SARDINIA APRIL 2005
THE CAST:
March 15, 2005 - Hey everybody, sorry for the page not being updated for awhile, but we've been kinda busy, not too sure what we've been busy at but oh well. Got back home from Vegas in mid February, ran away from all the rain, plus we missed our bed at home. Lots of climbing still going on around here. We just booked some tickets to go to Italy at the end of March to go climbing with some friends of ours, should be good fun. We plan on trying to put up pics and other stuff while we are traveling but we'll have to wait and see.
March 29, 2005 - Hi there, just sitting in the airport getting ready to head to Italy, pretty excited about all this. Our friends Jamie and Bonnie are already in Sardinia and from what we hear, the climbing is great. We aren't too sure how much internet access we will be able to find when we get there, but we promise to try our best to keep thing updated with all the climbing and we will try and get lots of photos up as well. We just got back from a quick trip to Mexico, sitting on the beach and stuff, great fun. Shelley got an amazing tan as usual, feel like I'm traveling with some Spanish girl or something. That girl can really tan. We are flying directly from Calgary to Frankfurt and then taking a flight from there to Sardinia. Not looking forward to the 10 hours in the plane, but at least we don't have to go through Toronto and switch planes. Guess the flight is packed, bummer, here I thought we could spread out. We are going to fly Ryan Air from Frankfurt, they only allow 15kgs of weight for each of us, we are alittle over but hopin for the best on that front. Well, that's about it, hope everybody is doing great. Be sure to send lots of email from home, it's always great to hear what's going on, and we'll try and do our part and keep this baby updated.
March 30, 2005 - Guess what, we made it to Germany! Had a great flight, took a bus to the Hahn Airport and we are hanging out here til tomorrow morning when our flight leaves for Sardinia. We had to wait about an hour for the bus after our flight landed but it was okay. Nice to move around after that flight. Here is pic of Shelley with our stuff waiting for the bus. About an hour and a half bus ride brought us to the Hahn Airport. There is a cool town here and we are staying at a nice little hotel with a good restuarant. The owner is an Italian guy and he was telling us all about Sardinia, made it sound great We just finished a great pasta meal and now we're going to try and get rid of some of the jet lag. The Hahn Airport is an old US Airforce Base that has now been converted to a public airport that is basically used by Ryan Air. Tomorrow we leave for Sardinia at 7 am, and Jamie if your reading this don't forget to pick us up. Well that's about it, we'll try and have more updates later. Hope everything is going great, me I'm just hanging with tanned wife enjoying Germany!
April 15, 2005 - Hello there, bet you thought we fell off the planet or something. Turns out internet access in Sardinia is somewhat difficult to come by, especially the places that let us hook up the laptop. Well, since we last posted we have been climbing lots and trying to stay dry. I guess I'll start at the beginning and work back to here, where by the way is Alghero in a little hotel room.
On March 31st we flew from Germany over to Sardinia. Interestingly our friend Jamie had forgot to turn his clock ahead, they do it a week earlier than we do in North America, so he was an hour late to pick us up. He walked up and was quite proud of the fact that he was right on time, until he saw the airport clock. Anyhow, we drove to Cala Gonone and found a little appartment to stay in for the next two weeks. Our place was in the same building as Jamie and Bonnie's which was quite handy for hooking up in the morning and going climbing, plus they had a nice deck looking over the Med, versus our's looking in a back alley. We didn't rent a car at the beginning of the trip because we thought we would be sticking pretty close to home for the first week and Jamie and Bonnie had one that could haul all of us around.
The first couple of days we climbed close to Cala Gonone at a couple of cool little crags. One was called Freoli and the other Birdiscoti, spelling is not my strength so I hope that's right. Both are along the ocean and offered some great climbing in a nice location. We both suffered from jet lag pretty bad early on, so we didn't sleep really well for almost a week! Made the first couple of days climbing pretty tough, but is was still good fun. Here are some shots of Shelley and Jamie, Shelley is at Freoli and Jamie is at Birdisocti. Jamie onsighted the climb that he's on in the pic, I think it was 6.b+, it was a good climb to get.
The next two days it rained so we just hung out in our appartment, went to a small town called Dorgali and cruised around Cala Ganone. The weather on these days was kind of a bummer but we survied okay. The temps were much cooler than we expected them to be, we even had a heater in our appartment that we used regularly, not something we expected to do. Over all though it was fine cause I think it gave us some time to get over the jet lag. We also celebrated Jamie's birthday during this time, we went to this little place in the hills and had a traditional Sardinian meal, it was six courses and was excellent.
After the rain finally stopped, Shelley and I decided that we better get some climbing done when the weather was okay and spent the next five days climbing everyday. Normally we would take rest days every couple of days but we figured it the weather was okay we would climb. For a rest one day we went slab climbing, which saved our arms and kept getting our fingers toughened up for the rough rock. During that five day stretch we spent a day at Cala Luna, a beach area with some overhanging climbing. We had to take a boat to this area and it was a nice place to hang out. Unfortuately most of the climbs were 7's and harder so there wasn't a ton for us to do, but we did spend the day working on some of the routes and felt pretty worked after that. Also during the five day stretch of climbing we discovered the climbs at Dorgali. This area reminded me of France in alot of ways, really good climbing on steep, featured limestone. Both of us decided that this was one of the best areas that we climbed at, and spent several more days here. Shelley flashed a 6.c+(or at least that's what the guide book said it was) plus redpointed an excellent 6.c called Overland. I think Overland was the best climb we did on the trip, it was certainly my favorite.
One thing I have to mention about Italy is the food. Don't get me wrong, it's really good, but I've eaten pasta every day for the last 18 days if I include the junk in had on the flight over. Talk about carb loading! The coffee here is fantastic, we have at least three cappacinno's a day, sometimes more(maybe that's why we had a hard time sleeping). We even found this litte capo maker that we bought to bring home, you can use it on the stove, it's very cool. Shelley makes amazing salads every night and the vegi's here are really good. Just like France, the yogourt is excellent. There are little pizzariea's all over the place and we have snacked at a few, but mostly we've been cooking on our own and having fun doing it. The pasta you buy here is way better than the stuff we get at home.
Sounds like the pilot is going to land so I have to quite writing this, I'll try and put the update up in Frankfurt and maybe do some more later. Jamie, Shelley and I did this climb called Sole Incantorie and I have some shots and a bit about that adventure, plus we'll try and do our top 10 things we learned in Italy, since the one from France was kind of a hit.
April 17, 2005 - Hi there again, we are somewhere over the North Sea right now, sitting at the back of the bus. Back to climbing in Sardinia. As I mentioned before, Shelley, Jamie, and I went and did a climb called Sole Incantore on a small spire call the Golaritese(spelling is totally wrong). Access to the climb is either via a 1hour car ride and 45 minuite walk or a short 35 minute boat ride that cost's 35 euro. We decided on the boat because we are all lazy.
We headed out around 8:30 on the boat, our captain a tough looking Italian lady seemed to have things under control. Our goal was simple, beat the Euro's to the climb and be on the route so we wouldn't have to wait, plus Shelley and I left our helmets at home and we didn't want to be climbing under any other parties. Much to our surpise and delight, we were the first to the climb.
Being gentleman we gave Shelley the first pitch which she promptly got lost on. With Jamie yelling up instuctions about where the belay was, she became even more confused so she belayed him up and then they both were lost. I smoldered down below while Shelley and Jamie tried to get unlost, which they finally did by Jamie sending Shelley up what they hoped was the second pitch. Turned out they were correct. Shelley styled this pitch and promptly brought Jamie up. By this time the Euro's had arrived, but amazingly none of them wanted to do the route we were on. It's surprising how you can convince other parties not to climb below you when you bumble around for a while at the base. I'll have to remember that for all the ice climbs next year.
Jamie being the only one with a guide book suggested that I should do the next pitch, Jamie seemed to have it all mapped out as to who would get what pitch's so I said okay. Our dreams of getting the route free promptly ended when I hung at the third bolt of this pitch. What I didn't know was that the pitch was 35m and proved to be quite difficult. I brought Jamie and Shelley up and it was finally Jamie's turn to lead. His chess like manuevers had left him with the slab pitch, his speciality, but he also had to take a hang and other tactics which will remain secret to get through the pitch. Being a fair guy, I offered Shelley the last pitch because it was her turn, and to my surprise she took it. Shelley seems to have a nose for good pitchs and this one turned out to be as good as the other one she lead, much to my dismay(actually I was kind of glad she took it). Jamie made it quite clear to me that I was to beat the German's to the summit so I got the last few easy meters to the top and we ended up first on top, much to our delight.
We also met a British couple who were on the climb next to us. It was some old trad route that doesn't see much traffic, and all I kept hearing was how this piece of gear was crap or that piece was crap. Brits, ya gotta love them. When we rapped down, they were at one of the stations that we used. We mentioned that we had some ice climbing in Canada, and they promply said that the best ice climbing was in Scotland. We just smiled and agreed, I said to be sure to tell all his friends that too so there wouldn't be so many of them around next season. He thought that was pretty funny
Our early bumbles hadn't cost us at all and we were the first to be able to rap down and head to the beach of course that was after we admired the great views. Jamie phoned the boat and they were on their way to take us back to Cala Ganone.
That was pretty much it for the climbing, Jamie and Bonnie left the next day, so did B and Al and we were left all alone in Cala Ganone to spend our last day hanging out and get to Algero to catch our flight to Frankfurt.
Earlier in the week Shelley and I decided that we were going to rent a car for a few days so we could check out some things on our own, plus have a way to get back to Algero. Our plan was to borrow the McVicar car for a morning and head to Nuero and get a car. Good plan, except that Nuero is very difficult to figure out and nobody speaks English. We drove to Nuero with no idea where a car rental place was, but hoped that there would be lots of signs advertising the different car companies. That turned out to be somewhat misguided and after driving in circles for about a half an hour we decided to ask for directions at a gas station. Once again, no english, but I did find three old guys who were very helpful and offered lots of advice. I think they thought I was looking for a mechanic and they sent us off to the industrial section of Nuero. We found that area dispite my efforts at getting us lost, only to discover there were no car rental places, lots of mechanics though! Finally we decided to stop at a little coffee shop and ask, the owner and his wife spoke no english either. After many hand signals and pointing in the phone book, he finally figured out what we were after. He promptly phoned over to one, and the guy actually came over and picked us up and let us follow him back to the AVIS agency. At first he couldn't figure out why we wanted to rent another car, we already had one, but we convinced him that the car we were driving wasn't ours and he rented us a Fiat, Punto. Italians are so nice, if that was France, we'd still be in Nuero driving around.
The streets in all the towns are very narrow and driving can be somewhat intimidating, plus there are lots of one ways that can suddenly leave you with only one way out.
Also while we were in Italy the Pope died. This is a pretty big deal all over the world but in Italy it's really big deal. The day before he passed they kept showing the huge crowds in Rome. The only TV we got was Italian so we really had no idea what was going on. I thought maybe they just always show this much stuff about the pope. We actually didn't know he died until we were sitting having cappicino in a small cafe and there he was laying in state on TV, we didn't need anybody to translate that to english for us. From what I read and heard, it sounds like it was nuts in Rome during the funeral.
Well that was some of our adventures we had in Sardinia. Overall it's a great place to come and I would definately come back. The climbing is excellent, people are really friendly, food is great and getting around is pretty easy. Internet access was a bit of an issue, one place that was open 3 hours a day, and the wouldn't let me use my laptop so I couldn't do any updates or stuff like that, but it kind of made the place feel remote and that was nice. My battery is going dead on my computer so I better shut up and get this done, hope everybody enjoyed the pictures and stuff, excuse my spelling it sucks and I know it.
Here are some shots that I thought were pretty good.
A swimmer, this was shot from Sole Incantore.
Shelley climbing Euro style, thats B and Al above her.
Jamie and I wondering in Birdiscoti.
Following the princess to Birdiscoti.
Shelley on the way to Sole Incantore.
PS: On a sad note I just found out that our dear friend Birdie didn't make it back to Canada. Birdy left a mark on all of us that won't soon be forgotten. Birdie would sit quietly until squeezed, then the screech of the Red Tail Hawk would break forth from her tiny body. That sound will forever remind me of Sardinia. Most of Birdies days would be spent being tossed around by Sammy and Niki, or squeezed whenever possible. I remember one day in Dorgali we were leaving a small cafe and Birdie was sitting on the table and everyone was heading out the door. I grabbed her and put her in my pocket, knowing that eventually Niki would proclaim "hey! where's Birdie", which she did as we were driving the winding road back to Cala Ganone. Sam's reply, "looks like Birdie didn't even make it out of Dorgali" was seen as pretty funny by everybody except Niki, fortunately I had Birdie that day. I sensed her days were numbered but I really thought she would make it back home. Seems I was wrong, she found her freedom in Olbia, and is probably now in the hand of some young Itialian child, their parents wondering, what is that god awful sound coming from that bird?
