The Bugaboos - A tale of epics

After spending some more days at the Atlantis Wall in Echo Canyon, where Tim and I managed to do 2/3 of all the routes on the sector, including several 7b's en c's and a 43m long 8a+, called Buffet Royale, for me, we packed our stuff and headed towards the Bugaboo Provincial Park, located in the Purcell mountain range to do some trad climbing in an alpine setting. At the same time this was the first time for me, and so i had to accept everything that's part of it, like long and hard approaches with heavy backpacks, moderate food, bad windy (hurricane is more appropriate) weather, getting up endless cols and the like. But we were able to climb some nice popular routes on all of the most important spires: McTech Arete on Crescent spire and Northeast Ridge on the Bugaboo spire were two nice but very easy mellow routes. Much harder and with a longer approach was Fingerberry Jam on Fingerberry Tower (5 pitches), located next to the Howser towers and North Summit Direct on the west face of the Snowpath Spire. One thing that all these climbs had in common was the fact that there always happened something, from minor shitty things to real epics. I felt like cursed, especially because Tim went a few times climbing with Aki, a Japanese we met in Bow Valley, and things went smooth when climbing with him, but when I joined something happened. Or the rope got stuck when rapping down, or we couldn't find the rap station at the top of Fingerberry Tower, and, after looking for more than an hour, had to rap down the route we climbed, leaving behind several slings ad biners, and with again rope problems, arrived at the campsite at 11 pm after walking 2 hours with soaking wet shoes. Another time I stared climbing totally frozen in Sunshine crack (NW face of Snowpatch spire), arriving at the first anchor as a dead man. But the epic of all epics mother nature kept aside for us 'till the very end. To days ago Tim, me and Aki wanted to do the North Summit Direct, 8 pitches containing some 5.11 pitches, fairly hard for me, since my crack techniques sucks. We knew the chance of showers was 60% that day, meaning a thunderstorm in the afternoon, as low hot air collides with cold mountain air, creating thunder and lightning. We were a bit slow with 3 guys, and the 3 last pitch all of a sudden hail came down from dark angry clouds, that we already saw approaching from afar. Nonetheless we continued climbing, hoping to arrive to the top before all hell broke loose. Idle hope actually, when Aki continued it stared to hail more and more, we yelled at Aki to rap dawn, and when he arrived we saw his chalk bag was full of hail instead of chalk, and we weren't able to see our anymore. They were covered with an icy layer of hail. So we had to rap down the route on some fixed nuts and slings with soaky wet ropes and almost totally frozen hands and bodies. "Climbing is cool", Aki said. He was right, when you're in a warm sleeping bag, with a hot meal and protected against the fury going on outside. We were lucky, we arrived at our tents just in time, the bad weather was accompanied with wind almost 10 beaufort at the scale of Richter. Two other guys, Sang and Nathan, we knew from Squamish can tell the same epic, but a day earlier. While climbing the Becky-Chouinard on the South Howser tower (20 pitches and 'the' Bugaboo classic)- also succesfully climbed by Tim and Aki, congratulations - Nathan got some electrical shocks in his ass and Sang's ice axe started zooming. Scary. So, feeling cursed, Tim and I decided to leave and head towards the US - country of -hopefully - cheap food. Probably we'll go and check out the basalt climbing in Trout Creek.

Me in the 3th pitch of Fingerberry Jam

No comment

Tim climbing the first pitch of Fingerberry Jam

Indeed, and I'm Jesus!

On top of the Bugaboo Spire - beyond the Howsers's north face

Aki, the jamming master

Start hailstorm...

...and a few minutes later

The newest chalk on the market: Hailchalk - Supersticky for ultra performances

Trying to write my name with the moon - failure

Me safe on the ground after the hail storm

From the Bow Valley to the Bugaboos

Here are some random selected pictures from our adventures in the Bugaboos. The story follows. Stay tuned!

Parking lot with chicken wire against the marmot-chipmunk kind of creatures



Applebee Dome campsiye and the Snowpatch Spire



Howsers on the background

Me in one of the Sunshine crack pitches

No hands in the fistcrack of the last pitch of sunshine crack



Bijschrift toevoegen



Bugaboo spire on the left and Crescent spire on the right

Tim attacking the fistcrack in Siunshine crack

Full protection against nature

Once on a rainy day

Mais qu'est-ce qu'on fait ici?

We escaped the rain in Squamish and headed eastwards to the canadian Rockies. Our first stop was in Skaha (Penticton), one of the driest and arid places in Canada, and so hot they even can produce wine there. But here to the rain kept following us. Despite one day of good weather, during which we climbed some shiity rock in the burning sun, we moved our asses out of this not so pretty region and continued our way to the Bow Valley (Banff and canmore). Our Walter survived his first long distance trip and we could enjoy the beautiful Rockies during the ride without worrying about car problems. This part of Canada is the most expensive place on earth. Banff is like Chamonix but without the climbing and mountaineering atmosphere. Instead hordes of tourists are engulfing the region with their RV's and 4x4's. You have to pay for everything here, a basic campsite is 26 dollars and when you enter the Banff national park, you have to buy a pass, none of which we actually did. Sleeping in the car is so much better than being immersed in an elitist campground full of people who just are to lazy to get there asses out to the top of a mountain and instead just walk 500m to a lake, just to return after 30minutes, filling parking lots with tons of cars (literally), and causing problems for other people who really want to enjoy nature during a day trip. Enigo, the Spaniard from Basque Country, who came along with us, went back to Squamish. Just as we did during massive rainfall on this trip, he asked himself "Qu'est-ce que je fais ici?". Me and Tim took advantage of 2 sunny days to hit the rock. We went to Cougar Canyon and Echo Canyon. Although the rock is a bit chossy at times, we could enjoy some routes. I did an 8a and 7c in Cougar creek and Tim could do the same 7c. The approaches to the different sectors are really long, 1 hour minimum, but the good point is, that it's calm and quiet, no crowds or traffic noise, perfect. A few days ago, we took a rest day and went to Moraine Lake and hiked up to the Sentinel pass. No massive tourist invasion up there. Yesterday first shower in 10 days, today again mierda liquida,  and two dirtbaggers who ask themselves "qu'est-ce qu'on fait ici?"

Hails

Hoog Sammie, kijk omhoog Sammie, want dan wordt je lekker nat

The car is in the pocket. Finally freedom and no more walking to buy stuff. It's a 20 year old volvo 740, and it still drives pretty smooth. Only, the left front light is broken, there is no right mirror, the speedometer and odometer are broken. The horn sounds like a coughing chain smoker when honking, and the knalpot is as good as disappeared.  Walter, we have baptised our car, old but undestroyable.

How has the climbing been, well not much "soeps", rain, rain and again rain. Last week, before we get rained out, we did Alaska Highway (5 pitches). A really nice route but it felt so hard for me. The second pitch is a bit overhanging with chimneys. So you have to squeeze and press your a way up. both technical and physical, in the end i did more aid climbing, just pulling on the gear. A really got multiple slabs in the face, also in the next pitch. Offwidths and chimneys are hell if you don't know the technique.

After Alaska highway, you have a ledge and then you can continue with the Calling, what we did. It was already too late to finish the route, so we only did the first 2 pitches, and the second pitch is an amazingly incredible perfect and at least 30m crack. I laybacked it (i can't fucking properly handjam yet). I never shouted so loud in a route before. I finished it with pumped chickenwings.

After that it startyed raining, untill the rain was pouring into our tent. Stinky, humid sleeping bag = not cool. Now both me and my sleeping bag have become first class "dirtbags". I went with Siebe to Murrin park (we call it urine, go to nightmare rock there and you'll know why) to do some single pitches and take a bit easier. We also went to Cheakamus canyon, apparently the only sportclimbing area in the neighborhood. Here we discovered a totally different kind of climbing. The rock is gneiss, a kind of granite bit less rough. Nice to feel sharp crimpers under my fingers again, peeling off  layer after layer of skin. We did some 7th degrees and I could do 8a+ in the big overhang at the end of the day, while being totally frozen, fossilized and feeling cripple like an 80 year old man. That's the time to send things. Bompa Sam did it again.

Yesterday evening Tim went to the presentation of Nina Caprez for the Squamish Mountain festival, while I stayed with siebe in Cheakamus to do the 8a+. When he came back, he was followed by a policecar, but didn't notice it. A liitle bit further he saw the cap and pulled over at the next intersection. He got a fine of 250 bucks, cuz he was driving to fast (speedometer doesn't work remember) and apparently he neglected the the policeofficer in his car. The fact that half of the car is broken, there were 2 people to much in the car, and Tim that had drunken a beer didn't seem to be a problem for the cop (well we can discuss about Tim's alcohol test when the cop couldn't figure out how to use the alcohol blow thing and instead asked "breathe in my face", probably that's the fininf reason) but seeking a safe stopplace and fining you for that is the world going around in squares. If we don't pay in 30 days, we'll get a conviction and we'll have to do collective work instead of the payment. Lol we're moving our asses out of here in the next weeks, so no payment and no problems, although a dry night in the cell is worth the consideration, just a little. 

Walter, the Sportbolide

Fearless creature (mix of rat, mouse and squirrel) - beware, nothing seems what it likes

Second pitch of The Calling - Bambi Sam the beast roaring himself straight to hell

 

Maestro Tim leading and almost dying in the second pitch - begin ma te kwijle

The Big Show wall in Cheakamus

Hails

Busted in the showers

It has been a while since my last post. Meanwhile a lot of things have happened. First the shower story. As there is no shower at the campsite, we wanted to check out the showers at the Klahanie camping 400m down the road, which is forbidden. After a first inspection round, we returned in the evening at 10h, hoping there would be nobody in the showerblock, but we got caught by the raging bull campsite wife while standing under the shower. It freaked us out. The stupid asympathic rich people with a big 4x4 and a cravan as big as my house saw us entering the building. Man that women was dangerous, she almost teared off the showercurtains, grabbing all our stuff, throwing it through the air and forcing us to come out of the shower naked, yelling like "you have no right to be here, you didn't pay, now you have to deal with it". If the women would have had a shotgun, we would now be dead, I can tell you that. But in the end it was a funny experience, standing outside bare naked with people laughing at you.

A 50% shower - we've had a first 100% shower in the rec(reation) center a few days ago, in the swimming pool shower there, bringing no swimming short with us, and thus showering in our underwear - give us enough energy to attack Grand Wall again. This time we did it without problems. After that days of rain kept us away from climbing. The visit of a special guest to our campsite helped us to survive the boring period. A momless little baby bear roamed around for 2 or 3 days searching for food. And food it did found, in the form of all my apples, rice cakes and little triangular breads, our bear boxes didn't close to well and during the night the little one mananged to open the door, grab the food and run off. This was my first bear encounter ever, a wild bear a couple of meters away from me, he being more scared asme. After the sky showed us his blue again, we tried Freeway, another 12 pitch long classical route on the Chief, and slightly harder then the Grand Wall. Reaching the summit, Red didn't want to rappel, he didn't want his ass dangling in the air under a giant roof, so we walked back along the trail, barefooted, 'cuz we didn't bring our shoes with us. Once but not twice. lol

Tim and me are now very excited, because we're going to buy a car. We've met an Australian climber here, Rob Wall (suitable name for a climber) who wants to sell his 20 year old Volvo to us for 700$. A nice deal and a real luxury in "beautiful" British Columbia. The belgian dirtbaggers are almost free to hit the road!!

Hails

Our rack of gear

Me in the Split Pillars

Me in one of the pitches of Freeway

Tim Hulk

Tim in the Split Pillars