Hueco #2

Life here in Hueco Tanks is getting more relaxing every day. We get up in the mornings and start off the days with a long breakfast in the sun, chilling on the pads, have some coffee... Then it's climbing all day long with burritos after it - perfect!

We checked out a lot of problems all over North Mountain and everybody kinda found his projects and favourite lines... One problem I really wanted to get on was Diaphanous Sea, V12. It's such a cool, pure line, the holds and moves are very very nice and hard to find on a rock climb just like that. I got on it once three years ago but couldn't do any of the moves back then. It's style of climbing is pretty basic: pulling on crimps in a roof. I kinda have a hard time on climbs of this character... coming back stronger and more confident this time I knew that it still will be challenging for sure. This time I first got on it at the end of day on North Mountain, tired and little skin left and to my surprise did all the moves on that first session! So I rested for two days, grew some skin and came back with high expectations on climbing the boulder. But no, I was to shaky that day and always fell on the big crux move where you throw your right hand to the big flake. Also my fingers and tendons started to hurt really bad after a few goes... frustrated I had to call it a day and leave. I was able to finish off the day by doing the amazing Dirty Martini on the Rocks V11 in a few goes wich was nice at least!
I decided to wait some days for when the weather forecast finally pronounced cooler temps (it still has been really really hot!) and climb on other stuff in the meantime. But I couldn't really stick to that plan and so I found myself back on Diaphanous Sea two days later at the end of a long day on North Mountain. But it was windy and overcast, temps were good and so I decided to give it a try or two.
After the burning sensation in my fingertips, caused by a horrible warm up go, disappeared I sat down again and pulled off the floor. And with no expectations or anything else on my mind I simply climbed better on it, stuck the big move perfectly and with surprising ease and moments later stood atop of the boulder... my skin was fried big time but I was just so psyched to have done this super classic line. Lifetime ticklist - check! :D

We are now in the second half of our trip and starting to feel better every day. Skin is getting thick and we are all psyched to get on tours now and explore more of the beautiful climbing this place has to offer.

Emi

Diaphanous Sea... pic by Flo

Dirti Martini... pic by Ingo

Flo sending Theater of the Absurd

Ingo

Joe enjoying some austrian Kaiserschmarren!

the dudes

Hueco

I am in Hueco Tanks! Finally after a long long while back on the road, traveling, with all your focus and life revolving arround climbing... as it should be. I got here with two friends (Ingo and Flo) a week ago and we will be in the States for another 3 weeks, mainly here in Hueco.

Taking off in Munich, Germany, we left snowstorms and cold weather behind, just to arrive in El Paso twenty hours later, with nothing but blue skies all day long, every day... Psyched out of our minds we had three straight days of climbing on North Mountain right away. I have been here once before about three years ago so I already knew a lot of the problems and showed my mates arround. Still down from the jetlag (bouldering at like 4 o‘clock in the morning feels more than strange...) we kept it mellow, did a lot of moderate climbing, some classics like „Babyface“ or „See Spot Run“ and just enjoyed the mass of rock and climbs arround us. After months of gym-climbing or sessions outdoor with shit and cold weather it felt like paradise to move on those rocks...

After those first three days it was time to rest, get over the jetlag, grow some skin and enjoy the fabolous city of El Paso, Texas... :D

Two days later we where back on North Mountain. I had some unfinished business from the last trip, a problem called „Barefoot on sacred ground“ V12 didn‘t let me up back then and I was keen to get back on it. I goes up the Arete next to „See Spot Run“ and the climbing revolves arround compression moves on slopers and pockets. First though I wanted to get on „Dark Age“, a V11 that combines the two problems named above. I had figured out the moves before and so I decided to go straight from the start. I moved through the problem smooth and confident and the climbing felt amazing! Friction and skin where good and I got to the top feeling very comfortable all the time, finally the jetlag seemed to be over and I was starting to climb. Back down I did the final two crux moves of „Barefoot...“ again to get that tricky and high heel hook dialed, rested for a while and sat down at the start and set off. Feeling kinda nervous on the first moves I soon got my mind in the bubble and was up at the crux. I placed that high heelhook, pulled on, it stayed and before I knew I was at the big finishing Hueco. I made a big move to the right to get into „See Spot Run“ and toped out.

It felt really great to expirience progression over the years. Something that once felt hard for me just went down really controlled... Very satisfying!

The trip is on, psyched for more days of climbing and shooting fotos, tacos and burritos, meeting knew people, chilling and feeling the flow.

Emi 

Ingo

Flo

Redneck

Dry rock!!!

Dry rock 2!!!

barefoot on sacred ground, pic by flo

New Photos

Some new photos can be seen in the bouldering, people and randoms gallery. Fall has been ok, although the snow came a bit too early for my taste, causing some unfinished business... Looking forward for the US trip know!

Reini Fichtinger in the Zillertal, AT

Naturized Movie!

Hi everbody, just wanted to state that the brand new naturized website has gone online. Its a local site here in Austria that focuses on climbing, slacklining, downhillbiking and everything else that's fun! Editor in chief Berni Kogler has put together a nice flick with some cool impressions of all those games, with some other funny stuff included, so check it out if you want!

Here is the direct link to the movie on their site.

seee ya, Emi

Zillertal Sessions

The rain has stopped for some days again and we took our chance to find some dry blocs in our lovely home spot, the Zillertal. Lucky we were, stuff was dry and allthough conditions were moist and warm our crew (Katha, James, Ben, Ingo, Peter and I) had an amazing weekend outside, climbing new stuff and repeating old classics... Some pics in the galleries!

Emi in Drischiebl | Magic Place | Pic by Ingo

Val Daone

We spent some time in Val Daone recently, amazing blocs in a beautiful setting! Check out the galleries for some photos. Some more on chalkjunkie (FRESH Gallery).

Emi

Fresh air

Hi everybody, just wanted to say that there is a new gallery on my blog, one showing some of the random shots I have lying arround on my computer wich I thought would be cool and interesting to share! Also there is some more new pics in some of the other galleries so have a look if you want.

On another note, I just got my new camera the other day and I am totally psyched to go out and shoot. Wich I soon will have more time for again (along with climbing outside)! And, as the sweet toy also films on HD, we hopefully will have some crispy little flics in our bags in the near future, so stay tuned and above all: enjoy ya climbing!

Cheers, Emi

Randoms Gallery

Everything, everywhere.

NATURIZED trailer

Check out the trailer of Berni Kogler's upcoming movie for Naturized!

GET NATURIZED Teaser from Berni Kogler on Vimeo.

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So long...

...since the last post... sorry for that but things just have been really busy, not in climbing outdoors though unfortunatly! Since the semester is coming to an end things at Uni are spicing up really hard, lots of stuff to do, papers to write, presentations, and all this kinda stuff... And to top it all, there was a period of straigth rain in Austria for the last four weeks! So well, all there was left to do, in lack of spare time and because of the weather, was to go to the gym and train. It was fun but I truely miss the rock and all those cool sessions outside and simply can't wait for summer and more time for climbing! Anyways, enough of the whining, I found this video on my computer that I once made after the rocklands trip last summer and somehow we never put it online somewhere, so here it is! It's the footage of one of my best climbing days ever... Psyched for the rocks!! - Emi -

rocklands '09 the nice day from emi-moosburger.blogspot.com on Vimeo.

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Swizzy update...

We've once more been down in Ticino last week, originally planed to stay for a week at least but unfortunatly the weather wasn't nice to us (as mostly this winter...) and after four days we just couldn't stand the rain and even snowfall(!) anymore...

Anyways we had a good start with a sunny day in Chironico, Juri and Mario and Me and lots of cool Boulders in the 101 sector.
First stop was a roof called "Tricky", a really nice and weird 8A were you have to do some crazy double toehooking to solve the puzzle and climb out to the lip... Juri quickly found out the solution (thx!!) and so we soon all succeeded. Next we moved over to test our powerendurance skills on "The Arete with the Pocket", a sustained 8A with about 20 moves that each for itself aren't really hard but add up on the redpoint and create some nice spice in your forearms! Got my first proper pump this year... but luckily made it to the top though :) After a long long rest the pump finally dissappeared and I felt ready to go and try "Keinfisch Kleinfisch" again, a short Dave Graham 8B just a minute down the hill. It involves some nice compression climbing with a brutal kneebar into a kinda tricky mantle and a slab to top it out. I allready checked it out last time and this time got some nice beta-tips from my mate Martin who just did it a couple of days before... so allthough kinda sour allready, with the solution more technically than hard pulling, I somehow managed to sneak through the problem, didn't punt on the mantle, vibrated up the sandy slab and had it in my bag, end of a nice day!!

Below is a photo of Flo bouldering in "Atlantis" on the last rain free day before we gave up and bailed... At least the snow was good back at home :) some more shots in the bouldering gallery.

Happy easter everyone!

Emi

Powder days...

We've been out in the snow recently and had some good days! Zlu has put up a new Gallery on his webpage called "white gold" where some shots of the action can be seen. Below is a clip of how I put an end to my snowboard by hitting some snow-covered rocks, those bastards!! Well what can I say... Allways wear a helmet :)

how i killed my board... from emi-moosburger.blogspot.com on Vimeo

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Some days in Ticino

Me, Korni and Katha spent the last days down in Ticino, giving it a try on the quest for dry boulders. After realising that there still is plenty of snow arround we first focused on climbing in Cresciano. Our first day there, a sunday, was sunny, dry and with perfect temps, psyche was high! We bouldered in Osogna on classic old lines like "Revê de Mario", the first 8A in Ticino established by Fred Nicole back in the day or the perfect slab "Mary Poppins"... It felt so good to touch the good old swiss granite after a long period of snow, rain and days in the gym...

The next two days were rainy and we ended up sitting and driving arround, basically getting really bored and hoping for the weather to clear up. Wednesday was sunny finally and we were back at Cresciano. We mainly tried "Mithril", a short and steep 8B established by Dave Graham.  All the moves went down for both of us at the end of the day so motivation was high to come back and try the whole thing. Two days later we returned and started trying it from the start. I suddenly stuck the first move, did the second, the third,... and suddenly found myself on the tricky mantle! Kinda shaky and surprised what's going on I did't get a foothold the right way and when I tried to stand up allready, all of a sudden, my foot slipped and I dived down face first into the pads! Holy crap! I just fckd it up at the mantle!... Luckily nothing was hurt except some scratches and my heartbeat slowed down again... Whilst I took a long rest Korni managed to fight his way out the roof too and was at the mantle... Both of us knowing you easily can blow it up there we were kinda stressed, him climbing, me spotting. He kept it together though, stood on the slab, shaking like he had just drunken 20 Espresso shots in a row, greeeat success!! I put my boots back on again, ready to find out if I could climb the thing again and get another chance for the mantle... After struggling on the first move twice I stuck it and climbed up to the mantle again! This time I was better prepared, did everything exactly according to Beta-Plan and topped out, yessss :)

The following days we spent climbing in Chironico, on and off, with the rain between sunny days... I managed to climb a really amazing problem called "Conquistador", 8A+, compression climbing on a beautiful bloc lying in the riverbed at "Schattental".

Allthough the weather was pretty bad most of the time we had  some nice days as well and can't wait to return soon! Some more shots in the bouldering and people galleries.

 

                                      Conquistador - Pic by Katha                   Warming up in Cresciano

Boogalagga

Last Saturday, the 2nd of January 2010, has been the first day of bouldering for me and Korni in 2010 and it started good! Good because we were able to climb a really amazing problem despite the absolutly freezing conditions that day. The year started cold! It was a windy day in Ticino's Chironico, wind at minus 5°C or more means that it actually felt like minus 20°! A "warm up" was pretty senseless. No way to get "warmed up". So this ment we started without one, trying "Boogalagga", an amazing line established by Bernd Zangerl, around 8B, technical, powerful and really cool holds and pockets. We've been working the porblem lately and made good progress but this day, because of the cold, our tries felt really bad! With a massive lack of cordination or feeling for the moves, we saw our chances of succeeding disappear. We kept trying though and all of a sudden I stuck the first (the crux) move for the very first time. Out of nowhere it seemed. Both, me and Korni, where confused, that was something totally new. After maybe two seconds I realized I stuck the hold and was still on so time to move on! I kept it together, stuck the last hard move to a crimp and topped out. Nice! Psyche was high, I came down, high five, Korni chalked, pulled on (I still had my shoes on) and sent it just right after me! We both where more than glad that the whole desition to not go to Cresciano but freeze our asses off here paid off and we got the candy in the end... Two more Photos in the bouldering Gallery.

 

pic by Korni