Uneventful restday on the Saturday and I should have been raring to go at Stretched and Pressed/Stargate on the Sunday. That was the plan anyway instead I got up feeling sick again. Id spent some time in confined spaces at the end of the previous week with the German guys from the campsite (the ones who gave us the flu bug the first time round) and so should have known id be at risk. Ive actually since found out that two of their group have been to the hospital with Swine flu! They leave later this week I believe but if I do see them in the interim im going to be running very fast in the opposite direction. On top of me feeling rather naff the weather had got very humid. This is rare for Africa as its a very dry heat here, it reminded me of summer days in New York, suffice to say climbing hard was out.
Monday was the girlies last day before she left me on my own for the final two weeks. She does like to move on rock but is not as obsessed as me and likes to mix that up with other various activities. Unfortunately this area of SA is pretty barren to be fair, there are other tourists here but what you can do is very limited. They seem to just drive about very slowly in their hired SUV’s, eat loads and thus are generally overweight. In the intervening hour after lunch, just before they have another snack at tea they tend to congregate at the various graveyards that we pass en-route to the rocks and snap some pic’s (no offense intended to South African’s I know but this is the Western Cape one of the main tourist hotspots in SA is it not?)
So anyway for our final day together on the Monday we looked further afield and found some hot springs place to go to 80km or so away called The Baths. Having not climbed for a bit I went out Monday early for a short session but as is often the way when you get up early and then feel rushed to climb I was in dreadful form so sacked it off to get to these baths. It was good but it was not exactly Roman baths either. It was basically a hot swimming pool that was pretty rammed or you could just go and run yourself a bath in these private rooms and sit in them for a bit. We did that then grabbed a meal out in Clanwilliam on the way back - good enough.
From Tuesday I was flying solo for my last two weeks here. The day started grey and by lunchtime it was absolutely lashing it down. The roof to my bedroom started to leak so I got the saucepans set up and sat down for what turned out to be a very long 24 hours. The rain kept falling all through Tuesday night and into Wednesday morning. By lunchtime id hit rock bottom with my dvd collection having watched Shrek 2 and The Goonies within a single 6 hour spell!
Some blue sky appeared by Wednesday afternoon and looked promising so without further ado I got myself up and out. First site to hit me as I drove down to the main road and looked up into the pass was snow. Pretty rare for Africa this and not something I expected to see as we are supposedly coming into spring here. It now made sense to me why the roof had stopped leaking in the night, despite continued downpour, it had frozen. Anyway the scene looked spectacular with the golden orange rocks being nicely framed by the white hillsides, it would have made a great shot to stick on here, but unfortunately the missus had taken the camera back with her so you are just going to have to take my word for it.
Jeez just noticed ive typed 5 paragraphs and haven’t even mentioned the actual climbing yet this week. Hang in there this could be a longish post but ill try and keep the climbing update succinct. So I trudged up to the Fortress boulders through the snow, one great thing about the Rocklands boulders is they tend to dry very quickly. Almost everything was in by the time id done the walk-in. I warmed up longer than usual as it was baltic and went round to the Stretched and Pressed roof.
For those that have climbed with me they know I seem to perform much better in close to zero temps. I think its due to my skin being pretty weak etc etc. I actually hadn't given this too much thought up at the Fortress, at least not until I got on Stretched and fired it first go. It had felt easy. Well pleased as its a stunner this one. Another load of snow then rolled through which delayed me a little but once that had passed I moved over to Stargate. This problem is thinner than Stretched and I needed a go just to get my fingers crimping properly again. Next go I sent it easily, I know quite a few people who have taken 7c+ for this, no way 7c is fair for sure.
At this stage I was starting to feel a little cold and damp but spurred on by the obviously favourable temps for me, I decided to slog it over to the Last Day in Paradise boulder. Supposedly Fred Nicole was coming down from the Roadcrew sector, on his last day, a year or two back and spied this perfect 60 degree wall. Either he was tired so it took him a while or he had some bad beta but it ended up rated 8a at the time. Now with a cunning heel hook its a great 7c I believe. Anyway after an horrific hike to the boulder across flooded marsh I was really up for flashing this one. It looked to suit me being very crimpy, the temps were super low and most importantly of all my trousers were totally soaked from the walk in and I wanted to get home asap.
I pulled on from sitting, threw to a decent incut sidepull for the LH, dug my right foot on a spike for maximum tension and reached up to this razor crimp for the RH. It felt good and I felt the flash was on. From here you stick your left heel next to your LH that is holding the good sidepull and really sit down on it. This enables you to lock the RH razor and make a long reach to a slopey pocket for the LH. Once you have this you compose yourself and jump aggressively to the perfect finishing jug. Unfortunately as I reached the sloping pocket and spent a milli-second digging my fingers a little deeper into this hold my heel popped causing a violent swing and I was back on the mat. Flash gone but I sent next go and hot-footed it back to the car park. Great problem, great day.
Next up back to the Pakhuis boulders. Id met this American couple the day before coming out of Fortress and they hadn’t visited either Pakhuis or the 8 day rain sector. I fancied the company so offered them a tour for the next two days. The guy really wanted to get his first 7c in Rocklands and liked roofs so we headed up to Born to Struggle. This is a 7c roof that has good holds and biggish reaches, but with some cunning heel/toe trickery it was not meant to be too bad. Met French beast Olivier Lebreton at the bloc who casually fired the flash off for his warm up. So now we had the inspiration too so we booted up.
After the oh so close flash of Last Day in Paradise I was really up for putting things right on this one. It started well, you make a big throw into a RH slopey pinch from decent jugs and then hit a sloper on the lip of the roof for the LH. Once here all I had to do was put in a double toe-hook under a hidden roof enabling me to slap up again with the LH for a jug without loosing tension, then its 6b to exit. Left toe went in ok I pulled on it and started to move my right in nextdoor, as I did the left toe popped and the inevitable swing put me back on the mats. Another flash blown by a foot fumble, I made a mental note of that and fired it next go.
I then set to work on getting the American guy up it, he’d given me one of those horse hair brushes for free, so I figured I owed it to him. An hour or so later he’d got close but with power gone he had to call it a day for now but he has 3 days left of his trip so the send is still on hopefully. To finish at Pakhuis I decided I had to go and give the big dyno of Black Velvet another burn. I definitely got closer on the jump with finger tips just snagging the finishing jug but I probably need another inch or two to really grab it. “Not much” as Jerry would say but ill need another session or two to get this done and im still not sure I want to really put that much into a dyno, albeit a very cool looking one. Anyway we will see.
So finally 8 day rain sector. Not much to say here really. The Shark I have spoken about before and Barracuda, the 8a line next to it, are both world class. Id love to climb them but another session here Friday has left me dubious about my chances of success. Africa is certainly a continent of extremes, we had snow early in the week, but by the end of it 3 days of cloudless skies had really pulled the temps back up. They are forecast to get much hotter for much of my remaining time here. Shark/Barracuda bake in the sun for most of the day till 5pm or so and by then the damage is done. Plus they are super sharp on the first tip. Rest day was required Saturday after trying them both Friday for an hour or so my skin was totally shredded.
I got back out Sunday, but ill update on that in my next post as im seriously outstaying my welcome in this one, Its now shorts and vest weather as forecast, the snakes will be starting to stir too which isn’t too appealing. Case of “He who dares Rodney” I suppose....
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