Rocklands IV - I used to hate Monday's

Monday started off well. A big team of Americans were heading up to the Ceder Spine. I'd said i needed more mats on this one after my initial attempts last week, so i decided to tag along. They were meeting some guys elsewhere first, so we planned to meet late afternoon.

Having rested Sunday my skin felt good so with my morning free I decided to give Caroline another feel. Didn't manage to seal the deal this time but certainly got past first base. I didn't want to have too many attempts in the knowledge there there would be pads/spotters at the Ceder Spine later. As with most things here, Caroline is sharp, but it also pinches parts of your finger as your hand slides in a crack. these can become real painful after a few goes.

The best attempt saw me fall one move from the final dyno ( which is ok ) so i'm feeling confident for next sesh. The crux move, where i fell on most other goes, is the one before. It requires you to undercut a small edge with LH, stand up on a spike on the left foot, whilst simultaneously toe-hooking awkwardly with the right. This enables you to slap up right handed for a semi-decent pinch, then you're close. Its a right good move and super burly for me as its very front on. I've since heard whispers that technical drop knees take a lot of the power out of this move, getting you down to 7c-ish, but i'm stubbornly sticking to my sequence now, as its a great move and 7c+ this way.

Anyway, afternoon arrived so we slogged it up to the Ceder Spine. It was horrific, the normal walk in to the spine is bad enough, but we tried to cut out some of that by going cross-country. Wading through head height reeds, in a semi-swap, worrying about snakes and all sorts, i resolutely promised myself that this problem was getting sent today.

To cut a not-so-long story shorter, it worked. I got up there with ten or so Americans trying the thing, took a swig of water, put my shoes on and went straight up it first go. That's what fear of the walk in can do i suppose, but to be honest it seemed a bit of an anti-climax for such a great line and easy-ish for 7c. Still i was pleased and the vid we got looks great, so good day to start the week after last weeks no show....

Rocklands III - Yearning For Rock

After three days with my head down the mist finally started to clear on Friday morning. I still had this swollen gland in my neck from the lurgy, it kind of felt like a golf ball and when i turned my head to the right you could see it sticking out. Still i was desperate just to move about on rock and so wrapped up and headed to the Roadside boulders.


It was great to be out again and the warm up probs felt special, its amazing how much you appreciate climbing when you are forced to stop. After 30 mins or so of plodding i decided to give Caroline a go. Now this, along with the Cedar Spine are my two "must do's" that i've found so far. Caroline is a 35 degree overhanging wall that climbs a crack and pinches in opposition. The rock is patina patterned sandstone and it looks gorgeous. Now pinches are not my strong point and this thing is 7c/+ so its going to take a bit of work but i made some good links Friday to feel this is on soon, so will be back.


Yesterday the slow crawl back to feeling human again continued so we headed back to the Sassies for a short session. The Beetle made it the whole way up there without getting stuck in sand once - result! I also got up Pinotage from the high start, that is 7b/+. Now the issue is, i did plan to do the sit to this problem, it was really the one problem i had on my list pre-arrival that i had heard was classic, super etc, etc. However, in my view, the stand is classic, super etc, etc and the sit involves some nasty heel hooking on chossy rock into sharp crimpers that then get you into the stand. Pre-arrival of course i thought that the climb was just a sit start line and didn't know about the funky stand, now i've done that motivation to link from the sit has diminished somewhat. We will see but right now this is right down the list. (Photo of the stand above)


Rest day today, golf ball in neck more like a small marble now. Next week it's on....

Rocklands II - Fever Pitch

Right now i'm writing this latest update because i've got nothing better to do, quite literally, i'm sick as a dog. Had a decent day on Monday, woke up with a fever Monday night and its gone steadily downhill from there. Do they get the flu in Africa? I thought that was cold places primarily...

Anyway, so that's the latest. My ticks in the last few days are not climbing related, but consist of series one of Extras, with the guy from the office, numerous episodes of Only Fools and Horses, and some naff film called Death Sentence. The weather has cooled and it looks great for climbing. Our whole house is still out at the rocks now whilst i shuffle about feeling sorry for myself indoors.

To not set too depressing a tone things have been improving on the climbing front. Sunday the Beetle almost made it all the way down the approach road to the Sassies in one clean go with only one stop to dig it out of sand. Monday we drove to the top of the pass and hiked into the roadcrew sector. Downsides: Its 45 mins hike and the sector is quite small. Upsides: I climbed Ulan Batar, a 7b/+ stunning orange overhang that is just quality and had a play on the Cedar Spine. The spine (SS 7c, 1st ascent Lisa Rands i think) is touted as one of the must do's in Rocklands. Its a big overhanging arete, immaculate black and orange streaked rock with really interesting balancy, yet powerful moves on it. In about an hour i'd worked all the moves bar the top slap for a decent flatty, which is pretty scary, but with more mats (we only had one with us) i think it's on, so i'm massively psyched to get this done when i feel better.

Having come to Rocklands with no real idea of the problems i'd like to go at/ areas to go to, i feel like now i'm getting a better understanding of the place. I wouldn't say i have a firm tick list of what i want to do or anything but some things are starting to make sense. Cedar Spine is a must, Roadside area has some real quality, Sassie's has Pinotage that's sharp but good and there's the DePakhuis areas that we've yet to go to. However, i could still quote a bigger list of what i want to do in Font, no probs. So i'm still to be fully convinced i suppose....

Early Persepectives - Emperor's new clothes?

Ok so for now photo's/vid's that sort of thing are off for the moment i'm afraid. Ive found some internet on our farm but its some old relic of a PC that grunts and groans if you ask it to load the BBC webpage. The monitor is even worse, the picture is really, really blurry so as i'm typing this i'm having to sort of squint through one eye to get any sense of what i'm writing.

So Rocklands, so far...hmmm. I'm going to start off with something controversial and say i'm not bowled over with the place. It's early days, so my opinion may change, but right now i feel when climbers who visit here get asked what they think about it - its maybe a case of the emperor's new clothes going on. What i mean by this is that in that story the emperor was tricked in to appearing in the nude because everyone had told him his non existant robes were great and he was frightened to question popular opinion. Perhaps here everyone wants to join the herd and say Rocklands is the world's top bouldering mecca just to agree with the pack, maybe i'm wrong..the jury's out i guess.

For me right now, Clanwilliam as a local centre for shopping etc is functional, but the place is pretty soul less. Access to the crag is pretty hard, as the road is often dirt tracks or worse, fine in a pick-up, but remember we came here in a 1977 VW Beetle! Twice yesterday we had to dig it out of the sand, its like the Dakar Rally at times. More specifically there is loads of rock, its golden orange and there is some beautiful features, but its also pretty sharp in places, similar to grit, so pulling hard in the African sun can be painful.

Finally there is no guide as such, so we have these topos printed from the net. They are ok, but not that clear, some are out of date and many of the directions are wrong. It means only around 5-6 of the 18 supposed areas are easy for us to go to without help. It seems most climbers meet in large packs in the hope that someone knows where the rocks are from the car park and its easier, but that means you spend your day with 30 other guys trying the area classic. Ok for beta but if you came here to experience some real wilderness, not really what you'd planned.

Its certainly early days, and i don't want to sound totally down on the place. We have been up to the Sassie's, i've tried Pinotage - a 7c+ classic overhang here - and have a way i think i can do it with some skin. I also did Petit Hueco in a few goes, an amazing 7b+ roof that was high quality. Also, saw Kevin Jorgensen flash some 8a highball arete in fine style that was impressive.

So that's all good, but quality moderates for the missus seem pretty elusive so far and combine that with my earlier points made in this post...then can we really compare this with a Fontainbleau as yet? Maybe for the top level American climbers that we're staying with here, that crush 8a's for warm up's but for your more average Joe, i'm not so sure to be honest.

Today we went to the Riverside boulders. Usual problems finding them of course, but eventually we spied chalk on holds and zoned in. To be fair it was a good day, i climbed a really nice 7b overhang called Dragonfly and then crimped my way up a cool 7c roof called Roof Fighter with a funky toe-hook move. The area was not world class though by any means and we looked at the hard stuff too, like Fred's 8b Olifants Dawn which just looked nasty sharp.

Anyway, things appear to be on the up i guess...weather is forecast to be very settled now and i have that Pinotage thing to go back to at some point. If you've read all this give yourself a pat on that back...

South Africa 1 - tourist trap...

I know posts are getting a little sporadic but Internet out here is hard to come by as many a climbing blog is suffering right now. We arrived Tuesday into Cape Town. Flight was 2 hours delayed, we'd had minimal sleep and then we had to go and get the car as with the mats and stuff our luggage was huge.

To keep costs down I had heard of a place that hired out old VW Beetles (think Herbie but older) for dirt cheap. Some guy came to collect us and take us to the Beetle place. Obviously since this wasn't Hertz these guys operated out of a less savoury part of town. Although we'd heard all about the problems in S Africa of course it still doesn't prepare you for seeing these townships (slums) up front and personal to be honest. They sort of look like allotments in the UK but with more people, rubbish and they are seriously vast. Anyway safe to say the journey to the Beetle place through these areas was a bit white knuckle with us praying the driver didn't hit a red light and have to stop. Ive been here almost a week now and driving around have seen quite a few of these townships but so far the shock factor has not diminished. Anyway you get the picture.

We got the Beetle, its a total rust bucket, but so far it seems to move so that's the main thing. After that we headed out in Cape Town (cheap beers), had a look at a penguin colony, went on a two day safari and spotted some migrating whales off the coast in a place called Hermanus. So Ive been doing the tourist thing but I know what your asking I came here to climb, potentially the worlds best bouldering is 2 hours down the road (4 in the Beetle) so what the hell am I playing at?

Well suffice to say I'm super psyched to get up to Rockland's now. Ive been dreaming of boulders at night and woke up to some serious palm sweats last night. However I'm only here in S Africa once most likely and the missus is keen for this staring at animals eating for hours on end so I figured I could be patient for a bit. To be fair I also got a finger tweak from my last session at the Tor before leaving so I thought a weeks rest would not be a bad thing. Still my patience is close to wearing out now and even taking down a load of red wine every evening doesn't seem to be helping anymore; we leave for the boulders tomorrow and I'm praying the Beetle holds it together. The weather is threatening some rain but its super cool, much colder than I thought for Africa so conditions could be pretty darn primo. I even saw snow on some of the mountain tops coming back from the safari yesterday.

So next post I'm hoping will be a little more climbing focused with maybe a photo or two..until then over and out...