Arco recap!

I got back from a weeklong trip to Arco this VERY early morning due to some highway blockages and slowed down traffic. Reports have been of an international search for a murderer from France and Austria´s police did a thorough job of taking their part in it.
Arco was rad overall. There´s always setbacks and downsides, I didn´t get to project as much as I wanted to and thus didn´t send anything really hard but overall: successful trip! We found two new crags without all the negative side effects of Arco being Europe`s sport climbing capital, those being polished routes and an abundance of jerks, idiots and douchebags turning your day at the crag into a testrun of your personal stoicism and persistance.
As a matter of personal taste, I prefer steeper routes with bigger holds and bigger moves! A trip to Arco means a possibility to lay my hands on something I can´t get at home, namely tufas. With a mixed group of climbers it turned out to be tricky, about as tricky as I expected to get as much of steep enduro cragging as possible but as soon as Rob, Sabs, Daniel and Hans had arrived, things took a positive turn. Both new crags we visited turned out to be RAD! Since I wanna go and ride my bike, here´s Arco in stream of consciousness, followed by pics!

Cappucinos, Aperol, tufas and pump, Marco Gelato, idiots with helmets, "the cold is coming from the inside", Ristorante Al Fiume, severed pants, I WANT SKIN, big whippers, russian choirs, "can we get a cleaned appartment?", it´s a MALAMUTE HUSKY!, rest day hiking with my dad, fighting marmots, Italian chicks dig make up way too much, low budget and no shopping, 5.10s Hornet is crap, 5.10s Quantum rules, I need a knee pad, where did sabre tooth tigers go?, onsighting is something I seem to be able to only do on holidays, I need a climbing girl friend!

Rope climbing is on...

Well, my sinusitis is gone and so is a project that has been on my mind for some time. It still had 6 draws of mine in it, so doing it before embarking on my Arco trip next week was good. I made first steps back to climbing last Thursday and it went surprisingly well. On Saturday the crag was buzzing with people, I was feeling well and after first warm up go I fired it on my second attempt of the day. It felt surprisingly easy and maybe I have found a way of focusing before climbing into crux sequences! No photos yet, but they will be taken! We had a lot of fun at the crag, that´s what matters.

The day after we went to the Zillertal. That´s always good, I would love to go there more often but since I don´t have a car, all I can contribute is persuasion and gas money. I fell in love! Bachhexe is doable! I nearly send Los Lochos second go later that day (which was a good thing, since I dug deep and pulled the first roof part that had felt close to not doable when I hangdogged it) but fell after the dyno with the finishing jug in my hand. The major thing however is that I got on something hard and it clicked right away!

Tomorrow there´ll be a second round and hopefully I can get some photos...

Roots Bloody Roots

Yesterdays bouldering session was a blast, even though I was battleing an oncoming sinusitis. We got rid of the boulder under the one remaining project at the Sidewinder boulder which is finally workable...good team effort. Daffing that one aside was hard work!
I also repeated Roots Bloody Roots twice for lowdown and photos and Rob go the second ascent. We agree that it probably will settle at soft V7...but we´ll see. We´re both tall and the smaller guys had no dice on the shoulder move...

Out to cure my sinusitis!