The van's called Pammy - shes big and busty, dressed in red, a VW Californian too - it makes sense, sort of, we thought.
Aside from that captivating bit of news its been a slow start on the climbing front. Arrived in Fontainebleau Sunday late on but it was a clear night and Monday dawned cold. I was super keen to get out with the cold conditions so I headed over to Buthier to try Appartenance, a highball arete of quality, that is a target of mine in the forest. Unfortunately with Font if its cold that can backfire on you as a shady rock spot wheres theres no wind can get damp. People will talk about holds "going black" in font..meaning usually they are white'ish, a combination of the rock colour and the chalk residue i guess, but then as you begin to touch them working a problem and they warm up they kind of darken with moisture on the hold. Once this blackening effect happens you know you are up against it.
This is exactly what happened at Appartenance. The rock gets little sun and after arriving and feeling the rock was super cold I excitedly pulled on. Within a few goes I was slipping and sliding off the holds and so gave it up pretty quick. It seems at the moment Font is in its transformation phase. Tree leaves are only just starting to turn and theres still a lot of vegetation around. The weather is also erratic, after the cold Monday, Tuesday was hot and humid and by Wednesday it was pouring rain. Im only in Europe till late Nov/early Dec latest and so with the Font forecast looking iffy for a bit I decided a trip back to the Alps (Magic Wood) might be the best bet.
We hacked it through France in lashing rain Wednesday PM eventually making it to the Avers Valley in Switzerland (Magic Wood) by Thursday afternoon. After a quick turnaround I headed out for a short reccy Thursday evening but it was dreadful. The sky was that brilliant bright blue you get in the alpine areas but clearly it had rained HARD at some point in the last 24 hours as the whole of the wood was soaked. One of my main aspirations here is the overhanging wall of Sofa Surfer. I felt I was close on this back in June in the rain.
Remebering that this wall had the ability to stay dry in all but the worst and seeing that all the warm-up probs were dripping I headed up to the Sofa Surfer bloc straight off. Awful damp hell of death greeted me and that was game over for the day. Gutted but theres still time i guess. Today its dry but very cloudy so im not sure how much of the place will have dried but the forecast is better for Saturday so lets see if I can get going in the next day or two...
On way to alps stopping for coffee. Note: always make your own coffee enroute otherwise face a 20 quid sting for two coffess in the garage shop...
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