I finally stopped moving this weekend or more accurately driving my 2009 two-tone Mellow Yellow Mini Cooper all over the western US. I am excited about this having done three tournaments/festivals (Bozeman/Ouray/Redstone) in the last several months as well as "training days" to RMNP and Vail. A wild ride at speeds up to 114 mph not to mention M-whatever. I have been demonstrating my Euro-acquired Free-Tooling style a mode of winter climbing most akin to rock-climbing even though I don't know how to even rock-climb. Really I don't like extra weight (e.g., heel-plates) extra points (heel-plates, spikes/adzes) or decisions about what to climb in/with (I climb everything from waterfalls to dry routes in Fusion 2s and Ice Dragons). Learning to climb all over again has been an interesting if not humbling experience with several notable "no-sends" this season which irk me a bit but who said this would be easy?
The car has been a big part of the year as much a partner as any of the lost boys who have gradually melted away from the scene this winter leaving me with virtually no one to even ring-up. I have explored some good terrain though most recently Le Drool Integrale my first time up the thing, solo, ostensibly a tribute to the late-great Guy Lacelle. I felt utterly relaxed on this moderate test-piece cameras whirred and so I achieved a closure of sorts accepting my friend was dead so I would no longer see him out climbing.
Aside from the car there are the new F2s a tool so cunning you could put a tail on it and call it a weasel. To the gathering clog of detractors I say the 1990s called and they want their climbing style BACK. Sure, Nomics work but so did spurs, leashes, cutting steps and the Atatl. I am giddy every time I pick this piolet up that relegated every other tool I own to the museum, and what a museum it has become.
In a word I am now more into the FUN and spontaneity of it all the sending/spraying/posing rather bores me after all I have an occupation/profession so I don't need to live through climbing. Blasting around Colorado in a a Mini stuffed to the gills with climbing gear rolling out in eye-watering neon trousers for a session, moments of joy, quizzical stares, and ah, those instances of near-terror, always...
