Font raid, working away and locally stuff
I've been pretty lax at blogging recently, but here's a bit of an update as to what I've been up to...
End of April....
So I've been working in France all week, all over the shop really, but this morning I was in Velizy, east of Paris. I got done relatively early, and had time to shoot further south to Font. I had put my boots in on the off chance... :)
The weather was iffy when I pulled up at Franchard Isatis, and raining on and off.
I walked in and climbed a few of the blue circuit and a few tried a few problems from the off circuit book.
Because it had rained, all of the tops were really greasy, and the atmosphere was pretty claggy so topping out on anything was quite tricky really.
I then went over to Beauvais Est and climbed a few things. including a couple of the blue circuit and then a 5+ on the red circuit (red 2) which felt desparate, as I needed to cut loose. At least I think it was the red 2 problem, it was pretty difficult to locate the problems to be honest.
After a while I headed back to the hotel in Melun.
The following morning I had a couple of hours so I headed further south to Bas Cuvier.
I tend to discount this place normally due to it being busy, but what a quality set of boulders.
After warming up on a couple of orange problems, I set about the red circuit with abandon... Unfortunately my shoulder was, by this time, pretty painful and topping out on anything vaguely mantle related became untenable.
After trying a few of the reds and failing, I had a quick look at Marie rose 6a, getting to the move right to the sloper and sticking it. Unfortunately peeling off the next move.
By this time it was time to go. I'd mis-timed my departure though and would have got to the port late had I not got my foot down. In the event I managed to get to Calais from bas cuvier in a shade under 3 hours. A personal best...
Only a quick raid, but bearing in mind it was on a work trip, I'll take that. I reckon 2, maybe 3 trips a year are viable where I can nip down to Font.
May
The first two weeks were spent working in the US, first in Topeka, Kansas for four days in Del Monte at a dog food factory, which came as a surprise, I was expecting fruit juice... (they weren't all wearing panama hats, unfortunately), then we drove to St Louis as we had some programming to do at the St Gobain site - quite cool actually as they make 3 million bottles a day there for the Budweiser plant, and it;'s pretty much all fully automated.
After a couple of days here, I had a meeting in Greensboro, North Carolina after which I flew up to Philatelphia to visit the US office. All in all a pretty intense couple of weeks, and a couple of weeks during which I got absolutely nothing done climbing wise, but otherwise it was interesting to see a part of the world I've never been to before.
Next time I'll need to go somewhere that isn't the flattest parat of the US - I thought I was in Norfolk for a while there...
Since then, I've wanted to spend quite a bit of time with the family, although I did get out last week to Brownstones with Taffa, climbing about 25 classic problems throughout the quarry - I love this place, I really started to get into bouldering seriously here, so as I haven't been here for a while, it was great to do some of the old problems. Nothing hard done, but climbing here is like meeting an old friend, the familiarity is very pleasing.
Today, I went to the Jumbles. Sunny, but a bit greasy. quite a bit of traversing, had a pop at Clowns pocket but not seriously as I had no spotter. After the flurry of new routing and activity a couple of years ago, it looks like noone has climbed here in ages. Not a trace of chalk, and the plants are creeping back. I cant say I mind this massively, I like it when I have the place to myself really, and there are still a couple of projects I need to complete here. Maybe this summer, maybe...
So all iin all not masses done, but I've also been incredibly busy. I will be more at home over the next couple of months, so maybe able to get out a bit more, we'll see...
End of April....
So I've been working in France all week, all over the shop really, but this morning I was in Velizy, east of Paris. I got done relatively early, and had time to shoot further south to Font. I had put my boots in on the off chance... :)
The weather was iffy when I pulled up at Franchard Isatis, and raining on and off.
I walked in and climbed a few of the blue circuit and a few tried a few problems from the off circuit book.
Because it had rained, all of the tops were really greasy, and the atmosphere was pretty claggy so topping out on anything was quite tricky really.
I then went over to Beauvais Est and climbed a few things. including a couple of the blue circuit and then a 5+ on the red circuit (red 2) which felt desparate, as I needed to cut loose. At least I think it was the red 2 problem, it was pretty difficult to locate the problems to be honest.
After a while I headed back to the hotel in Melun.
The following morning I had a couple of hours so I headed further south to Bas Cuvier.
I tend to discount this place normally due to it being busy, but what a quality set of boulders.
After warming up on a couple of orange problems, I set about the red circuit with abandon... Unfortunately my shoulder was, by this time, pretty painful and topping out on anything vaguely mantle related became untenable.
After trying a few of the reds and failing, I had a quick look at Marie rose 6a, getting to the move right to the sloper and sticking it. Unfortunately peeling off the next move.
By this time it was time to go. I'd mis-timed my departure though and would have got to the port late had I not got my foot down. In the event I managed to get to Calais from bas cuvier in a shade under 3 hours. A personal best...
Only a quick raid, but bearing in mind it was on a work trip, I'll take that. I reckon 2, maybe 3 trips a year are viable where I can nip down to Font.
May
The first two weeks were spent working in the US, first in Topeka, Kansas for four days in Del Monte at a dog food factory, which came as a surprise, I was expecting fruit juice... (they weren't all wearing panama hats, unfortunately), then we drove to St Louis as we had some programming to do at the St Gobain site - quite cool actually as they make 3 million bottles a day there for the Budweiser plant, and it;'s pretty much all fully automated.
After a couple of days here, I had a meeting in Greensboro, North Carolina after which I flew up to Philatelphia to visit the US office. All in all a pretty intense couple of weeks, and a couple of weeks during which I got absolutely nothing done climbing wise, but otherwise it was interesting to see a part of the world I've never been to before.
Next time I'll need to go somewhere that isn't the flattest parat of the US - I thought I was in Norfolk for a while there...
Since then, I've wanted to spend quite a bit of time with the family, although I did get out last week to Brownstones with Taffa, climbing about 25 classic problems throughout the quarry - I love this place, I really started to get into bouldering seriously here, so as I haven't been here for a while, it was great to do some of the old problems. Nothing hard done, but climbing here is like meeting an old friend, the familiarity is very pleasing.
Today, I went to the Jumbles. Sunny, but a bit greasy. quite a bit of traversing, had a pop at Clowns pocket but not seriously as I had no spotter. After the flurry of new routing and activity a couple of years ago, it looks like noone has climbed here in ages. Not a trace of chalk, and the plants are creeping back. I cant say I mind this massively, I like it when I have the place to myself really, and there are still a couple of projects I need to complete here. Maybe this summer, maybe...
So all iin all not masses done, but I've also been incredibly busy. I will be more at home over the next couple of months, so maybe able to get out a bit more, we'll see...
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