Monday, June 9, 2014

Climbing through the history: FRANKENJURA.

The Frankenjura might be one of the world's most famous sport climbing areas where back in the days guys like Wolfgang Güllich, Kurt Albert, Jerry Moffat and many others started to write a piece of climbing history, developing the idea of rotpunkt (red-point) and raising the standard level achieve at that time.
Actually is not just this history that pulls up into the area but the incredible collection of hundreds of small rocks spread over the woods. This region is situated in the triangle between the three cities of Bamberg, Bayreuth and Nürnberg and counts something like 1000 crags with a huge number of routes.
This place was in my mind for a long time because I had always heard rumors saying that it was amazing and the climbing was mostly powerful and intense because the routes are pretty short ranging from 10m to 20meters.

I’d not never expected to be able to planned a trip to this magic place till next September, actually just because it was the time to go to college and the next holiday would have been more forward, but one day Gabri Moroni asked to my brother and me, if we wanted to enjoy a little trip to Franken with Emanuele and he.
Skip the school was not a problem so I took advantages of this suggestion and I said “yes we are”. Gabri probably was the first people I would have chosen for the first trip to Franken because he has been there several times so he can be defined as a local climber. During the trip he recommended us some of most classic routes you have to climb, from 8a to 8b range.
Video frame of Boiling Point 8b, Frankenjura.


The first 2 days of climbing the climbing condition were not the best because there were high temperature with a very high percentage of humidity but there 3 days later the condition were way worse because a heavy rain hits us. The main goals of these first days of climbing was “Nightmare 8B” and “Ekel 7C+” both at Eldorado sector and “Casablanca 8A+” at Holzgauer sector.
I was so close on another proj called “Subway 8B” that runs along a wall-shaped wave with something like 10 hard moves on weird holds. For the crux was at the end of the wave, where the inclination of the wall change, because from a small crimp with the right hand you had to do a dynamic into a 3 fingers jug. There was a “static” way for this move too that consists to match the small crimp and go to the jug more easily but I preferred the dynamic way instead just because It suited me better.

After the 3 days of raining the temperature get colder and the friction came. Each of us had a project on his mind for example me and Ema wanted to get better on Subway, Gabri wanted to try to send “Hattori Hanzo 8C+” tried few days before and Andrea wanted to try “Queeel Dich, Du Sau 8B/+”. 
I woke up really sycked because the day seemed to be so promising, we went directly to Bärenschlucht sector were we got a quick wamp up. Ema and my-self moved to Subway for the second sesh on the route so I did a try to complete the warm up and to get used to the moves way better.
I needed 4 more attempts to be able to get to the top because the 3 tries before I fall down at the very last hard move due to little mistakes. The day finished as well for Gabri and Andre that were able to take down their respective project. Ema get progress on Subway, being almost able to figure out  the first  double dyno move that is the hardest one for him.

The following last 2 days we checked Maximilian sector and Rotenstein sector where Gabri show us many other must-do routes . At the first one I was able to send in few tries a super classic “Boiling point 8b” and “Bad brain 8a+” instead at the other one I sent 2 amazing lines following the 2 edges of a rectangular shaped-wall. The 2 lines are called “ Die Kante 8a+” and “Engel & Bestien 8a” both top 10 routes I’ve ever done.
Die Kante 8a+ pic. Andrea Zanone


This was a very successful and positive trip not just because I sent quite hard but actually because I travelled and climbed through a piece of climbing history, trying and seeing routes that had been climbed about 20 years ago.