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2013-01-25

The first time I heard about Peñoles was years ago in Cresciano when my Mexican friend Diego Montull was talking about this remote bouldering area in the mountains of Mexico. Eventually his photos and stories got me wanting to visit the place. However the last few years especially the Northern part of Mexico has been very unsafe with an ongoing war between the drug cartels. Now things seem to have cooled down a bit so we decided to finally go see for ourselves what this place is all about.

We flew to El Paso in Texas, right on the Mexican border, packed the car with everything we needed for a couple weeks trip and drove down to Peñoles. After about 12 hours of travel, two of which were spent dealing with import permits for our cars, which you need to get through the military check points and another two hours just plain lost, we finally found ourselves in the massive boulder field of Peñoles. We spent the first night just sleeping outside by the boulders and set up our camp in the morning.

The massive potential was hard not to notice straight away. Just within minutes of walking from our camp there are great problems like El Baca Loca (V13), Lado Activo del Infito (V14) and El Fantasmo Hambiento (V12). And now on top of that my first ascents; Zugzwang, El Infierno, 101, El Señor de los Cielos and Blood and Sand. And that’s just what’s right next to the camp.

Peñoles is geologically a lot like Hueco; a mountain of boulders in the middle of the desert. Also the rock in many places is similar to Hueco, but that’s pretty much all these places have in common. There are no restrictions of Hueco, no entrance fees, no waiting in line, no back-country guides needed. You can camp by the boulders and go climbing whenever you want without getting a permission from anyone. Those who’ve never been to Hueco may take all that for granted, but really it’s a privilege.

Almost all the boulders are massive and although the rock type is similar to Hueco, some of the features and the size of the boulders remind me more of Bishop. At first glance a lot of the rock seems chossy, but it usually cleans up really well. Let me be specifically clear about this. I did not climb on choss once the whole trip. Sure, there is also lot of chossy rock in Peñoles, but when you have a ridiculous amount of rock to choose from, why would you climb on anything but good rock? You find a lot of great patina rock which is bomber and barely needs any cleaning.

The rock seems to be made for hard boulders. While there are great problems and projects for all grades, what really strikes my eye is the amount of hard projects in the v14 - v17? range. It is very rare to find these lines that are really hard but still possible and I don’t think I’ve never seen so many of them anywhere else in the world.

Zugzwang is one of the hardest problems I opened this trip. It’s a total freak-style problem and it took me 3 days of work and cleaning to do. It’s also one of the most morpho problems I’ve ever put up and particularly hard for me. Zugzwang has a very unique sequence; it starts with a ninja-kick dyno to a position where I am completely spanned out to the point i have to open-hand everything. From here I get a swing going and kick my foot on a foothold as far as I can possibly reach. After matching my feet and inverting my body horizontal I am totally stretched out in every direction. And here comes the crux; the release. You’re completely stuck and feels like moving any part of your body will just send you flying off the wall, hence the name. I only managed to hold this crazy swing once on the send.

First ascent of Zugzwang (V14)

To the right of Zugzwang I opened another stunning and hard highball El Señor de los Cielos. It’s proper bigwall bouldering, just trying to find the easiest way to navigate up the huge overhanging face.

Bimbos & Booze is another great one I opened. It has a hard dyno start off a rock and the whole wall is perfect Hueco style patina rock. It’s in the same zone with, Corona sin Rey, another new amazing and hard highball. Corona sin Rey is really long and sustained and although not as steep as the Martini cave in Hueco, it reminds me a lot of Esperanza.. except maybe when you’re at the last moves 9 meters of the ground manteling over the lip!

First ascent of Bimbos & Booze

Also in the same area is yet another great highball I opened called High Definition. This tall slightly overhanging patina face might be my favorite problem I that opened in Peñoles. It has very Bishop style climbing, but across the whole wall the rock is like the best kind of iron rock you can find in Hueco.

The downclimb from El Infierno

El Infierno is another really hard one I opened. It was my last problem of the trip and I was very psyched to leave with having finishing all the projects I had set out to. El Infierno is Diego’s old project that he’s spent a lot of time working on and I was psyched to hear he managed to send it as well shortly after we left! The really hard part of the problem is down lower, but it keeps going and going until you find yourself on top of a 20 meter tall boulder. This is when I found out there’s no easy way down! I ended up down-climbing a steep slab with some loose rock halfway down and jumping over a big gap onto another big boulder, which you still need to down-climb to the get back to the ground!

El Intento project

There are some really hard projects waiting in Peñoles, like Diegos El Intento project to name one. Diego has tried it over 7 years now and he’s getting closer. That and the countless projects and all the problems that he has opened up to V14, should keep anyone busy for a long time. And every day we kept finding great new projects that I’m psyched to get back to!

Just another project we found

I’ll leave the safety issues of traveling to Mexico for everyone’s own consideration, but apart from that Peñoles is well worth a trip in my opinion. Some more information about the place can be found here: http://www.toropesado.com/toro/pesado/

Stay tuned for the videos!!

Yesterday I managed to make the first ascent of the well known Wagon project seen in the Dosage 4 film. While it was probably the most famous boulder project in the world, I’d wanted to climb this problem ever since Dave Graham showed it to me in 2006.

Off The Wagon, as I named it, is one of the purest boulders I’ve ever climbed! There are only a few features on the wall and they are far apart. I used the same beta that Chris Sharma was trying in the Dosage film; a hard deadpoint to a crazy campus rose-move. If not also the first move, the second move is something that I’ve never seen anywhere else in the world! It’s very unique! Basically the boulder distills down to a really hard 2-move sequence followed by an easier but really nice outro.

So how do you grade something like this? Since I climbed my first 8B+, Dreamtime, almost 8 years ago I’ve reached a level of climbing 8B+ quickly and consistently. Although I’ve tried the Wagon project mostly one day here and there on different trips and often in less than ideal conditions, it still took me three sessions this trip alone. I can’t think of another 8B+ that would have given me that much resistance recently. That is why I find it hard to see it as your typical 8B+.

As always, it will suit some people better than others. Although it’s my style, I’m extremely spanned out sticking the first dyno which makes the next campus move really hard. I must have fallen there at least eight times on the link, after sticking the first dyno. So based on my experience on the problem, I’m proposing 8C for it.

The funny thing is that since my first time on it years ago, I always felt like I should be able do it pretty easily, but this problem is deceiving. It’s easy to feel like you are close, but putting together that last missing little bit turned out to be much harder than I thought.

Numbers aside, this boulder is something really special and for me personally topping it out was a very concrete sign of progress! Already many strong climbers are lining up to try Off the Wagon, so I’m sure soon enough we’ll have a better guess at the difficulty.

That’s one more project down, but still so many to left to try!

Important note: Although other areas in this valley aren’t concerned, this particular boulder is access sensitive due to it’s proximity to some houses. Please be respectful when visiting this boulder and keep the noise down.

2012-11-20

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I opened two great new boulders today! Here’s a video still of the first ascent of Simple Life, 8B. This problem has a hard sequence revolving around a shallow mono, which is actually surprisingly comfortable. You don’t find that everyday on granite!

2012-11-18

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Here I am, back in Switzerland trying some of my old projects in Ticino. This trip I’ve been focusing on five projects that are all in the 8C range and some definitely seem harder. I’ve found all of these projects already on previous my trips, but it has taken me a lot of effort and many days to clean all of them and fix the landings. All of these projects are pretty sizable and required a ton of work. A lot of the boulders here in this valley are massive and a just simple thing like getting on top of the boulder to set up a top-rope for cleaning can turn into a mission on it’s own. Now I finally get to enjoy all the work I’ve put in over a couple trips and focus on climbing!

What’s awesome is that all my projects are a bit different styles, so you can get a good rotation going on. I’ve already made good progress on some of them and a couple days ago I managed to send my main project, Momentum! After spending four days cleaning it in the rain and working on the landing and then four more days actually working on the boulder problem, I’m particularly proud of my getting the first ascent. Momentum (8C /V15) climbs up a tall blank overhang and you use every feature on the wall. It has a very dynamic style and the crux sequence is a series of two dynamic moves, the first one to a perfect flat pinch followed by a pogo move to a sloper.

A few days ago I got really close on the Wagon project which some of you may know from Dosage 4. It starts with a really awesome dyno to a gaston edge. From there you do a one of a kind campus rose-move. The dyno is hard and you have to be really precise. I used to think this project wouldn’t be so crazy, but given the amount of days it has already taken me over a few trips, it’s proven to be harder than I thought. The real project here is, however, starting from the ground and not standing on top of the wagon. This start is super obvious and it adds a really difficult sequence to the already hard project.

Let’s see, then there’s the really highball prow project which I haven’t tried yet and an even more highball project that must be really, really hard. And the roof dihedral which I think I finally figured out and have done most moves on.
Not everything here is 8C. I’ve also put up some totally awesome easier problems like Bio Spezial 7A+ and Sound of Silence 7A. I also put up a great and very highball problem that I named Life is A Gamble. The crux is the last move where you have to shift all your weight onto a bad smear and pounce to a sloper.

Today was supposed to be a restday, but I went to have a look at Carlo Traversi’s Heritage (8B+/V14), which he put up just a couple days ago. After seeing it all chalked up, I couldn’t resist it and went back to the car to get the pads. This problem is absolutely amazing! I managed to do it in a short session and enjoyed every second of it! I remember in 2010 I started cleaning this problem, but got side-tracked by all the other projects. This is why it’s great to have other people with a different vision here establishing new problems! And after only climbing on projects for the past weeks, it sure was a nice change to just go and repeat a problem.

The weather forecast for next week looks good and conditions are prime right now, so hopefully I’ll be able to take down some of these other projects soon! Stay tuned for the video of the first ascent of Momentum!

2012-11-16

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With the great conditions today here in Ticino, I managed to send a phenomenal project that I’ve been working on for the past couple weeks! This boulder is a dream come true for me and one of my biggest achievements.

Momentum, 8C climbs up a tall overhang with explosive and powerful moves and very few footholds. It has one of the most amazing sequences I can think of! So simple, yet so intricate. The boulder itself is so big that getting back down can be tricky.

Here’s a frame from the video which will be up on my website soon along with a blogpost!

2012-09-13

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Check out this video of the first repeat of Paul Robinson’s A Simple Knowing at Topside, South Africa. Great problem and one of the first boulders we climbed in SA after flying in from Australia. I know this could have been uploaded a lot sooner, but the internet in Africa can be tricky sometimes..