SUMMIT '08

Last weekend, the Flemish Klim- & Bergsportfederatie (Climbing & Mountaineering Federation) held its first big annual fair, called SUMMIT'08 to promote its activities in the field of mountain sports (in dutch: stagebeurs)
All trainings, educations and expeditions were introduced to the audience, people were able to subscribe also, clubs presented themselves and workshops were given.
Next to that, there was also an active part, with a mountainbike tour, an adventure circuit and at least 3 different indoor climbing walls! There was a boulder wall, a simulation of artificial climbing, and.... an iceclimbing/drytool wall.

I was asked to cooperate for that last one, so together with partners in climb Gerrit and Geert, and a bunch of workers from BVLB, we built a slightly overhanging 6.5 meter high wooden wall from scratch on saturday, created 2 routes on it with wooden "holds" saturday night, and belayed and let people try climbing with axes on sunday. Those who brought their boots or who were lucky enough to fit in one of the few pairs of boots we had with us, could also try climbing with crampons.

Plenty of people passed by to try, and of course we hadn't made the two little routes too difficult (but there was a nasty "missing" foothold in one of them - grin) so everybody with a little bit of climbing experience was able to top and ring the cow bell I had found on my parents attic.

Next to that there was of course the opportunity of seeing back a lot of people, meeting new people, and "networking" in common. I got a nice tip of where to sleep in Canada, and guess what, C1sc0 had booked a couple of nights in that very spot the day before! Speaking of coincidence...

Another part of the fair was an exhibition about the history of Belgian climbing & mountaineering. Due to the fact I was "on duty" I didn't have time to visit this exhibition extensively, but I briefly walked through. Most of it I had already seen a couple of years ago on another fair.
But it was very interesting indeed! Those of you who know a little about Belgian history, or have been climbing in the Alps, might have heard of Ernest Solvay, a Belgian industrial who sponsored the Solvay bivouak on Matterhorn, or our fromer king Albert I (grandfather of Albert II) who gave his name to the Refuge Albert Premier in France, and died in a climbing accident in Marche-les-Dames, near Namur in Belgium. Also his son king Leopold III was a good climber, well known in the Dolomites.
Don't be afraid, I'm not going to write down Belgian climbing history(link in Dutch) here! But holding the Kings Ice Axe was a strange experience indeed (it was behind glass at the exhibition, but yeah... the day before... :-) ) and to my pleasant surprise, one of my photographs -about iceclimbing- was used at the exhibition too.

If anyone's interested, I can do a next post about how we set up our iceclimbing wall, with some more pictures.

Drytool competition

For once, I will do a post in Dutch, as I just take it from the organisator's website:

Wanneer? Vrijdag 25 januari 2008 om 20u
Waar? Recreatiedomein Breeven te Bornem

Naar jaarlijkse gewoonte organiseren we ook binnenkort onze dry-tool wedstrijd.
Telkens treffen we hier talloze liefhebbers die streven naar de overwinning en vele mooie prijzen, maar ook vele nieuwsgierigen die eens van deze klimtechniek
willen proeven.

Inschrijven via info@berghut.be of 052/47.85.22
Gratis deelname

In short: fridaynight january 25, there is a drytool competition in Bornem.
If you go take a look at the website, you can see two small pictures I made last year...

Mud & rain

Last weekend was the 5th edition of De Kuitenbijter (Calf Biter), a yearly recurring event organized by De Bergpallieters, providing a unique combination of all weather hiking, team spirit and orientation.

This years edition was quite... muddy and a bit wet, but as always the weather could not stop us. The slippery mud may have slowed us down a bit though, or at least made us feel our calfs a little more than usual.

Most participants agreed that the orientation part was not a big challenge this year, and prefer more technical (orientation) difficulties above more distance..

I believe I am the only one having completed the trial all five times, making it a bit of a habit to me now, more than a challenge. To avoid the routine of it in the future, I decided not to participate anymore next year, but volunteered for the organisation committee instead. Let's see how we can push the needed orientation skills to a higher level!

Wintertime...

This weekend we left daylight saving time, which I think is a pity, since I could use that extra hour of light in the evening all year long! Now I will arrive home from work when it's already - or nearly - dark, it will be less practical for for feeding the animals or other chores around the house, or going climbing or biking..

So Geert and I decided to wait at least one more day to switch time, and leave early for a rock climbing sunday. No Dave today, but a day of (slab) climbing at the Rochers de Paradoux in Yvoir.

We arrived early, and it was really no surprise nobody else was there to climb. What did surprise us, was that we stayed alone like that until somewhere in the afternoon! While it really was a nice day to be out and climbing. Are less people climbing nowadays? Has the poor summer caused them giving up on climbing outdoors and do they stick to indoor climbing halls? Did they all move to Germany? Are they afraid of the cold? Are they all on holiday?

To be honest: we didn't care, but enjoyed the climbing. Even though I realized I forgot my climbing shoes when it was way to late to turn back to get them, so I had to climb on my Five.Ten Mountain Masters approach shoes...
I did some scrambling and climbing on those shoes before, so we didn't care, just kept to fifth grade routes.

Climbing at Paradoux is totally different from what you get in Dave: absolutely no need for any mobile pro whatsoever! Even when they put in the guidebook a route's protection is "demanding some commitment" there's still plenty of bombproof bolts in it.
Make sure to take loads of quickdraws when you go there!

So, mental lead climbing training was absent, concentration on using footholds was omnipresent, and once again we did discover some less known little pearls of climbing routes. Perhaps it's not a coincidence, but those little pearls I'm talking about, were all opened in the seventies by the late Claudio Barbier, and are atypical for the crag, which has mainly slab climbing. And no, I'm not going to spoil it by telling which routes I'm talking about! q-:

Trad Climbing in Dave

Yesterday was time for another day of classic Belgian rock climbing at the Rocher de Nevieau near Dave, I wrote about this spot before.

We anticipated to the "bad bolts drawback" by taking some nuts and camalots and went for some -ehrm- less frequented routes. One of them was even mentioned in the guidebook being "in bad shape nowadays", and the most recent guidebook for this crag is almost 20 years old!

Needless to say most of it was totally overgrown, and we made good use of our rack: we only found two our three old rusted pitons in the whole route!

But it definitely was a nice adventure climb. The name of the route is also quite appropriate "L'Inconnue" (the Unknown). Even Eddy did not know it!

It's a shame most climbers only climb first pitches in Dave, while a lot of routes have two or even three pitches that are very beautifull also. Those are also completely not polished - which is a relevant and valuable characteristic for Belgian rock climbing routes!

But the premise all Belgian rock climbing is sports climbing holds less and less; there definitely is trad climbing in Belgium, and I hope it will be preserved!

Worldcup Puurs

This weekend the IFSC sports climbing competition circus landed in Belgium, more precisely in my neighborhood, Puurs. Given this and the weather not really inviting for an outdoor climbing or hiking trip, this was a nice alternative.

I have written before about the place the event was hold, where I also noticed my former role as president of one the now joining climbing federations in Flanders. I guess it is this past that gave me a VIP badge, which was not only interesting for access to food, drinks and a seat with a nice view, but mostly for being able to talk to "other climbing VIP's" while watching the competition.

The climbing was breathtaking to watch, especially the lead (or difficulty) climbing. I may be quite biassed by being a climber myself, but in my opinion sports climbing is one of the more spectacular and aesthetical sports to watch, and in that point of view very underestimated.
From a spectator's point of view, I think you could compare lead climbing most to figure-skating or gymnastics, although it is easier to follow and more suspense because the one reaching the highest hold wins, instead of a jury giving points.

But if you're more into quick action, go watch the speedclimbing! While it still isn't very popular and widespread in western Europe -it's almost completely dominated by Russia- the exploding power for sure is comparable to athletic's 100m sprint, and because of the daring -jeté- jumps, at least as spectacular.

Of course none of them doesn't beat iceclimbing & drytooling though... but I guess that's just my opinion.

(and it will take more than a while before that circus ever comes to Belgium...)

Indian summer

Two weekends with excellent weather have made outdoor life go well again.

Last sunday I went for a walk with a good friend in the east of Belgium. As there are a lot of steep hills and woods in that part of the country, both orientation skills and physical condition had some excercise. It was also a testcase for my ice climbing boots; I found out what's wrong with them so my feet always start hurting after a while when wearing them. I will write later on this boots topic, as I get the problem solved.

Yesterday was time for another day of old fashioned rock climbing at the Rocher de Neviau, near Dave. While I have climbed there a lot many years ago, this crag has become one of my least favorites over the last years because of its often polished holds and overcrowdiness. The reason we went there yesterday nevertheless was because my climbing partner of the day, Geert Gijsbrechts, needed to prepare a lesson he has to give there next week.

So we started by walking down the crag in search for a spot for Geert's lesson, but bumped into Eddy, an older climber performing access controls. Nothing wrong with that of course, since we are both members of the Belgian Alpine Club for years.
I had never met this man before, only heard about him; he is also a regular guest on BCN. But he turned out to be very talkative, and it took us some time before we finally got into climbing.

We noticed the crag didn't get overcrowded at all, even while it was a very nice day where you should expect a lot of climbers. It even made me thinking about reconsidering returning there more often. The polishing of the rock is not worse than elsewhere on popular -and overfrequented- Belgian crags after all.

Of course there are other drawbacks that might cause people not climbing there anymore, like a noisy road right underneath, and the fact that most bolts are old and often far apart, which probably frightens today's -spoiled- sports climbers. Or maybe our friend Eddy is keeping them away with his frequent access controls.

Almost all Belgian climbing crags are bolted, since most rock is naturaly very badly suited for natural protection, either because of lack of cracks and stuff to place gear, either because of the rock wearing of too quickly when placing and removing gear over and over. So we have a long term bolting tradition, and a lot of Belgian climbers never got into trad climbing at all, being used to bolts everywhere. Where bolting in Belgium originated in traditional pitons left in place for the next climbers, to avoid rock wear, today's climbers seem to get more and more used to very well protected routes, and back out when bolts are father than a couple of meters apart.

This bolt distance (lack of) engagement thing bothers me, although I can understand climbers don't want to trust old rusty or even moving pitons, being in place for many decades. The problem with Dave is that you need an environmental permission nowadays to place anything permanent, even a bolt, and that obtaining this permission is taking a long bureaucratic way. So CABBAC and the Rebolting Team have to wait for this before doing anything about the old bolts and stuff, otherwise a total climbing prohibition may be the result.

So we engaged in some nice longer routes, which were most enjoyable in the sun. Training is to be fun, isn't it?

Opening Klimax II

Yesterday I attended the official opening of Klimax II, a new part of the indoor climbing complex in Breendonk, not so far from where I live. I had the honour(?) of listening to a couple of speeches, amongst others by our Flemish sports minister Bert Anciaux, and our rather new Flemish Minister-president Kris Peeters.

Of course those speeches are not the reason you go to ceremonies like this. It's a good opportunity to meet people and learn the latest news about what's going on behind the screens. Of course this happens during the drink afterwards, but also while we were waiting for our Minister-president, who was about one hour late...
Klimax II is the first big climbing hall in Belgium that has lead climbing by default, as toproping is standard in Belgian indoor climbing. It's also not completely indoors, two sides are open, which allows a lot of spectators watching competitions, the first of which will be the World Cup within a couple of weeks.

September 8 was also the day the new Flemish climbing federation KBF (Klim- & Bergsport Federatie) should have been founded. For those not knowing: so far we had two federations here, history would take us to far if I had to explain all of this, and the main reason they didn't get together earlier, is people sticking to their position of power at both sides, blocking everything.
Also now I heard one big club is trying to block the process because they want more power in the new federation.

Why do I bother to write about this political topic?
A couple of years ago I was president of the smaller one of those two federations, and I spent a lot of energy to get to a fusion. So although I am not at all involved anymore in the actual process, I still care. And I will still be glad if one day will show all my energy spent on it, will not have been wasted.

But maybe the most interesting thing I heard yesterday is about ice climbing. I learned there is a waterfall in Belgium that freezes over regularly. I made the guy who told me promise to call me when it does next time, to go climb it with him. I hope he does!