Another fantastic day in China. My fingers are raw and tingling from the razor sharp limestone cliffs so this post is gonna hurt. We signed up for a day’s guided climbing with the most reputable climbing company in Yangshuo (China Climb). They are a good 10% more expensive than most but worth it in our opinion. What impressed me is that they don’t rent gear out like many operators – they only do guided outings – that way they keep an accurate record of gear condition. We had two guides to ourselves (Alpha and Aniel) which was unexpected – no other tourists. Aniel climbs 33 (and if you don’t know what that is, imagine climbing across a ceiling by clinging to pea sized bumps) so we had our rope gun for the day. Poor guy was in for a boring day because even when we were climbing at our best 10-15 years ago we were in the 20-25 range.

We got a taxi ride out to ‘The Egg’ crag (about 15mins from town and a 10min flat walk-in). The crags here look amazing. Just like Thailand but the karst limestone cliffs rise out of rice paddies instead of the sea. Our guides were very professional – helmets, top ropes for clients and continuous saftey checks – a bit restrictive for us but we understand why they have to do it. We fired straight up an 18 without too much trouble, I only told V it was 18 when she got down 🙂 We had an absolute ball. Either the grading is a little soft or we are stronger than we thought. We had a go at a few 18’s, a 20 and a very long (30m) 19 that beat us both – would loved to have just kept climbing but our poor little arms ! We finished the day on a 19 that was tremendous. Flowing laybacks and technical puzzles (for us) all the way up. V took a bit of convincing because the first move looked very strenuous but in the end she sailed through it like a pro.

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We just love climbing. Everything about the day just took us straight back to great memories: Walking through bush to an empty crag, hiding from the sun, the smell of chalk and dust, the sound of biners, the burning in your muscles, the fear of heights all new again and the exhileration of solving and then completing a beautiful set of moves.

It is amazing how ‘at home’ we feel at a crag with other climbers – Chinese, American – it makes no difference – they are in general all wonderful people. We have to get back into this sport !
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If we ever visit China again it will be for a dedicated climbing trip, but there are concerns. An American couple we met explained that access to crags is becoming an issue especially with expensive toll roads and fees being charged to climb certain areas. It’s unfortunate that the trend in China is to make money (and overcharge) at every possible opportunity. Climbing is really just getting going here – hopefully it will survive.

[Pictures: A view from the crag – clouds rolled in this afternoon – relief from the heat, our guides encourage V, V busts the first crank on the 19 and V’s new X-Men Tattoo]

– Posted from my iPhone via Wifi