Cajon del Maipo climbing 7th to 12th Jan, 2012

 Up into the mountains we went without any real idea what the climbing would be like.In my role of climbing researcher i had failed miserably to find any decent information on climbing in this area. As per usual the drive into the mountains gave fabulous scenery. We arrive at a lovely campsite by the river with showers that were so cold youd be out suffering from hypothermia, it was like a return to the tough guy race.

Scenery on drive into Cajon del Maipo.

 We were based in a small town called Banos Morales which was pretty lively! It had a chocolate shop, some thermal baths and a tourist information office that looked like it hadnt been opened for decades.Everyone including small children rode around on horses and the place was full of dogs. It was quite charming.

The buzzing town centre of Banos Morales.

 The first day we all went to the crag we actually had a topo for. In my role I had been for a reccy run the previous night and it was quite easy to find the hitchcock crag. Right by the road and up some scree which the northbounders had moaned about in the new routes book.

Hitchcock and Punta Zanzi crags. Hot rockers strip off after the sweaty 1 hour march up the quarry road.

 Once up to Hitchcock it gave some lovely single and multi pitch climbing up edges on faces, great stuff and 5 routes on the 1st day was a good start to the week.

Huw climbing a Hitchcock 5+, lovely face climbing.

Me and Tom on the 1st belay of Psicosis.

Tom ´The Hamster´ Mackenzie about to pull over the roof on the 6a+

 The second day was to be a big day for Tom and I. Above Hitchcock on a crag called Punta Zanzi we planned to do a nine pitch E2 up a lovely system of cracks. We left the camp at 6am in anticipation of at least a 3 hour walk in and battled with the scree for hours. The problem was getting to the base of the route was probably more dangerous than the climb itself. To approach you had to traverse a sloping terrace of loose scree with a 200m drop below. I hopped across to the end of the traverse and waited for Tom and waited and waited. I retraced my steps and found him paused on a boulder in the middle of terrace. "Its a death trap" he shouted and that was that. We descended back down the terrace slowly and resumed climbing on Hitchcock.

Climbinga  great 6b+ at El Hongo crag.

 The next crag we visited was one I had found in the Chile climbing guide purchased (amongst other things in Santiago). The crag was called El Hongo and had only recently been bolted. Both Huw and I fell off a brilliant 6b+ roof in aid of cleaning the cliff of its remaining loose rock!! Its now cleaning up nicely. I managed to climb an excellent 7a through a roof (which is rare for me) on this crag on the final morning which filled me with happiness.

Alpine flowers and glaciated peaks on my ´rest day´ walk.

 After three days of climbing it was time for a break. I hiked for four hours up one side of the valley for beautiful views of sulphur lakes, and glaciers winding their way down 5000m peaks. That was in the morning. In the afternoon after a dip in the orange coloured thermal baths and lots of chocolates Becky and I walked up the other side of the valley where we planned to bivuoac in the mysterious hut marked on the map. When we arrived 3 hours later the ´hut´made me laugh hysterically. It was a wooden box at 3000m that looked like a dog kennel but you could squeeze a maximum of three people into it. After a delicious meal of noodles with tuna and a game of card we settled down into our bags for a nights sleep.

From the opposite side of the valley pointing out the next days objective Dentro del Diablo.

Thermal baths dispensed with it´s time for chocolates before the big ascent!

Happy Christmas Toby! A cam as big as my head to help protect me on those big Patagonian cracks!

Trekking up the rib to the valley

Our luxury accomodation for the night (the wooden box)

 We woke up at 6am a bit dreary and plodded up to the ridge on the skyline which looked really promising. Of course we had no idea of any established routes in this area so the previous night had just picked a line and decided to go for it! When we got up onto the ridge it was fairly nightmarish. We scrambled up through and over ribs of the loosest rock ive ever experienced. Nearly every hold came off in your hands or under your foot, i certainly wont be recommending our chosen route. After dispensing with the disgusting ribs of choss we got onto a broader ridge of scree which lead us slowly to the summit. I was knackered, i hadnt felt good the whole way up. I regretted carrying the rope and climbing gear as the quality of the rock rendered it completely useless. We sunbathed and slept on the summit just under 4000m for a good hour before running down the scree slope (MUCH FUN) back to the bivvi hut for a dip in the river.

Early morning wake up in the box

Becky storming up the loose and nasty ridge

Summit just under 4000m - Woo hoo!

 With one remaining day  Huw and I went back to El Hongo to finish my little 7a roof and retrieve my quickdraws which had been in the rock all week.  Successful we went back down the quarry road enjoying all the waves from the friendly truck drivers but failing to hitch a ride to the campsite and then went back up the other side of the valley to check out one last crag. La Mina was a big disused quarry which Id been sceptical about visiting but positive reports from Steve made me change my mind. Glad I did, gave excellent climbing and was a nice way to end our stay in the Maipo. Lesson learnt, never judge a quarry!

La Mina - awesome sport climbing.

Huw finds time for some last day bouldering.

One last walk down through the tranquil village.

Our time was up , on our last night I enjoyed one last arctic shower and a glass of melon wine from some local chileans up visiting and some of the best beef ive ever tasted. The next destination was to be very exciting; the valley of the Condors.

Las Chilcas Climbing 2nd to 6th January 2012

 A new year and lots more climbing to come. Our first stop was just north of the Chilean capital Santiago where we had spent New Year. We were destined for a conglomerate rock climbing area called Las Chilcas. You could not miss it as the Pan American highway cut right through the middle of the climbing area. This was a single pitch sport climbing area on quality conglomerate, that means fun pulling on pebbles stuck in solidified mud!

View from up high. Las Chilcas and the Pan American highway. You can just see Ernie in the layby.

 The climbing was mostly steep and on pockets and rounded pebble holds.We spent four days in total in Las Chilcas where I managed to get a lot of mileage in doing 30 routes. I onsighted a lot of 6cs and 6c+ which made me happy but kept getting shut down on the 7as. It was not until the last day with no expectations that Steve n I managed to easily climb a lovely steep 7a.

Wonderful pocket pulling at sector Diabolico, me on a 6b+ called Capeta.

Jug!!!!

Train!!

Slightly weird climbing up a wedged boulder in a gully.

 Curoiously there was a man living under a boulder with his two dogs. I could think of better places to live rather than next to a motorway. A friendly man but his real gem was in the two dogs he owned which provided us with much entertainment. Black puppy was uber friendly, big dog got jealous if he wasnt getting any attention and jumped up and scratched. I usually ran away from him for fear of the dreaded rabies!!

Post climb attention from the dogs

 During the day the temperatures must have been close to mid 30s and with little wind and no shade it was impossible to climb. Unfortunately there were no nice water holes in this location so we had to find entertainment for about 4 hours in the middle of the day.

Mid day cards to alleviate boredom.

 Our stay was nearly up but on the last night Steve and I were hungry for more climbing. Due to the short drive the following day we were not going to leave until 10am. Opportunity. In the guide I had spotted a 6 pitch route called San Pateste, mostly easy but with one 6c+ pitch in the middle. At 5 am on the drive day Steve and I awoke from a sleepless night and trotted half an hour up to the big150 metre high cliff. To speed up Steve led the first two pitches in one before I led a lovely 6a up to the crux pitch. On joining me the curry from last nights dinner seemed to have caught Steve short and he had to make a dangerous traverse to a ledge on the right to relieve himself! Absolutely hilarious but i have not included the photos here. Steve fell off the crux pitch which was overhanging which meant I had to do it to get a clean lead of the climb. Luckily it was just my style of climbing and I managed to get through it. Victory was ours after another 6a. 4 abseils later and a sprint back to the truck we were back just in time for departure and a plate full of pancakes!!

Steve finding his way through the vegetation on the way to the route.

Looking down to Steve from the 3rd pitch (6a)

The bulging 6c+ crux pitch

We were on our way to the next stag of our jourmey. To the mountains of Cajon del Maipo, south of Santiago.

Los Arenales climbing 23-12 to 29-12-2011

 This period of time represented the last week Kirsty and I would have together and it would be a week of ups and downs. We restocked in the attractive town of Mendoza with its beautiful parks and got to see my rattle snake i´d been after back in Brazil, only in a serpentarium though! We only spent 1 day here but it was enough for the girls dorm to be invaded by bed bugs. To avoid the truck getting infected the girls put a huge effort into mass extermination of all bugs.

 On our way to the mountains we stopped at a service station for a quick pee break, I slipped out leaving everyone in the back asleep. Casually I strolled out of the bathroom to see the truck pulling away from the service area. Having had this happen before I thought it was Chris´s idea of a joke so I played along and ran dramatically in slow motion after the truck waving my hands and pleading they stopped. To my dismay they did not stop and I watched as the truck pulled onto the motorway and sped away! A passer by had seen my efforts to catch up with the truck and said momento roja camion si´´?! Óff he chased. I sat down to bask in the sunshine. Half an hour later i saw the truck trundling back down the other side of the motorway and I knew i would not have to sleep on a bench - all was good. The truck was escorted back to the service station by a police man on a motobike. I thumbed down the truck and enjoyed a good laugh with the others, charmed kirsty had not even noticed my absence!

Argentinian police escorting Ernie back to pick me up. No idea how the policeman found out.

Alysroo: Alys clearly getting very bored on another long drive day.

Me getting very excited about mountain granite climbing. Kirsty looking on sympathetically!

 The drive into the mountains was stunning and signalled a big dip in temperatures. Out of the shorts n sandals and into the mountain clobber. We set up camp by a raging river in the Cajon de Arenales. This would be the first time wed get to climb famous granite ajugas (needles).

 Our stay also corresponded with Christmas which would be very weird without the family but unique in such  a location. Although it was warm during the day it was cold at night so weather wise it wasnt all that different from back home. Much merryment was had on christmas eve before we opened our 5 dollar secret santas at 1201am on christmas day. I recieved a wonderful bow and arrow kit from steve which I was sure would prove useful in the future. The next day I was ill, very ill. I could not move and spent the whole of christmas day lying in the sun getting burnt and bitten by very annoying horse flies. I was gutted as I had been so keen on a christmas day climb. In the evening managed to eat a little bit of the Steak and cheesy potato dinner and a couple of crackers. Not stuffing myself on christmas day was completely wrong!

Christmas eve celebrations

Chris dressed in his best for christmas day dinner.

 The climbing did not start till both Kirsty and I had recovered from illness on boxing day. We lcimbed a lovely 3 pitch trad route and a 4 pitch sport route. For the 27th we decided to climb the classic Armonica. 8 pitches of wonderful traditional granite graded 6a. It involved an early start and a 3 hour walk in to the base of the route up some horrendous scree. The climb was wonderful on solid grnaite with lots of pure crack climbing which I am keen to improve upon before I reach Patagonia and lots of laybacking. It took us 3 hours to climb the 8 pitches to the summit and then another hour to abseil down the north west face where the rope kept tangling on ledges and getting caught up, urghh! A great day!

Kirsty scrambling up scree to Ajuga principal and our route.

Typical cracks found on Armonica needle

Taped up and good to go!

On the summit of Ajuga principal as the weather detiorated.

A chilled out last day climbing the 7 pitch classic Filo del Caballito

The last day was spent chilling out on a beautiful route which had a variety of chimney climbing, wall climbing and slab. Kirsty led the single sport pitch and I led the other 6 trad pitches finishing on a lovely alpineesque ridge. The descent was a bit more dramatic than desired as I ignored an abseil station thinking there would be another one further down the rope only to find the ropes 5 metres too short. I popped off the end of the rope and had to downclimb the last 5 metres to safety. Good job it wasnt steep as I was about 100 metres off the ground at the time, silly boy!

Overall a very nice stay in the Cajon with some fantastic climbing. It was now onto Chile and Santiago for New year fun!