je kijkt naar de officiële regels hadden ze me niet mogen laten doorklimmen en duidelijker moeten tegenhouden. Ik heb de mat alleen geraakt bij vertrek en heb officieel geen twee pogingen gedaan.

Deze situatie gaf een heel andere eindstand weer: Yannick Marchand op de eerste plaats en ik en Nico Mathieu met een gedeelde tweede plaats. De puntentelling zit dan als volgt;

Foto: Hube

Yannick: 3 boulders à vue en 1 van de tweede poging waarvan de eerste poging tot aan de bonusgreep.
Siebe: 3 boulders à vue en 1 van de tweede poging waarvan de (zogezegd) eerste poging niet tot aan de bonusgreep.
Nico: 3 boulders à vue en 1 van de tweede poging waarvan de eerste poging niet tot aan de bonusgreep.

Dit alles is een zeer spijtige zaak die ik zal moeten accepteren. Wat ik niet kan accepteren is dat de communicatie naar het publiek helemaal fout is gelopen.
Voor het publiek was het al snel duidelijk wat op het eerste zicht de resultaten waren. Waarna plots werd afgeroepen dat er een super finale ging komen. Die er uiteindelijk niet kwam en er plots wel resultaten waren. Deze (voor velen) vreemde resultaten waren een raadsel. De handelingen van de jury kwamen voor het publiek zeer subjectief over, waardoor er een grote teleurstelling in de zaal hing! Foto: Joris Aerts

Op deze manier zal het sportklimmen in België zich nooit tot een populairdere sport kunnen ontwikkelen!

Ik heb ook het gevoel dat er iets mis is met de regels i.v.m. het starten van een boulder aangezien dit al elk jaar minstens een maal is voorgevallen. Ik was dit jaar ook weer niet de enigste!

Ik ben nog niet zeker of ik nog eens aan zo'n officiële competitie zal deelnemen!

Verder wil ik wel Seb en zijn team van routebouwers en organisatoren bedanken voor de prachtige en originele boulders, de goeie muziek en het vlotte verloop van hun verrichte werk!

En ook een dikke proficiat aan Yannick Marchand voor zijn prestatie!
Foto: Joris Aerts

Foto boven: Hube

Twee bovenste foto's: D. Timmermans

Ettringen the snowy movie!

2010-12-02T18:56:00.002+01:00

Met de weinige goeie klimbeelden die we konden maken aangezien we maar met twee waren monteerde ik gisteren een kort filmpje om de koude maar toch weer warme sfeer weer te geven!

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Ettringen - Some motivated climbing!

2010-11-30T18:22:00.007+01:00

Onmiddellijk na de boulder competitie in Sint-Niklaas zijn ik en Florian Castagne doorgereden naar Ettringen (Duitsland), ten noorden van Bonn. Na een kleine drie uur rijden kwamen we aan in het kleine dorpje om 2u 's nachts. We hadden geen topo en waren er nog geen van beiden geweest. We zochten een slaapplaats en vonden er een op een grote open plek. Toevallig stond daar ook een soort van hutje, bedekt onder de sneeuw, waar we onze tent in opzette voor de extra warmte.
De volgende dag werden we wakker in onze tent in het hutje en zagen dat we op een grote parking stonden met een soort van wandelroute die van daaruit vertrok. Het was zeer koud en had toch wel wat gevroren.

Na enkele warme thees en een goed ontbijt waren we steeds niet warm genoeg om naar de rotsen te zoeken. We gingen ons dus nog extra opwarmen in een cafeetje waar we dachten een topo te vinden. Dit was niet het geval. Dus gingen we met de auto opzoekt naar de rotsen. We besloten eerst nog eens de parking waar we overnacht hadden te bekijken. Dit met resultaat want zo'n 20 meter naast de plek waar we geslapen hadden vonden we de rotsen.

Het klimgebied van Ettringen is een oude mijn met vulkanisch gesteente. Het gebied is dus een put in de grond waar je kunt in wandelen en dan gewoon routes kan klimmen.
Ik en Florian gingen hier naartoe om onze nieuwe passie in de sport wat te gaan beoefenen, het Trad-klimmen. Tot mijn grote verbazing stonden er ook zeer veel haken, dit is wel zeer jammer aangezien er heel veel te klimmen valt met trad-materiaal.

Aangezien we geen topo hadden hebben we twee dagen lang gewoon de mooie lijnen op gezocht en wat geklommen. De eerste dag vonden we al een mooie barst, die 7a blijkt te zijn, die we perfect met alleen trad-gear konden klimmen. Jammer van de haken die naast de barst stonden. Ik maakte mijn eerste val op een friend met een klein gilletje:) Weer een stapje verder in het Trad-klimmen! Nadat we elk een poging hadden gedaan was het al donker waardoor het die dag bij een poging bleef.

Die avond gingen we ons wat opwarmen in het plaatselijke café van Ettringen. We werden hier uitgenodigd door 8 Duitsers om een typisch Duits spel te spelen: Kegeln! Een soort van bowling maar iets moeilijker. Het werd al snel duidelijk dat België aan de verliezende kant was! :) Wij kunnen dan ook alleen maar klimmen hé ;)

De tweede dag werden we wakker met nog wat meer sneeuw. We konden de eerste twee uur nog goed klimmen met onze bevroren vingers en dode tenen. Maar eens dat het wat harder begon te sneeuwen konden we niet veel meer doen en moesten we selectief zijn in onze route keuze. We moesten ons project, 7a barst, laten gaan aangezien er op de eindgrepen van de crux 2cm sneeuw lag. Dit mocht Florian ondervinden!

Ondanks dat we niet al te veel hebben kunnen klimmen waren deze twee dagen het helemaal waard. We waren allebei zeer tevreden dat we nog wat konden trad-klimmen voordat de winter er helemaal aankomt! We genoten ook van de wat echtere en meer hardcore condities!

Ettringen is aan te raden als je wil leren trad-klimmen aangezien je routes kan doen waar nog steeds haken in staan terwijl je het trad-gear leert plaatsen! Je vindt er een beetje alle niveaus en is een groot massief! Bovendien is het er een hele aangename en rustige sfeer, zeker in de sneeuw!

Selectie 2 "Boulder 2010"

2010-11-29T22:25:00.002+01:00

Afgelopen zaterdag vond de tweede selectie van het Belgisch kampioenschap boulder 2010 plaats in Sint-Niklaas. Wat zeer goed is in de organisatie dit jaar is dat de selecties in twee verschillende zalen waren, het verschil in de klimstijl was zeer duidelijk.

Deze bouldercompetitie ging al een heel stuk beter als de vorige in Bleau. De boulders in Sint-Niklaas waren iets minder moeilijk waardoor ik alle boulders van de eerste poging kon klimmen. Met als resultaat een eerste plaats op deze tweede selectie van het BK 2010.

Ik had deze keer een betere techniek voor het klimmen van de twaalf boulders. Het eerste uur probeerde ik in alle boulders de bewegingen zo vlot mogelijk te doen en goede links te maken. Tijdens het officiële gedeelte van de wedstrijd nam ik meer rustperiodes tussen de verschillende boulders, wat nodig was in een fysiek vermoeiende zaal als City Lizard.

De boulders waren zeer mooi en telkens zeer technisch gebouwd ondanks de fysieke stijl. Veel vormspanning en kleine trucjes waren nodig om boven te raken.

Dankzij deze eerste plaats ben ik zelfs twee keer geselecteerd voor de finale in klimzaal BLOK op zaterdag 11 december!

Selectie 1 "Boulder 2010"

2010-11-21T12:06:00.008+01:00

Gisteren nam ik deel aan de eerste selectie van het BK Boulder in Gent. Ik ben tegenwoordig tamelijk goed in vorm in de boulderzaal en had er bij het begin een zeer goed gevoel bij. Tijdens het eerste uur wanneer we de boulders konden uitwerken ging het bij mij zeer vlot en kon alles bewegingen van alle boulders zeer vlot. Ik was bijna overtuigd van een plaats bij de eerste vier.

Maar tijdens de officiële wedstrijd waar het om pogingen ging liep het mis. Ik kon tien van de twaalf boulders klimmen. In een 11de boulder viel ik twee keer helemaal op de laatste pas waardoor de 3de plaats aan me voorbij ging. De vierde plaats heb ik verpest door te veel pogingen te maken in de twee dal -boulders. Deze lagen me helemaal niet en heb hier wat pech gehad.

Daarom eindigde ik dus op de 5de plaats, en ben ik nog niet zeker van een finale plaats!
Dus ik zal ook aan de tweede selectie deelnemen volgende week in Sint Nicklaas in klimzaal "City lizard" om daar bij de eerste vier te raken!

Foto's door Carl Debreyne

Peak District - Gridstone climbing

2010-11-17T17:24:00.018+01:00

Sinds mijn zomer trip in Amerika heb ik een nieuwe uitdaging in het klimmen gevonden. Iets wat mezelf nog meer uit daagt op verschillende vlakken in vergelijking met het sportklimmen dat ik al 11 jaar doe.
Het Trad-klimmen leerde ik in Squamish, Canada, gedurende een maand. Ik deed veel eenvoudige routes en meerdere lengtes en leerde de cams en nuts op de juiste manier te gebruiken, er valt nog steeds veel te leren.

Afgelopen lang weekend vertrok ik ondanks het slechte weer dat voorspeld werd met Florian Castagne, Olivier Vandenbroucke en Laurence naar Peak District (Sheffield) in Engeland.

Na een hevige boottocht met storm op zee kwamen we aan in Dover, van daar reden we met de auto ineens rechtstreeks naar de bekende gridstone van Engeland. We konden verblijven op een boerderij midden in de velden waar Nathan Rosenfeld ondertussen al twee maanden bij Engelse vrienden woont. De dag dat we aankwamen konden we zelf niet meer klimmen door het slechte weer en doordat het er om 16u30 al donker wordt.

De volgende dag bleken we veel geluk te hebben door het droge weer en de vele en harde wind! We trokken vroeg in de ochtend naar de bekende sector "Stanage" die helemaal droog lag door de wind. Deze sector is gelegen op de top van een heuvel en is 2km lang. Keuze genoeg dus!

Ik begon gemakkelijk maar ging al snel een mentaal en fysiek moeilijkere route opzoeken. Hieronder vind je de Britse trad niveaus voor de nieuwelingen, zoals ik, in deze discipline. De eerste dag kon ik een E3 5c (2de poging) en een E3 6a (onsight) klimmen. Geloof het of niet maar dit met dik verzuurde armen aangezien het plaatsen van het trad gear (cams en nuts) weer een heel andere stijl teweeg bracht. De rotsen zijn er helemaal niet hoog, tussen de 8 en de 16 meter. Maar ondanks deze lage hoogte kan je toch zeer gevaarlijk vallen wanneer bijvoorbeeld een van je veiligheid punten uitbreekt of je er gewoonweg niet genoeg kan plaatsen.

Na deze outdoor klimdag besloten we naar Sheffield te gaan voor een plaatselijke Boulder competitie in de grootste blokzaal van Europa, The Climbing Works. In deze zaal klimmen zowat elke avond van de week gemiddeld 50 à 60 klimmers. De kwaliteit van deze zaal is ook uitstekend! Ik was super gemotiveerd en klom bijna alle routes van de wedstrijd waardoor ik ook op de 1ste plaats eindigde! Ik kon ook de moeilijke "Money Boulder" toppen waarmee ik 62.5 pond won om mijn reis al direct mee af te betalen!

Een verslag, resultaten en foto's van deze competitie kan u op volgende links vinden:
Verslag: http://climbingworks.com/blog/2010/11/15/#Round_1_Results_Photos_and_FiveTen_winners

Foto's: http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=89879&id=1500104389&saved#!/album.php?aid=89879&id=1500104389&page=3

Resultaten: http://climbingworks.com/download/files/Bouldering_Lge_2010/CW_bouldering_comp_results.pdf

Pour voir un résumé en français sur Climb2Climb: http://www.climb2climb.be/flash-infos/1445-siebe-vanhee-gagne-a-sheffield-

Er was ook wat slechter nieuws voor Laurence die tijdens de competitie haar enkel brak en naar het ziekenhuis moest, hierdoor kon ze spijtig genoeg de dagen erna niet meer klimmen. Maar toch kwam ze de twee volgende dagen op krukken met ons mee naar de rotsen.

De volgende dag was een mooie zonnige dag maar klommen we maar een korte tijd doordat onze slaapzak te warm was in de lange ochtend.

De derde dag was een mentale topdag. Ik en Florian deden enkele VS 4c's solo als opwarming en waren daarna klaar voor het zwaardere werk. Ik deed mijn eerste E4 6a (Usurper) flash en mijn eerste E5 6b (Moonshine) 3de poging.

De E5 was een route van ongeveer 10 meter met een makkelijk begin en de crux 1 meter boven de laatste cam (veiligheidspunt). De crux is een zeer technische beweging waar je met je volledige gewicht op een klein steentje moet opkomen en van een platte verticale barst naar een goede greep moet gaan. Je staat boven je laatste cam en riskeert het dat deze er uitkomt als je valt. Hier mag je zeker niet aan denken als de rubber van je schoen het steentje aan het omhelzen is!

De concentratie die je nodig hebt voor het trad klimmen is voor mij groter dan bij het sportklimmen. Er komen veel meer factoren kijken bij het trad klimmen, namelijk de veiligheid, wanneer en waar plaats ik mijn materiaal. Dit vraagt een goede focus en zeker geen angst!

Deze drie klimdagen waren echt geweldig en leerrijk. Ik zal zeker en vast terug gaan en liefst zo snel mogelijk als het weer een beetje goed is. Ook de omgeving is er prachtig en past echt bij de klimstijl, rustig en stil.
Noodzakelijk voor een goede focus!

De Trad niveau's:

In het Belgen landje

2010-10-21T10:11:00.005+02:00

Momenteel ben ik veel aan het werk om genoeg geld te verdienen waarmee ik daarna het grote meer maar weer eens over steek.
Tussen het werken door volg in een strak trainingschema dat ik zelf heb opgesteld en ga ik
uiteraard regelmatig eens naar de rotsen.

Zoals vorige week zondag wanneer ik met enkele Leuvense klimmers en klimsters naar Marche les Dames ging om daar foto's te nemen voor de nieuwe topo die binnenkort zal uitkomen. Dit was een zeer rustig klimdagje waar we allemaal een heel aantal zeer eenvoudige routes klommen. Marche les dames is duidelijk een klimgebied voor beginnende klimmers, met wel 491 routes waarvan 200 in de 5de graad.

De klimstijl is zeer speciaal en bestaat uit veel gaten en goede voetsteunen. De rots is niet zo kwalitatief en zeer brokkelig. Marche les Dames is geen gebied met een grote kwalitatieve waarde maar voor beginners altijd de moeite om eens naar toe te gaan. Zoek je een kwalitatief klimgebied, Freyr ligt er niet ver vanaf!

In mijn planning voor de laatste twee maanden van 2010 staan nog enkele korte rotsklimvakanties gepland waarvan een 11 - 12 - 13 - 14 november. Ik zal dan met Florian Castagne naar Peak District (Engeland) trekken om daar het tradklimmen wat meer onder de knie te krijgen. Hier kijk ik volop naar uit aangezien ik alleen nog maar goede dingen heb gehoord van dit klimgebied.

Ik zal ook weer deelnemen aan de twee selecties van het BK boulder in november.

Keep on rockclimbing!

Worldcup in Puurs!

2010-09-16T21:53:00.004+02:00

Just home and I decided to participate the Lead worldcup in Puurs, Belgium the 24th of september. First I hesitated but I always like to have some more experience!

I'll keep you up to date!