The Before

I first saw footage of Mallorca years ago, when, in many ways, I was a similar climber to who am I am today.  I was younger and probably much weaker (not that I’m strong now), but I was just as consumed with the idealized notion of climbing.  And for me, the ideal comes in an astounding variety of ways.  This video:

Can be equated to this one:

I am equally interested and driven to accomplish both.  There is something just so elementally raw in climbing, and this rawness can achieved in so many ways—be it wearing a bathing suit and rock shoes high above the Mediterranean, or down jacket and crampons high in the Alps.  These two pursuits are only 900 or so kilometers apart, but yet are so fundamentally connected.  It this connection to the basics that draws me to climbing: taking only what you need to complete the objective ahead and then moving on to the next.  And the various disciplines of climbing lend themselves quite easily to this simplicity.  I have not yet Deep Water Soloed (DWS or ‘Psicobloc’ in the local climbing argot, a type of climbing where one ventures high above the sea without any sort of rope), but am deeply excited about setting out into unknown, vertical terrain high above the sea.  These climbs range from 5 to 30 meters above the churning blue waters and require only courage (but I’ll wear rock shoes and use chalk to boost my confidence).  


Thousands of kilometers away, back in New Hampshire, climbs like this do not exist.  DWS is a specialized sect of climbing, found in large quantity in only a few locales around the world.  I’m sure there are many dramatic cliffs plunging into the sea in Maine and California and maybe other spots stateside, but here in Europe, hundreds of Psicobloc climbs litter the cliffs of this island and others.  However, the boldness of these climbs can easily be echoed elsewhere.  Just before my departure, I went for a quick ice climbing session with Wes, my younger brother, at the cliffs in Rumney, just west of my home in Plymouth, NH.  We chose an unknown route and set out, me in the lead.  I hadn’t climbed on ice in about eight months, but had faith the line was easy enough for me climb without falling, as I own only two ice screws to protect the hundred-foot, ledged curtain (thereby risking 30-50 foot tumbling falls).  Once I made it over the initial vertical bulges and placed my first screw, I felt more secure, but after the next vertical section and the ensuing hollow ice, things began to get touchy.  I gamely scrambled on up the final ledge, trying to forget that if I fell, both ice screws would likely pull out from the rotten ice and I would fall all the way down to Wes, 75 feet below.  The final twenty feet were vertical at the onset, and then eased into a dirt slope up to a big oak tree at the top of the climb.  I tenuously eased up the thin ice guarding the top and pulled onto the snowy, grassy slope.  The last few feet were a relief: I was able to stand almost upright, and almost ran to the tree that marked the end.  Here, I threw a nylon sling around its base, clipped myself in, and proceeded to belay Wes to the top.  He made it up easily with the confidence of a belay from above.  Ice in New Hampshire, limestone in Mallorca.  


Worlds apart, surely.  But these climbs are connected by so many ideals.  Adventure, confidence, and a desire for the true nature of climbing.  If I didn’t get scared, I wouldn’t do it.  But it’s fear, overcoming that fear, and a sense of true, deep accomplishment that drives me and countless others into this seemingly crazy pursuit (among many other factors of course—as Hillary said, “Because it’s there”).  Mallorca and DWS offer this at its most basic level, and this is what brought me here.  Warm weather, tapas, and climbing, climbing at its purest.  And the café con leche in the morning and cerveza in the evening don’t hurt.  Not to mention the siestas. 


Here are a few pictures (all taken by Reilly Taylor) from our first days in Deya (the Catalan spelling as opposed to the Spanish Deia):


The view from a lookout a few kilometers South

Our road

Out exploring

A delicious orange