Frey, Nov. 14th, 2009!!!

Friday, November 13th and Saturday, Nov. 14th, 2009.

SHORT STORY: Made a successful, brief climbing trip to Frey where I was almost eaten by a dinosaur, or pterodactyl of some sort, mid-climb!!!

LONG STORY: I planned to meet my Swiss friend Lucas in Frey. He had planned to reach Frey’s refugio via the next refugio over, namely Refugio Jakob. If you are not familiar with the area and the trailhead, it can be difficult to find. That’s why I found him waiting for me at the trailhead to Frey when I arrived at Cerro Catedral at 12:30 or so! His trekking day had started at around 8am and he still had a good 2 ½ hours left!

My challenge was to be to climb a route on Torre Principal. We were both so tired upon arriving at Frey that we soon decided to aim lower and with more accuracy at a climb on the tower called El Abuelo! My good friend Hernan from Refugio Frey gave me the recommendation of doing the route “Del Techo” mixed with “Hay Que Entrar Para Salir” instead of doing “Ñaca Ñaca Crunch Crunch” as I had planned. This took a 5+ and made it a 6a. About 110 meters of climbing it seemed to be. Already now there is much less snow to arrive at the nearby walls! You can almost do it without getting your socks wet in normal shoes! Yahoo!

So. The next morning, Saturday, I get up at 7:45 and start eating my cereal. Hernan tells me where I can find an old harness to lend to Lucas, as I had forgotten to bring him an extra! Oops! After we finished eating at around 9:30am, we headed off to the wall! Thanks to the Guia de escaladas, by Rolando Garibotti, we found our route just fine and started off! Two easy pitches of 4 led to more fun and interesting 5+ and/or 6a pitch that Lucas and I broke into two, thanks to a lack of gear.

The story of the day was here at the midpoint of the pitch, where I made an early anchor because the fall potential had become too great as it wasn’t easy climbing and I had already used most of the gear below! Safer to make an anchor than run it out and risk having no gear to make an anchor higher up!

After making the anchor and managing the rope, I began to belay Lucas. A sudden wooOOSH nearby, as if that made by a distant airplane displacing air, forced me to look away from Lucas and to my side, at a condor! The Patagonian king of the skies, measuring in wingspan much greater than myself at 6’1”, seemed to be sizing me up for lunch! It passed one meter above me, examining huddled, makeshift anchor-forced location on the rock, its feathers practically caressing the rock a mere arm’s length above me. I quivered in my squatted position, drawing my arms in, clutching the Grigri, and looking for a spare large BD Camelot “just in case”, of which, of course, there were none! I shouted down to Lucas in Castellano (See: español), <> <> he says, plucking a Camelot out of the crack some 20 meters below me.

Some 15 Condor passes later, and my breathing relaxes enough to take out a camera and take a few photos. At one point our Condor, Nahuel as I call him now, passed by me face to face so closely that I could have brushed his wingtips without even fully extending my timid arms! Incredible! I thought I was making lunch! Two pitches later, after switching turns lead-climbing, we arrived at the walk-off point. After attempting the final pitch, finding it too cold to our liking, we walked over and did El Perfil de la Mujer, the short tower behind El Abuelo with a fun and quick 20-meter 4 climb!

Our trip finished well! We planned an asado in Frey for the upcoming weekend with Hernan and Alan, the two refugio friends I’ve made there who are finishing their months of working there soon! I met up with my friend Luciano “Nano” and Matias for the hike down! What a great, brief trip to Frey! I hope the weather can hold up for some more trips before I head over to Chile and Cochamó on the 4thish of December! Two weeks and a bit more! Wow!

Cheers, big ears, -your landescaper, n8

Weather

The last three weeks, Bariloche and I have been under the weather! Call it spring cleaning, call it allergies for the first time, but I have cabin fever!

It has come to my attention that I have posted pictures about Valle Encantado but have said nothing about its current rules and regulations as a result of the owners. As it currently stands, there are very strict rules as follows: No fires allowed; no camping allowed; no one is allowed on the property who has not signed their name on what I have been told is the equivalent of a liability waiver, and this includes Valle Encantado´s both sides of the river; word on the rock is that it will be closed to all from December, 2009 until March, 2009. In other words, for the climbing season. This is a result of the rules above being broken, as well as trash being left in previous years and a growing concern of the owners due to the rising popularity and consciousness of this unique climbing area.

In my opinion, all of this could be worked out if the climbing community organized itself and came with one united voice to the owners of Valle Encantado. However, as it stands there are individuals and small groups, whether under a banner such as Club Andino Bariloche - I do not mean to pick on any one person or group - or just as climbing friends, who have not taken the initiative to gather and unite. Also, money is more of an issue here as it is in, say, the States where the Access Fund is a viable option. So, sadly we wait out this issue and the weather! For now...