Climbing in Bucegi Mountains - Dealing with Small Misfortunes

Every year I manage to go through the summer without great realizations in my climbing performance. This year I was as lame as usual. There are plenty of reasons not to climb during summer and I always cling on each and every one of them - it's too hot, it's raining, the rock walls aren't dry yet (if it rained beforehand), the seaside is tempting, trekking is fun, it just doesn't fit as a relaxing activity for holidays, mountain biking cannot be postponed, etc.

As soon as the fall comes, however, I seem to turn my thoughts towards rock climbing again. I come to find that it's my favorite discipline amongst other outdoor activities that I like to perform. It's silly but it's true!

Every aspect of autumn encourages the climber to hit the rock faces - cooler temps and yet warm enough to be pleasant, better friction for both sole of climbing shoes and hands, great colors of the changing landscape, new crags to climb on, especially those which are facing South, a larger group of people in every tour (they're all back from their holidays and are eager to get together) and so on.

My desire for adventure is even higher in this season and this is also fueled by the ideas that spark within our group as we climb indoor and chat in the afternoon of every week day. We, climbers from Brasov, gather more often and in great numbers, now in the climbing gym, than we did all summer at the crags. It's pretty convenient for us - we're all so sporty and yet pathetically lazy.

Bucegi mountains are a great terrain for extreme adventures and I love to go there for both climbing and hard trekking or scrambling. My trip on Saturday had a little bit of everything.

I headed with Castoru for a seldom visited conglomerate climbing wall in order to climb a seven pitches route. There are several routes across the wall and there is also room for a few other lines. Castoru is already thinking to drag me here once more in the future so I can help him to bolt what is to become a fashionable route. :-)

As usual, we carried extra gear for protection (nuts, cams and pitons) and used two half ropes for the climb. I always advise adventure climbers to be equipped likewise when going multi pitch climbing.

I'm not sure whether it was bad fortune or luck but a small event deterred us from finishing the route - we accidentally dropped a climbing shoe... I mentioned luck coz once at the top of the route, a new saga is looming for the glorious climbers, that is descending safely - there is no path and the terrain is awfully treacherous. And now, with short daylight, it meant we should be as fast as possible. So, as we couldn't afford to loose time with one of us climbing either bare foot or with mountain boots, we decided to rappel and to look for the shoe at the base of the wall, between the fir trees.

We did so and found the shoe just a few meters away from the wall; its rolling was stopped by a fallen tree.

Even though our climbing tour was abruptly stopped by this incident, I am still satisfied for learning the way up to this wild and solitary wall. I like to think that small misfortunes, seemingly annoying, are the price one has to pay in order to escape greater calamities. Perhaps if we hadn't dropped that shoe we would have had trouble on the lengthy descent (like some friends of ours had this summer).

Photos taken with my phone camera.
By the way - can you recommend me a sturdy camera phone that takes high quality pictures? Carrying a digital camera is too much for me, that's why I prefer a phone which I can keep in my chest pocket and take out easily when needed.

Take care and be safe!

Me after the first pitch - I look sleepy and a little fat Castoru - leading on the second pitchThe approach wasn't quite a piece of cake

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