Triple Date to Font! :) (Sept 12) by Charlotte Garden

So... Off to Fontainebleau for a late summer holiday with my boyfriend and two other couples.  It was a beautiful sunny day when we arrived so I wasn’t expecting to be climbing anything too hard as friction was limited and most things are pretty slopey. This created a great opportunity to get some mileage in on easier (still class) stuff, I was also slightly apprehensive about being there again as last time I was carried away from the 95.2 boulders with a broken ankle.

We stayed in a beautiful gite a few miles outside Milly which was handy to get the daily Pain aux Sexual (chocolate and almond croissant-highly recommended!) for some pre-climbing energy!! :)

Most of the week was spent doing mid range red circuits which was so much fun! Font has everything from dynos, crimps, slopers, mantels and everything is enjoyable despite the grade :) It was amazing to escape from training on plastic and just enjoy climbing on some real rock while having a great holiday in the forest with the sun!

A highlight of my holiday was receiving an email telling me I was going to get a load of prAna clothes!!!!! Sooo much fun looking through their website and filling in an order form!!! I’m so excited and can’t wait for stuff to arrive!!

My brother James had been competing in the Paris World Championships and he came out to meet us after ranking 67, good effort to him and the rest of the GB team! It was cool to watch him crush some problems and show us all what’s possible. He did this really burly compression 7b+ roof which was so inspiring.

 

I managed to send a few really cool 7s including the following;

Some extension ‘sit start’ that got 7a using the beta my friend Easy had figured out (thanks J). It only took me couple of goes, however, he was quick (and quite rightly so) to point out that my bum wasn’t the last thing to leave the floor and I had to repeat it to get the tick. This was a good lesson for me in bouldering ethics and highlighted some bad habits (that I blame on indoor climbing).

Grande Marche 7a+ was a really steep powerful side pull crack that was totally dependent upon one heel hook (love them!) I managed to manoeuvre up through the crack with a lovely sequence on the send go but was surprised to find myself desperately wriggling like a salmon on the top out. After my sketchy sloppy top out James then kindly demonstrated a textbook mantel to send the problem, thanks!

The main one for me though was the Cul de Chien roof (Toit de Cul de Chien) 7a as I had tried this years before on the broken ankle trip so I knew it would be a good test for me! We went to Cul de Chien on the last day when it was soooo hot we were greasing off warm up problems! Some random French guy had a homemade remote control helicopter with a camera on it and an audience had gathered. When my left heel popped out the back, I managed to quickly fire my other foot in the back to stop me swinging off and I knew that now I had to commit. I found myself topping out to the buzzing of the helicopter and the applause of a crowd. Scary fun and classic!

After a great week of holiday sun fun climbing and hanging out, eating cakes etc it’s time to get back into training and I’m psyched! Refreshed with some outdoor skills, I had a break from training and had a really great time with my friends!

...and after climbing these amazing rocks, what would the Font trip be without climbing through some rocks...

...and making use of the trees.