S U N

"Sun is shining, the weather is sweet". Makes you want to climb. Doesn't it?

Extremely rare sunny day! We hardly ever get to see sun in November in Finland. Not to mention climbing! But today (22.11.2009) was a welcome exception!

Testing testing, so interesting. I think these new DSLR's make handy cams quite obsolete...

Past weeks

I have been a bit busy with school work lately. Hence the lack of updates. Here are few shots from past weeks.


Kirsi sending one of the best aretes in Jyväskylä called 'Uniikki'. Moves on it are very unique indeed. It is an arete, but doesn't climb like one.


One of the strongest boulderers in Finland Jussi Remonen has changed his passion from climbing to woodwork and other hand crafts.


Jussi's stool. Everything is done by hand and no electrical appliances or screws are used. Everything is done the old fashion way!


One morning in Lehtisaari.

Fyysikko

A funny video of my accent of Fyysikko... How nice to see yourself behaving like a total twat. Believe it or not, but I was still enjoying every minute of it!

Huomio: Sisältää huonoa kielenkäyttöä! ;)



Fyysikko is a classic Font 8B problem at 28.7. First accent was done by Tomi Nytorp in 2005. Problem consists 12 hard sustained moves and a jug haul at the end. On the send I got a really bad cramp on my right calf muscle. Luckily I was able to fight all the way to the jugs and top it out.

10 days in Lapland - Part 1

This is the first of two videos from our Lapland holiday. I decided to make two videos instead of one long. It will work better in 27crags as it features one area at the time. I didn't edit this video too much so that it works as a beta video too, I hope...

Part one features 'Martti Servo' block. Quality of the rock is as close as you can get to Fontainebleau in Finland. Without the reindeer you might actually think that you are in Apremont.

Misty morning

I am not a morning person. Sometimes it worth waking up early though. Like the other day, it was a beautiful misty morning when me and Doris went for a walk. Thankfully I had my camera with me.

Plywood factory at Säynätsalo.


Infamous bridge which has caused a lot of debate lately for being too narrow.


A good place for a morning swim?

10 days in Lapland

By the original plan we were supposed to go to Lofoten. But being Norway the weather forecast didn't look too promising. So in the end we ended up staying in Lapland for the whole time. Out of the 10 days we climbed 9. First 8 in a row. We were a bit knackered after that so we had to take that one rest...

Hiidenkirnut. Can recommend!


Kikka sending 'Los Cojones direct'.


Some easy soloing at Kirnut.


Doris and her favorite toy.


Kikka climbing at 'Rotanloukku'.


Can't believe that we have rock like this in Finland...


Jarmo 'The Axe' Annunen sending 'Pimp My Ride' at Servo block.


Kikka sending 'Almendra assis'. Or was it 'Peukku assis'?

Think...

http://www.ukclimbing.com/articles/page.php?id=2038

http://www.ukclimbing.com/news/item.php?id=48885

Kuhanjulma

Went through my video archives and found one that I haven't published yet. Quite a lot of work filming yourself climbing...


Quick update. Just got back from Rovaniemi. Weather was warm and humid for most of the time, but we still managed to climb a LOT. But more form that later. I have some video of our trip. Would people like short videos, like one problem in video or a longer one?

Problems that we got on video:

• Pimp My Ride (Jarmo)
• Viimeinen Tuuttikuski (Marko)
• Almendra or Peukku Assis (Kikka)
• Turvasanat (Jesse and Marko)
• Los Cojones Direct (Kikka)
• Pyramidi (Marko)
• Easy Company (Marko)
• Midi Assis (Marko)

Off Season

Like it love it? Or just hate it?

Have to say that I have enjoyed climbing quite a bit these past few warm and humid weeks. Off season climbing can be fun if you don't stress too much about it. I've been having some nice sessions with friends in Jyväskylä and Helsinki. Especially super humid session in Myllis was cool! Just did a lot of easier stuff but had to fight for every single one of them. So cool! Seems that every time I go to Myllis it's either too warm or wet. Now it was both!

Btw. Should off season be called wedding season instead?

Once again congratulations to our dear friends Juha and Oili! Thanks for an amazing wedding party! All the best to you both!

Now that the weather seems to start cooling down I've injured my both middle fingers... Right worse than left. Board climbing isn't good for you if you do too much of it. Holds are very similar all the time. I think that's the reason why I got injured fingers. Well live and learn. Although I think I should have learned all ready...

Anyhow, here is a video of Gluteus Maximus. F.A was done by Mika Hinkkanen. Think it was 1st of November 2007? Boulder is quite "of the beaten track" so it doesn't get much traffic. Although it's really worth your while. It consists 3 hard moves and shares the top out with 'Pacman'. Climbing is very similar to this Font problem called 'Hibernatus gauhe'. Although for me Gluteus Maximus felt a tad harder. Conditions weren't prime though.

TIA

TIA = This is Africa.


Roadcrew.

Rock: Quartzite. Not all good quality, but there is a LOT of it to choose from. And it varies in different areas.

Texture: Exactly the same as Grit stone but with more holds. With pebbles and all.

Color: Orange / Gray.


Teemu Uusi-maahi sending 'Rhino'.

Climbing: From mindless jug hauls to best climbs that you can imaging. Harder ones being better ones (most of the time).

Fact: There is more jugs than anywhere I've seen before. Still maybe not for beginners. Most of the blocks are just too easy to be climbed on.

Amount: Lot of rock, still not very developed (hope it stays that way).

Approach: Mostly long and treacherous walks (20mins being average). Mostly gravel road, but sometimes you need to do actual climbing to get where you are going (not too nice when its wet)... It's not an 'easy' area to be in like Font or Swiss.

Permits: Needed for every area (about 3€ a day per person). Hard to get and find out how the whole thing works...

Rules: Leave no trace, walk on existing paths, pick your garbage (finger tape is also garbage). Clear tick marks (so the same as any were esle)!

Guide: Coming... (some info in the web). Locals are making one.


Roadside.

Senery: Beautiful!

Wildlife: Yes and some poisonous! Didn't see any snakes though. Apparently you have about 2hours to get to hospital if one bites. It will be hard in that terrain. Good thing is that they mostly hibernate in winter time. Baboons are quite scary too.

Weather: Could be rainy. We where lucky though. Only two days of rain. It was mostly hot around 27celsius. Had some cold weather too. Actually saw some snow up on the mountains! If you are staying in a campsite, you will most likely need warm clothing.

Season: Our summer.

People: Very friendly. Still stay a way from certain areas.

Bankcards: Work. Need actual cash to get petrol though. For permits too.


Teemu Uusi-maahi sending 'John Denver'.

Eats and Drink: Olifanti, Nancy's tea house, Kelder. All of them good! Cheep too!

Shopping: For grosery Spar in Clanwiliam etc.

Stay: Many different. From houses to campping. We stayed in De Pachys campsite. Can recommed.

Car: Needed. Preferably 4x4. Roads tend to be quite bad in climbing areas. With heavy rain there will be hard river crossings to do.


Ville Kurru warming up in Plateu area.

London epic

We had a pit of an epic, when coming back from Rocklands. Our transit in LHR was about 9 hours coming from Cape Town. So we decided to go sightseeing London. Of course not taking the underground but only the very nessesery. We ended up walking +15 km with heavy bags. Almost missing the flight because someone got hit and killed by the train so the tracks got closed and we ended up running like headless chicken in a middle of nowhere trying to find a cab or right bus line. When in airport we got stuck in security check behind Serrano family form Spain who didn't know that tooth paste etc is actually considered as liquids... So we just barely made the flight.


Teemu having no clue where to go.


Well Paddington sounded good.




London Eye and Big Ben.


Kids playing around near Tower Bridge.


A tourist.


Dunno what the hell that was... Long walk though. Had to go see. Apparently its called ' The Gherkin or Swiss re'.
Koko näy

Teemu and mates.

Vihersalo

Two problems from Vihersalo. Which is small area near Jyväskylä with good rock quality. A bit like Vaasa actually. Some info at 27crags.com. If you decide to visit this area, please behave! There are houses just next to boulders.

Don't know the name of that first problem? So if someone could enlighten me please?

Huhu

There was a rumor spreading amongst Jyväskylä climbers (4 of us...) about a cool new block with a 45dec overhang. Finally we got info of the location of this boulder called Huhu! Have to say that it's an amazing problem!



Thanks for Jani Askolin for all the hard work!

Moon 14

Does anyone have a spare Moon school set number 14 hold? I would be keen to buy one. Mine blew up in my face! Wasn't even pulling that hard from it. Bloody annoying. Just had a good problem going from that hold...

Font Images

Famous texture of Fontainebleau.


Kikka moving pads around. Erosion is a big problem in Font. Even the wind and rain eats the rock quite quickly. You can see that the arrow and 20 are about 1mm higher than the non painted surface.


Stefan Pettersson close on Fata Morgan. One of the very few climbing pictures that I took...


Cul de Chien.


Doris.


Andy and Lara.


Pihla having a nap.

Hämeentie

Jyrki sending the amazing 'Hämeentie' in Hurissalo.

If you are wondering what is Sami doing on top of the boulder with a bouldering mat? It was a sunny day and sun was just hitting the top holds. Jyrki couldn't see the top holds at all. So Sami had to act as a shade...

Hammas

Bit of an inside joke this video... 

All most DV quality, sorry about that...

77

"Choose Fontainebleau. Choose bad weather and slow drying rock. Choose polished, pof blackened holds. Choose trashed problems and grotesque chipping. Choose crags overcrowded with greasy handed weekender Parisiens and legions of ubiquitous Yanks. Choose grumpy old locals chastising everyone (except the French, that is) for using chalk. Choose unsafe car parks (just like at home) and obscenely expensive, yet utterly lifeless bars. Choose Calvaire, that slimy hole in the ground o a wet weekend day with 20 or 30 other people huddled beneath it's partial cover, wondering what the hell you are doing so far from home yet so far from paradise..." - Simon Panton, Bouldering Scene, Climber may 2002.

Still we chose to choose it. We absolutely love it there. We have so many good friends out there. Every time it feels like coming home (in a good way)... I don't think much of that text is true. Only once have we been told of for using chalk and I think they where weekend Parisians. Francois ( THE local hero) got quite pissed of about us getting told of. One of the 'Bleausards' actually said to me that 'pof is shit' when I was about to smack it on a foothold!

Last time and last boulder that I've climbed in Font was when I topped out 'Big Dragon'. After that it kinda felt that I'd had enough of Font for a while. After visiting Swiss/ Italy / Austria four times in a row we felt that maybe it's time to go back to cradle of movement. It's not like the climbing can get any better than in Font, but it's maybe not that important any more as seeing your friends first time for a long while.

Any how, here is a short video of our trip to Font. I was supposed to do a lot of filming, but I got lazy and didn't do much of that. Climbing is too much fun to be bothered with camera.

Thanks to all friends (old and new) for such a nice holiday! Hope to see you all in not so distant future!

Iban G.

Think it was 2000 or 2001 when we met this strong as a bull Basque climber. He was here in Jyväskylä doing some kind of a job training to become a certified electrician. If I remember correctly all they let Iban do here was some garden work. Closest he got to actual electricity work was changing light bulbs... There is some pictures in Iban's blog from his time here.

On one of the pictures we are gluing Forte's jug back on. Well actually Juha is. I'm on top of the rock... It's a shame that the hold came of in a first place. It was a very special climb. Now that the hold has come of again it's maybe a bit harder but not so nice to climb. It actually stirred quite a conversation at slouppi if it was OK to reinforce or glue holds back. I still don't know the answer. Maybe in some cases it's OK, but in Forte's probably not since it goes without.

  

La Rhume Folle from Marko Kauko on Vimeo.

A short video of the man himself in Fontainebleau, Bas Cuvier. Don't remember the year anymore. Maybe 2002? Good old days!

Revelations

Motivation arrived today in a form of a book. Singed and all by no other than Jerry Moffat himself! If you don't know who Jerry is you can not call yourself a climber... Let the training commence!

Self portrait.

Just been doing some systemboard lately. Good way to train some climbing specific isometrics (e.g. Lock offs etc.). Seems that it's not that bad for your fingers like normal climbing since the moves are very controlled. Bit like fingerboard training. Same principals apply on system training like it's very important to use and maintain good body and finger positions trough out the exercise. I pay special attention on elbow angle. I try to avoid chicken winging because I think that it's bad for your shoulders and elbow to use unnatural angle. 

Last week end we had two days at Boulderkeskus. It was good fun! It's good to go visit some other caves every once in a while. It sort of a gives you perspective of where you are in your training, or which are your week spots. It's the same outdoors when you visit new crags and climb with other people.

Check this out!

If you have not yet seen it on BK's site. Can't wait to see the whole film!


PURE - A Bouldering Flick by Chuck Fryberger OFFICIAL TRAILER from Chuck Fryberger on Vimeo.

Archives 2

Here are few 'digitized' pictures...

Jyrki on 'Nakit ja muusi' -98. 'Forte Risoluto' and 'Nakit ja muusi' 7B+ says the text on my album. Although think they both should be listed on MTK's list of hard boulders. Juha gave them both 7B+ after visiting Fontainebleau for the first time. On that trip he spent the whole week working on 'Carnage' which he did in the end. He had just sent 'Forte Risoluto' and 'Nakit ja Muusi' before. Have to say that 'Carnage' is miles easier...


Jussi Remonen doing F.A of 'Salamurhaaja'. Grade is still a mystery. Having just seen Ben Moon on 'Real thing' doing 'Karma' Jussi probably didn't figure out the easiest way for this boulder...


The dream team, Jussi, me, Jukka Mäkinen and Jykä...

Plastic pulling

Some plastic pulling. Picture by me with a timer...

From the archives 1

These pictures are from Samppa's arranged gathering to Font. There was a big posse of Finn's and two Brits in our ridiculously cold and expensive gite (one with a tennis court).

Unfortunately I don't have any really old pictures digitized yet. 

Our captain of the trip Samppa.

Juha Saatsi wearing his color of power. In his case blue. 'La Baleine' Petit Bois.

Tim Clifford working with 'Big Dragon' in Petit Bois. Think the problem was named after a certain shop in Switzerland... Tim sent the problem later that spring.

Crazy weather

Weather is just crazy at the moment. Would have been possible to climb outside today! Just too lazy to do the same old problems again and again.

This was what Päijänne looked like just few days ago.


This is from today. No snow and warm.Supposed to get colder tomorrow...


From the photo archives for MTK's retro picture challenge. Kikka sending 'Desert island arete' in Earl crag back in the day. More coming later...

Good effort!

Just read from Bishopbouldering that Tim had send Matt's 'The Swarm' in Bishop. Good effort. Though not sure if it was hard for Tim since he is super strong on crimps. Same goes for Matt. Think he gave V13 for 'The Swarm'. It just got upgraded afterwards... Shy Yorkshire man 1 and 2...

Here Tim Clifford working with 'The Ace' in Stanage plantation. He would have probably done 'The Ace' easily, but Tim wanted to do it with out glued hold...

Photo by Kirsi Kauko.

Here Matt Birch coming down from 'Ben's wall' at Curbar. Good old days!