On Tuesday I crushed my last Mission burrito for the next two months. Thirty-six hours later and here I am – Rocklands, South Africa. After sticking to my jetlag combat experiment of only allowing myself to nod off on the plane rides I slept for twelve hours last night. I woke up this morning to Ethan jumping on the bed, wrapped only in a towel, yelling “Fire!”. There was no fire. I wanted to punch him in the face. Instead, I got up and went to the Hen House for coffee.
The Hen House is, as best I can guess, a renovated hen house – now tiny coffee shop on the farm. I had my morning cup with some climbers from Norway that would end up being part of our crew for the day. We sat on the back porch looking out on fields of boulders and throwing rocks for the dog, Pinotage. Not terrible.
There are basically three or four houses – all renovated farm buildings – to stay in on the Alpha Farm. We have our own for the time being which is incredibly nice. Some fellow ex-pats are bunking next door and then there are the Norwiegans. We’re basically all of the climbers here right now with the exception of a few camping down the road. Team Alpha Farm – no one actually calls us that, but they should – went to the Roadside Boulders today. The name Roadside is a bit misleading. The boulders are about a 15-20 min hike from the car, but the hike is beautiful. Semantics aside, this place is absolutely ridiculous. For the first time, I felt like I was in Africa.
We warmed up quick and shortly after had done our first Rocklands boulder problem called Roadside Dyno. The problem was tall and the perfect intro high 5 from African bouldering. Afterwards Ethan headed up the hill to try some heinously hard business while I walked over to check out a problem called Caroline. Caroline is one of the nicest boulder problems I’ve ever seen. A perfect, 40° wall with pinches and crimps stacked straight up the middle of the face. After much beta-sussage I was able to do it in two parts and am really psyched to try to link it together.
The rock and the scenery are everything they’re touted to be. The best sandstone I have ever touched and bloody sunsets. The house we’re in is incredible. One big downside is that you have to pay for the wifi here, so I have to write these things quick.
Today I was losing my mind a bit – running around, pointing at boulders, hi-5ing Ethan and screaming “We’re in Africa, dude!”. Tomorrow we check out a different are. I will try to take more pictures.
Ethan's Heart of Darkness
do u have pics of ethan in said towel? thats kinda hot.
looking forward to reading more!
Totally bitchin!!!!!!!!!!$$$$$$