Phil going for Sabotage in Dave.
Plato's Insel on the Atlantis rock in Höllental, Rax-Schneeberg, high above the Schwarza flow.
Two people traversing the Cosmiques ridge when a chough dives by.
It's that time of the year: workers hike up with heaps of work ahead. Tools: scaffolding and stairs. Deadline: before the snow melts and the tourists burst out of the mountain train to see the leftover Mer de Glace glacier. Soon, from that station, the tourists will take a high-tech 1960's lift down to the level of the 1960's. Then will start a winding descend on improvised stairs, dramatically expanded by the workers each year in order to reach the disappearing ice.
In 1825 the glacier ice was 360m thick here. In 1995 it was 245m. When I pass the plate of 2018 (sometimes I still think it's 2018 now) I still have quite a drop beneath me. Eventually I reach the current 2021 glacier: 90m thick.
There's something metaphorical to the speed of this retreat. More in the article right below..
school of destruction
Submitted by margerita
Climate disruption, biodiversity loss.. Most of the people are too occupied with making ends meet, looking for escapism on barren (sub)urban lands. Meanwhile our means of survival are sold out by greasy people looking to multiply their Ferraris. Collective action required, not lifestylish protests, but true actively society-participating change.
Green mountains all stumble atop each other
la vie en rose
Submitted by margerita
n/a atm
Led it and I sweat
Choco Prince, Easter
Liuba in Philosoff
Wanterbaach welness
Submitted by margerita
n/a atm
Aga in Phenix (more climbing on the film roll)
Into Condroz, onto the bright path, the forbidden track
Tautavel
Submitted by margerita
n/a atm
Up with the last light in La Grande Cheminée
Ben climbs Our Handsome Friend Pavel
The strawberry tree tales
Submitted by margerita
We head towards the eastside. We listen to incredible stories of the man that gives us refuge before we search for shadows in sundrenched "least developed" Ogliastra. What an honour to greet Sards on land rising dramatically up from the Mediterranean in very own green colors, as we're shown a path under 1000 year wrenched torn wooden giants.
Afterwork session (the projie)
Water solo home
Sailing seven pitches up the Fälensee skies
In our Western societies kids are taught to view the world through nations. Accompanying territorial states have been imposed on us as the basic building blocks to understand the world. The goody-goody media continues what they're taught and further reduce the globe to a bunch of nation-sized pixels.
Rivers can be an alternative basis to build up spatial knowledge.
Notice the Tagliamento river, the last Alps river of which the course has not been strained yet.
Geum Reptans above islands of ice
The white
Submitted by margerita
Alpes — the whites — Romans said of the snow-capped wall of mountains. Brightness obscures all detail of the dazzling colors of insects, foxes, lynxes and orchids. The Alps provide shadow in the heatwave that is modern life. Off the highway we tread babysteps to where all becomes bigger (or we become smaller) like Alice tiptoeing into Wonderland.
Lockdown in Luxembourg
Vertical free solo limit
Submitted by margerita
...
Mist reigns, streets are wet and weald is rainforest. Pull Marine's blank wall is unexpectedly good.
Shine on you crazy limestone
Submitted by margerita
We leave the house to the steep empire of thick-leaved evergreens. Finale Ligure hides somewhere down, where medieval buildings squeeze through the valley. Thus Finalborgo reaches for Finalmarina, and Finalmarina for the sea which sure doesn't hide in the rocky foothills (Piedmont). Like true Ligurians, packed with Ferrero sweets, we go to rock.
Die Ringbolzen des Nibelungen
Submitted by margerita
Well after sundown we escape steep rocky slopes, out of the grip of beech trees, oaks and quartzite rock monsters. Southeastwards we will continue to follow that bustling blue vein down there, boding its chain of prominent cities from where we'll push through to the lands of Das Rheingold and Die Walküre and set foot in Odenwald's hills.
Ballerina slab Kurz und Knackig on home grounds
Wim lays his eyes on Altmeisterschreck (Old Masters fright?)
Toothless at the collapsed (industrially destroyed) Grottes Schmerling
Dizzy heights
Submitted by margerita
n/a atm
Hannes
A to Z of the well-informed climber
Submitted by margerita
Stop fighting the gravity of wisdom and let climbing knowledge come to you.
Koen and Tom, Luxembourg
Font
Cave uprising
Submitted by margerita
'Roof works co.’ tries to escape apocalyptic scenes. The company flees to the heart of climbing valhalla Condroz, where the south of Belgium is said to be gentle. But la douce Belgique is reckoned without Modave’s cave. Guided by the lights of fireflies they'll be fighting on arrival, struggling for survival.
Luxembourg
Shine bright like a dino
Submitted by margerita
The sinking sun colors her own path through the beech trees. All of a sudden two cars slam on the brakes as two deer walk over. We are about to set foot in a vivid village, shining like it's just been built. Indeed, we don't know where to look first, as we're drawn to a lush garden. Come along west of the Rhine along the verge of Pfalz and Vosges...
Siudrama
Submitted by margerita
Us three return to the near-desert. Limestone cliffs turn into extraterrestrial monuments. Incontainable become the chunks of abandoned spaceship motherboards, devoured by all that grows. Today’s the day. Weeks into the infamous season — stonemeltingly hot! desolate! — we find abandoned Siurana reigned by cool sweeping breezes. We foresaw.
Ben and Hans in El Prado del Rey
Frankenjura
Fabi
..
Ice climbing in Belgium
Pomegranate garden of Eden
Submitted by margerita
The day ends in fire, the sea's screaming red. 'Cross the coast there's darkness and the menace of pitch black land...
until tiny lanterns glow up along which lone carlights gently bend.. Metal wings become feet, night becomes day and sun
beams through plataan forests, citruses and flower bulbs. Once called Lycia by vanished people we'll call it Eden.
Hans DW
Hans in Aeroplane Klaxon. On the right Boulevard du Vol, found and freed by Arnould t'Kint in 1981, with no grade to express its difficulty yet.
Jeunesse
Flight to Nice + Prophets of free climbing
Submitted by margerita
I jump in, belaying Ben in projects, and Ben belays me on the go. Over the weeks we each send a series of new personal benchmarks. Kaboom! Time to team up for multipitches?
Glucose M1, beginning of le toit (the roof)
Mission Dibona
Submitted by margerita
I open my work agenda. A lot of colored days are coming up. DIBONA BRAM they say.. Aha, the plan we made last winter: celebrating Bram’s PhD with a roadtrip into France with the elusive, high and pointy cherry on top: Dibona.
Hiding for the sun, north facing Donkey Kong
Les Quatre Cents Buts (French film (1959) and slang for The Four Hundred Goes)
Thiebout tries to figure out Borderline near Berdorf
The long awaited Chamonix trip
Submitted by margerita
..to Sweden... To the probably only place in the world where a small grocery store sells crack gloves, friends, nuts and hexes (the latter optimized in 1974 by the Swedish Tomas Carlström). We will find ourselves with no bolt in sight, no chain to clip, in a kingdom of pure trad.
Grotte du Brotsch
Veni, sendi, vici in the Modave trilogy
Three lizards
Submitted by margerita
..
Finale Jardin Secret trilogie
Report Initiations
Submitted by margerita
LUAK Trophy’s flame passed on with the assistance of Liuba. The semester is off! In the dark wintery streets a light burns at LUAK's headquarters when lost Existenz-architects stumble in and find us stuffing the KULeuven Van with the settenbakken. So the story begins, a tale of rock initiations.
LUAK Wintermeet
Submitted by margerita
Top Italia Arrampicata
Hans
Pieter
Calanques + Alpine history
Submitted by margerita
Ever yearned for a thrilling climbing chronicle unfolding above the azure blue Calanques? Sigh no more! Especially for you dear readers, fanciers of fancily written reports, I will decently typ here in the utmost strive of eloquence my very own clearly written, yes, with delicate care presented, link to Wim's Calanques report. Others can click above.
Chill a l'aise met de ijsvijs
Submitted by margerita
Ge hebt interesse in een alpiene startstage die u een basiszelfstandigheid geeft. Ge stelt het uit. En dan moogt ge telkens passen als een paar mensen een zot alpien plan hebben of een speciale multipitch weten maar met gletsjeraanloop en moordlustige seracs. Doe maar zo'n stage (of andere stevige introductie).
f*ck berge tenzij blankenberge
Submitted by margerita
Het is alweer enkele jaren geleden dat de Summermeet naar een alpiene bestemming trok. Nu is het zover: Chamonix. Dit jaar hebben we het KUL-buske, en nog goed lang zelfs, dus we rijden eerst naar La Berarde. We blijken niet alleen. (Fotoverslagje)
Eerste aprildagen met Sebastian, Brecht en Naomi.
Coldfingerweekend
Submitted by margerita
Voor dag en dauw, als licht al aanbleekt op het lover, ga ik op pad. Ik weet wel dat jij op mij wacht. Ik trek de bossen door en trek de bergen over, ik heb te vaak ver van jou mijn dagen doorgebracht.
Kobe
Costa Blanca
Submitted by margerita
We zijn goed op weg in de winter. De lesvrije week komt. We kiezen voor goedkope snelle vluchten, in ruime zetels, tussen bruingeschminkte glitterende bomma's. Jawel. Richting Benidorm. (delen I-VI + gsmfoto’s)
Professor Ivan and Pieter
Find Dave
Ailefroide
Submitted by margerita
Schapenwolkjes leken klimgrepen en een bende was al in Frankrijk rond Grenoble en Briançon. Ik moest tot dan werken. Mabon, toen wisten we het. Mijn auto werd gevuld als de kolenkachel van een stoomtrein, de koffer werd volgepuzzeld: koffer dicht.
Niels toont Marie Rose
trad bij de fransen
Submitted by margerita
EIKEBAH BOORHAKEN.. zeiden we... knuffelend met een paar sets nuts en friends. Het was tijd voor graniet en barsten. En laat de Zuid-Vogezen nu net op maar 1,2 Fontainebleau van Leuven zijn. Fotoverslag van een dik verlengd weekend:
coldfingerweekend
Submitted by margerita
Leuven. We're on the eve of spring. It's sunny, friday and late. Students, back from class/working/PhD/.., have packed in two vans and a car. Tasks are divided. Driver, music maestro, midfingermanager, co-pilot, window orchestrator.. LUAK’s coldfingerweekend is about to begin.
El Chorro
Submitted by margerita
De lesvrije week is nog niet eens begonnen of een vliegtuig Zaventem-Malaga vertrekt in het holst van de nacht. Diezelfde dag nog, 's avonds, bolt een auto over bergflanken El Chorro binnen. Het zal nog ff duren voor we tegoei beseffen wat er allemaal gebeurd is. (lang verslag)
Einde Hungaria
coldfingerweekend
Submitted by margerita
(pandemonium, iemand een echt verslag?)
verslag initiaties
Submitted by margerita
(in afwachting van verslagen van La Douce France hoorde ik)
verslag Arco
Submitted by margerita
Zwoele zomeravond. Fish are jumping out. Aankomst Arco. Na La Bérarde is er een tweede summermeet. Handig voor wie de eerste ook moest skippen wegens andere dringende trip. Ik voeg me bij de cordée van Alessio, Hannes en Wannes. Drie is geen getal om mee te zijn.
