Scotland hits Grenoble

Following the invitation from Erwan at Petzl I arrived in Grenoble a couple of days before the film festival. So as I had a bit of time to spare there was the chance to either go dry-tooling and try out the new Ergo's or a day sport climbing at Presles. As it was a beautiful day we opted for some bolt clipping. Erwan, Eric and I had a brilliant day out and Erwan clocked up some impressive airmiles.

The massive expanse of the Presles valley

This huge gorge is loved by climbers and BASE jumpers alike, Erwan took his rig along so I was hoping to see my first BASE jump, unfortunately it was a too windy. Monday was lashing with rain so I got to go and check out the Petzl Factory and Offices - what an inspiring place to work. As you walk into the building you are surrounded by amazing images, probably every Petzl poster ever printed. The offices are filled with little groups clustered round their Macbooks designing the next bit of super swanky new kit. (Sadly I didn't manage to steal any shiny kit whilst I was there!)

Late afternoon we went to collect the evening's whisky supplies from the local whisky expert, and were given detailed instructions of the best order to drink them in for maximum effect. Next stop was the station to collect some journalists, we then got a bit lost but arrived at the festival venue just in time to don out kilts and jimmy wigs and get serving the whisky.

After the film was shown we (Erwan le Lann, Tony Lamiche, Martial Dumas, Yann Mimet, Mathieu Meynadier and myself) were invited up on stage for a question and answer session. Completely terrifying, 3000 people and I don't speak french! Luckily the host decided that it would probably get lost in translation asking me anything and talked to the others instead!

At the end of the evening everyone who had appeared in the films that night was invited up for a team photo - which meant I got to share the stage with french ice climbing legend Francois Damilano, thankfully by that point we had all decided to get rid of our kilts! I have realised that I don't look good in a skirt and I was jealous of the other boys tanned legs - think I need to spend more time somewhere sunny!

At the aftershow party (rock and roll lifestyle!!) we finished off the whisky. Then when we all got thrown out of the venue headed back to Erwan's house until the early hours. Finding my way back through Grenoble to my hotel proved a challenge and I thought I was going to end up bivvying out in a side street.

A great few days, really good to catch up with the boys again. A massive thank you to Erwan and Petzl for the invite, hopefully see them all back in Scotland again soon.

Next day I dashed back to Manchester to go to Mountain Equipment's 50th anniversary celebration night and product launch. A great film about the history of Mountain Equipment's involvement in mountaineering over the last 50 years made by Brian Hall was shown, followed by a "fashion show" of some key garments over the years, and of course the new range for winter 2011. The star turn being Andy Parkin in his original all in one down suit from the '80's. Next up were Dave Macleod and Paul Diffley introducing The Architect, the short version of the Smith Marshall film. Fun evening and looking forward to some of the bright hardshell suits heading our way next year.

Just around the corner?

Looking out at the dusting of snow on Kinder and getting an update from James Thacker who was on cosy ML camp in Snowdonia (suffer!!), it seems that winter really is on it's way. So I thought I'd share a few photos from last winter's Welsh antics to get psyched. I really hope we get such amazing conditions this season, I've got some lines spied out and can't wait to get stuck into them. And no, I'm not telling you where they are!

Cwm Silyn

Central Ice Fall



Craig y Rhaeadr



Chequered Wall



Cracking Up - photo Ray Wood



Good Luck - and be careful out there, a smack in the mouth from your axe hurts!

Sneaky post

Andy isn't looking so I thought I'd sneak in a picture of him signing a copy of Alpinist!! The perils of being a winter climbing hero!
Article wrttten by Ian Parnell about their ascent of Bruised Violet in 2009, really good article and fab pictures too.

Issue 31 if anyone is interested.


I'm going to be in trouble

Ruth

New Mountain Equipment Delivery

Woo hoo, winter appears as does shiny new kit from those lovely people at Mountain Equipment. In the box this year are lots of new products, two of them, pictured below, are jackets to keep me toasty warm in different conditions.

This is the NEW Citadel jacket designed to keep you warm in conditions from Patagonia to Alaska, but will be perfectly at home on those long winter belays in Britain when trying to push new lines. Similar to the Fitzroy, but with twice the insulation. I had a prototype to test last winter and used it whilst filming The Pinnacle, a great week with some cold conditions especially hanging around on belays waiting for cameras to get into position.

Next up is the NEW Arete Jacket (in Bombay Orange - good colour!), having seen this at the product launch last year I could hardly wait for them to go into production and I could get my mitts on one. When it arrived I loved the jacket but I wasn't sure what I was going to use if for (other than looking cool in the pub!), but as Mountain Equipment say it's perfect as an alternative to a mid layer fleece, actually it's even more adaptable being lighter and smaller to pack. So far it's been used out on the grit as a great layer to chuck on in between routes/problems. Or to be stolen by Ruth whilst she takes photos!

More on some of the other products as they get used.

Holland's Highest mountain

Check this out. The last Great Problem. What do you reckon will happen first, getting pumped or getting the fear?

This image cropped up on my Facebook account from a friend in Holland.

It needed to be checked out so found this article Jack Geldard of UKC wrote last year.

I think id be terrified climbing the slab side nevermind the overhang but what an awesome facility, just dont go in high winds I guess.

Grenoble Mountain Film Festival Invite

Film Festival season is coming to it's peak and I'm getting psyched for the premier of The Pinnacle (Smith Marshall Project) at Kendal Film Festival in a couple of weeks. Out of the blue came an invitation from Petzl's Erwan le Lann to go to the Grenoble Mountain Film Festival. They are having a Scottish themed evening and showing the film the Petzl team made a couple of winters ago in Scotland. The boys had originally contacted me to get some information and I ended up acting as their tour guide for the 10 day trip, the highlight being Ueli Steck repeating my route The Secret in about 20 minutes, I almost hung up my rack there and then!
The only prerequisite is that I turn up with a kilt, now searching for both a kilt and a set of Jimmy Wigs for the boys to wear whilst they hand out whisky. Anyone who can help me out with either of those things - please get in touch!!



Les 12èmes Rencontres du cinéma de montagne
Uploaded by maisondelamontagne. - Discover the latest sports and extreme videos.

Sunday dawned damp so as my brother lives about 3 minutes walk from The Depot, we went to check it out.
The British Bouldering Youth Team were there on a training session, looking super strong and putting us to shame!
Lukasz Warzecha made a short film about the team a couple of months ago whilst they were competing up at Ratho - so check it out and get to know them.
Good to see the team getting together and showing some team spirit, would be great to think that we could do something similar for the World Cup Ice Climbing Competitions - maybe sometime in the future, near future?

The BMC presents the British Junior Climbing Team from Lukasz Warzecha - LWimages.co.uk on Vimeo.