Fontainebleau

The whole trip started with an early start at 6am on Saturday the 30th of March, so we could get on the road for the long drive to Fontainebleau. As we had done the same last year I knew the drive was tedious and boring but time soon passed quickly and all of a sudden we had arrived at our gite; it was tiny but it fitted the purpose!

Day One, we went to Apremont, one of the larger areas. I quickly warmed up making ascents of an easy slab, Jiu Jitsu (6a+) and other climbs. Within 15 minutes I  found myself trying Legitimate adherence assis (7a) and within 15 minutes I got the tick for it, the first of the trip's grade 7's.

Fist bump after both me and George ticked the first problem...

We then moved our stuff to Restablishement (7a) with a weird top-out and difficult start. I flashed it up to the top-out but topping-out is an extreme weakness for me - I simply could never do this one, but after the frustration of Orrin and George both doing it I finally succeeded! That was it for ticks for the first day. I tried several other problems but never fared well on them so I relaxed and felt warmed up for the next 5 days of climbing.

The next 5 days went really well! The next morning at Rocher Fin I flashed Memoire d'outre tombe (7a.) After that I rested and waited until we went to Canche Aux Merciers and Drie Zennin. At Drie Zennin I did one of the favourite problems of the trip, Diversion (7b), a great problem, powerful and overhanging- it was right up my street. Orrin soon got the tick and about ten minutes later I did too.

The next days went quite quickly: I got one more flash of a soft 7a, Sa Pelle au Logic at Gorge aux Chats, and did one two more 7a's on different days, Corto Maltese and L'Araignee, both at Bas Cuvier.

 Next the harder stuff! The first of the harder problems was Carnage( 7b+ ) - I really enjoyed this one as it was more like an indoor problem. So I decided to try the sit-start but was too tired. However, luckily we went back on the last day and within five or so attempts I got Carnage assis too (7c), those being my favourite ticks of the week as they suited me. But suiting my style too was Magic Bus (7b) which I made a quick ascent of on Wednesday morning- a roof problem with big holds and a weird foot sequence for me, but a very good problem. One of the classics of Font is Rubis Sur l'Ongle (7b+) at Gorge aux Chats. I first tried that one on Tuesday for about an hour: crimps with a technical crux three-quarters of the way up the face. It was a beautiful route but sadly the sun was on it and made it the holds feel horrible so we left it and came back to do it on Thursday morning when I cracked it after an hour or so. It was a brilliant trip with great weather!

I would like to thank Orrin for his competitive spirit pushing me on these problems and Nick Reyner and Debbie Corbett for all their help with beta, finding problems that suited me and so on...