Check out this rad video my good friend Matt Hanner put together of a problem at Little Rock City, Tennessee. He is a professional photographer in Atlanta who recently started dabbling in climbing videos. His first videos are amazing so I can’t wait to see what he produces in the future!
Two highballs at the Buttermilks: Mesothelioma and Secrets of the Beehive, plus Stained Glass thrown in for good measure. Check out my wacky new move on Secrets, the dropknee reverse mantel cross or DRMC.
I use the term ‘Around the World’ loosely because we are only going to Europe and South Africa. I’d love to continue jetsetting around the world for a year or more but I didn’t win the lottery and so far nobody has paid me to climb a rock.
We purchased our airfare for the whole trip through Orbitz. The cost for Atlanta to Paris to Cape Town to Atlanta was $1,694. We haven’t booked a car for South Africa yet but we have one for Europe. In Europe we are doing the lease buy-back program through Peugeot. It is cheaper than renting if you need a car for more than a month but it’s still pricey. It might be cheaper to buy and sell a used car but we didn’t feel like it would be worth the hassle and the likelihood that we would be ripped off since we don’t parlez le french. The way a lease buy-back works is that you pay a set charge like a rental car but they deliver to you a brand new Peugeot at the airport and you drop it back off with them when you leave. It includes a full warranty, insurance, and even roadside assistance. The best part is we booked a Peugeot 207 SW which has a 1.6L diesel engine that gets 60 MPG on the freeway! Considering diesel in France costs $6.50 per gallon, this car will definitely save us some money on gas! For all these benefits we had to fork over $3,758, or split two ways, $1,879 per person. Our chariot for Europe:
Peugeot 207 SW
Typically it is cheaper to fly to Europe so let’s say that portion of the flight is $694 and it’s $1,000 to fly to South Africa. Our total travel costs in Europe are: $694 flight + $1,879 car + $450 gas = $3,023. We are projecting to spend somewhere in the neighborhood of $2,000 in housing/camping/shelter and $1,600 in food for our four month stay in Europe. So that brings the total up to $6,623. We tried to be conservative and budget more money than we’ll need but we’ll see how it looks after a few weeks in France.
South Africa is a lot cheaper than Europe but we haven’t decided whether we are going to risk using Best Beetle to get a 40 year old car for $200 per month. We also don’t know whether we’ll be sharing a house the whole time or camping part of the time. Some people have said the camping is awesome and some people have said it’s terrible. We’ve heard the same thing about camping in Font so we’ll have go find out for ourselves. Here’s the rough SA budget so far:
Flight: $1,000
Shelter: $600
Car + Gas (per person): $425
Food: $800
Total: $2,825
Throw in a contingency plus a few hundred dollars for oversize baggage fees (crashpad) and we get to our grand total of $11,000 for seven months of international fun. If you are a climber in need of motivation to save money, I’d say this is a good place to start. I’d take the trip of a lifetime over buying a house or new car any day of the week!
This is all speculation since it’s been seven years since I’ve been to Europe and I’ve never been to Africa before. We’ll let you know how much we really spent at the end of the journey. If anyone has any suggestions for where to stay, whether to camp or pony up for real shelter, and what type of car is best to rent in South Africa, we are welcome to it!
I am starting 2010 off with a bang by quitting my full time job of two plus years. My last working day of 2010 will be January 29th. Two days later I will be driving a Uhaul with all my belongings across the country to my hometown of Atlanta with a brief stop in Hueco along the way.
2,200 Miles
From there lots of unpacking and packing will occur and on February 9th me and my good friend Leslie Warnock will be departing for Paris, France. We will start off the trip in Fontainebleau where we will climb for 1-2 months. From there we don’t have a set plan but lots of time will be spent in Switzerland among other countries. We’ll be in Europe for four months before flying to South Africa on June 1st. The Rocklands will be our home until our return flight to the US. Leslie is flying home at the end of July to start grad school and I will stay a few extra weeks before flying home on August 21st. When I get back to the States I will continue the trip here for at least six months or until I run out of money. Up until now my longest climbing trip has been two weeks so this will be a whole new experience for me. I am a little anxious but mostly excited about my new life as a climbing bum.
I’ve been busy selling off things that I won’t be needing for the next year which freed up some cash to buy new film making toys. The best part is that I’ll finally be climbing with someone else who is psyched on filming and editing. Leslie has already made several short climbing vids, so you can look forward to seeing lots of great climbing footage from the two of us as we travel the world for seven months in search of the best boulders!
I just sold my car yesterday, so for the next four weeks I am trapped in the suburbia that is Irvine, California. I don’t even own a bike so my sole mode of transportation is a pair of old running shoes.
I made it up to Bishop one last time to drink beer, heckle, and snap photos. I’ve got some video to finish editing but until then, here are some stills from the weekend.
Bridget on the classic High Plains Drifter
Bridget on High Plains Drifter
Bearded Ian on Stained Glass
Stained Glass
Success!
I’m in Atlanta for the holidays and luckily I had a couple of free days to go climbing. On Monday we headed up to Little Rock City which is just north of Chattanooga, TN. It was a beautiful day with a high of 50. Conditions were prime and I was psyched to get back on The Shield. Every year I come home the sandstone blows my mind. It’s so completely different from climbing anywhere out west. You can use features here that would be impossible to hold if it were granite. The rock is so smooth yet it grips like sandpaper. After warming up we headed over to the Tristar/Dragon Lady corridor. I managed to do Celestial Mechanics V7 first try which was rad. It’s one of those climbs that I could hardly pull on the starting holds a few years ago. After that a few of us started working on King James V10 which starts on the left arete and climbs up and right with a crux that is higher than the finishing hold of Celestial. On my first try I climbed up the arete and then over onto cool blocky features and made the big cross at the top to gain a small three finger edge but fell trying to grab the next hold. On my next go I grabbed the same three finger edge and committed to grabbing the positive right hand hold. At this point I tried to swing my foot out right to a ledge but couldn’t immediately place it there so I had to fight to hold the swing on the tiny crimp. Mid-swing I heard a pop from my left hand…
Video featuring lots of hard new climbs from Black Mountain California, several first ascents including Vorpal Blade V13, a few old classics such as Morphic Resonance, a guest appearance from Sarah Palin, and even a highball or two. Hope you like it!
We headed up to Black on Saturday to find out if we could drive up the mountain. Luckily the gate was wide open so we drove straight up to the Corral. There was still some snow on the ground from last week but the boulders were dry. It was 40 degrees when we arrived but the sun was out so the conditions were perfect! After warming up we worked on the mid-day lightning project which is just below the corral next to Dark Horse. This wall is amazing and it has features that beg to be climbed. Unfortunately it still feels hard! Not sure how this one will go but somebody needs to do it!!
Mid-day Lightning Project
I drove north on Wednesday to spend my Thanksgiving in Bishop. Thursday was a beautiful day in the buttermilks. I worked on a few things; finally managed to do Stained Glass which was exciting! All this time and I had been grabbing the last hold wrong! There is a little razor hiding on the left side of the hold which is the key to victory!
Alex Savage on Stained Glass V10
Here’s an old clip of Ian McIntosh climbing Expatriot V11 at Black Mountain. Unfortunately he sent as the sun was going down so the footage is noisy.
On Friday we drove north to the land of large boulders. We arrived in Bishop at midnight and past out. Saturday morning started off with one of the best warm up circuits in the world: Sunshine Wall, Green Wall, The Hunk, and High Plains Drifter. It felt great to be back in Bishop for the first time since spring. After warming up someone in our group had the bright idea to work on the Mystery (Grandma boulder). We headed down the hill to join a full gym scene of 20+ people. We worked on the Mystery for a while, Sam crushed it (again) and he got really close on Direction, falling on the Thunderbird move at the end five times.
