Better than Ueli Steck? Frank Jourdan

Even Steck admits to an on sight climb as being the betteraccomplishment. Jordan didn't require pre inspection or multiple laps in the alpine.



And a bit of tongue in cheek when I say "better" as both are obviously incredible athletes. Just wanted a little shock value as most haven't heard of, or understand Jordan's accomplishments in North America. Some perspective? Manyof these climbs take a full day's walk just to get to the base. Most if not all, have rock much worse than on the Eiger. There are no trams,no cell service, no fixed gear with few climbers out compared to the Alps. And finally only the easier routes have seen much traffic. Almost everything Jordan did was an early solo ascent if not the 1st solo ascent.I've never heard of anything remotely comparable having been done by one climber in such a short amount of time in North America. You would have to look long andhard in the Alps to find anyoneso eager, capable and most importantly committed today, let alone in 1994.Read on if you want to know more.



Pictures are literally only of Jordan's "easy" routes from these trips!



Frank Jourdan?



David Dornian wrote the following about Frank Jourdan's summer for the Calgary Mountain Club World News' alpine report in 1994.



"A stiff little reminder of what can be accomplished when you put a few caffeine pills into your butt bag, hang a couple of ropes and your shoes off your harness, and get out whilst everyone else is still "waiting for things to come into condition"



What did YOU do on your summer vacation? In July, visiting German alpinist Frank Jourdan managed a quick two-week trip to the Canmore/Banff/Jasper corridor to finish off a North American tour.



Discovered sleeping in his car at the ACC clubhouse parking lot in Canmore, he was taken into town by staff, coffeed up, and the following amazing tale was extracted in halting English.



It seems that a few days previously, Frank had driven north to the Columbia Icefields where he soloed a route he referred to as "Skyladder Direct" on Mt. Andromeda. He then descended the line, crossed the glacier to the northeast, and ascended "The Shooting Gallery". From there, he traversed the summit of Andromeda, climbed down one of the "Practice Gullies" and moved across too the base of "The Andromeda Strain".





The gully of A-Strain



In the dark now, he ascended the "Strain" by headlamp, carried on past the Andromeda/Athabasca col, over the summit of Athabasca in blowing conditions and what he called "...very strong snow" and arrived back at the parking lot 45 hours after he had left.



There's more.



Moving north a bit, Frank then soloed the Robinson/Arbic on the North Face of Cromwell.



And more...



Next, he attempted the North Face of Alberta. Going up without a rope, Frank decided he didn't like the inconsistent nature of the rock band above the icefield, and so he traversed off the face and descended the NE ridge. As a consolation, he bagged the peak by the Japanese Route before returning to the highway.



And still more...



He drove to Jasper and had a look at the North Face of Edith Cavell, coming down because of wet rock and unconsolidated snow.



And finally.



Returning south past Mt. Kitchener, where he soloed the Grand Central Couloir - "Only to be climbed ven zer's eis..." - apparently spending over an hour tunneling through the summit cornice.





N. Face of Kitchner

Wait...



After resting and cragging around Canmore for a few days, Frank decided that he wanted "...perhaps one more peak" before he headed home to Germany. When he showed up at Acephale around noon on Sunday, looking for Todd, we mercilessly insisted that he have a go on Mirror Stage 12b. Heh, heh. After all, we pointed out to this quiet little guy in the pilled fleece, there was already a rope on it; he might as well give it a shot. Protesting that he was "probably quite tired...", he dutifully pulled on a pair of shoes and sent the rig first try. A little while later, he did the same to Bleu du Ciel 12b, loosing his feet during the hideous sloper match at the crux and simply pulling up and locking off while he reached across for the next crimp edge in the sequence.



Now willing to let him be our friend, we engaged Frank in conversation. Turns out he had spent the day before climbing the Blanchard/Robinson on the North Face of Howse Peak, avoiding the A3 chimney and block via the ice in the gash out right (which he admitted was slow going and "very technical" [and which Peter Arbic, the only other person to go that way, reportedly characterizes as "Death" - ed.] and had been forced to sleep on the mountain that night, prior to descending and running up to meet us at the crag."



Dave Dornian





There is more...



From:



http://www.alpinist.com/



Frank Jourdan



Posted on: December 1, 2004



http://www.alpinist.com/doc/ALP09/climbing-note-jourdan







The east face of Mt. Assiniboine, showing Cheesmond-Dick (V 5.9 A2, ca. 1200m, 1982). Frank Jourdan soloed the route in July for its second ascent. It was his third trip to Canada; in July 1994 he soloed a direct variant to Skyladder Direct, then climbed The Shooting Gallery, and then climbed The Andromeda Strain, all on Mt. Andromeda, car-to-car in forty-five hours. He then soloed the Robinson-Arbic on the north face of Cromwell. Next, after attempting the north face of Alberta, he climbed the Japanese Route; then attempted the North Face of Mt. Edith Cavell; then soloed the Grand Central Couloir on Mt. Kitchener; then soloed the Blanchard-Robinson on the north face of Howse Peak. His 2004 tour showed his enthusiasm to be undiminished. Photo courtesy of Raphael Slawinski



in his own words



"In July I traveled for the third time to Canada. In spite of bad conditions on the alpine faces I picked off a couple of good routes. After installing a bivy cache at Eiffel Lake I succeeded in climbing the Greenwood-Jones (V 5.8 A1, ca. 1400m, 1969) on the north face of Mt. Temple,





2000m N. Face of Temple

then, after a bivouac at the cache, the Supercouloir (IV 5.8, Lowe-Jones, ca. 1200m, 1973) on Mt. Deltaform (the final pitches of which are especially brittle).







Dave Cheesmond photo of Tim Friesenon Deltaform's crux



Deltaform's 2000m N. face. Cheesmond's picture above is the lastbit of rotten rock on top of that narrow ice gully.



Two and a half days later, when I was feeling more confident with this type of rock again, I headed to the glacier at the base of the east face of Assiniboine (the longest "twenty-kilometer" hike I ever did). This impressive mixed face was not in good shape either. After resting at the base I started climbing the Cheesmond-Dick (V 5.9 A2, ca. 1200m, 1982) at 2 a.m. I gained height pretty fast, but around 8:30 a.m. I got stuck just below the start of the upper, steeper sections because of intense rockfall. I searched for shelter and waited for dropping temperatures. At 4 p.m. (!) the rockfall abated and I kept going as fast as I could. In some sections, especially the steeper waterfall pitches, the snow and ice were almost gone. Therefore I was forced to climb very tricky, scary, loose and wet mixed terrain with sketchy pro. A ramp system and a traverse to the left leads to a steep rockface which is usually the crux, but, compared to the lower sections, the rock was not too bad. Using free, aid and drytool techniques I reached the easier exit slopes. A final, vertical, ice-and-soft-snow pitch through the cornice at the top made me shit my pants. The face took me thirteen hours to climb (with the stop, twenty-one hours). Another longtime dream was fulfilled.



After some rest days and a twelve-day visit to the remote Waddington Range, where I managed to solo three routes (the Flavelle-Lane route [TD+: 55 degrees 5.8, 980m] on Waddington; a possible new route [5.9+, ca. 650m], left of Perseverence, on the south face of Combatant; and the Southwest Face [TD+: 5.8, 1450m] on Tiedeman), I headed farther north to the main goal of the trip: the 2000-meter unclimbed northwest face of Devils Thumb, the ultimate challenge for a fast solo push. From Petersburg I flew in, highly excited to look at the face, but what a mess: there was no snow and ice at all, only very broken and chossy-looking rock (especially in the lower part). I realized that there is no way to climb this vertical quarry. I left for Canada, where I sat in my car near the river ready to start another attempt on the north face of Mt. Alberta (which I had attempted in 1994, failing below the upper rockband, which scared me too much at the time)—but I hesitated. The last weeks had hurt my knees and back painfully. The stress of being alone in a lot of scary situations had blown my mind, and I decided to not go: I was not motivated or calm enough any more. I started the car, anxious to get back to life, to my friends, to share my beloved red wine... and realizing that once again, I had been lucky to survive."



— Frank Jourdan, Pforzheim, Germany





Some holiday :)

Going to Interbike

Interbike will be happening next week and this will be my second year. If there is anything there you are interested in me checking out and photographing or writing about, please let me know over email. Likewise, if you're going and would like to say hello, get in touch. Contact me at filigreevelo-at-yahoo with the subject line Interbike. Looking forward to it!

Fall in Her Glorious Splendor

Maybe it is because we have missed so many years of this, but I am completely enamored by the fall colors.

Warmington circular

With Barry, Eddie and Maureen. 8 miles. It stayed fine, though some of the ground was muddy. Rain began on the drive home.




We took a footpath opposite the small cemetery in Warmington, heading north and then east,

following field boundaries to begin with, then crossing a couple of fields to meet the road near Davey's Lodge. We turned left and after a longish half mile we turned right ( south-east) behind America Farm, and past some more farm buildings. We crossed another footpath and worked our way round the paths and footbridges marked Cold Harbour on the map, to head southwest, towards Lodge Farm. The building has a large kitchen garden, and some outbuildings. The route continues along a rough road towards and past Papley Cottages to the remains of a moat and the site of Papley medieval village.

Pond at site of medieval village of Papley

The sun came out as we had our coffee break.

Maureen and the blasted willow

We retraced our steps to the point where a path went off to the left (northwest). After a couple of fields another path crossed ours and we turned left [though we missed it at first and had to turn back!].

Hope they can read.

This path headed south west and emerged on to the road by a small wood.

We followed the road to the right past Toll Bar Gate, where it swings left and later right by Miriam's Cover. At the end of the wood there is a crossroads - we went straight over and after a few hundred yards, just past a large farm (Tansor Wold Farm) the path went off to the right.

At this point there was quite a trek through rape fields, and some grass fields.

Warmington was in sight when we got through the gap

The last lap.

And back to Warmington.

Milky Way over Cascade River

The other night while we were photographing the Northern Lights, we looked to the south and were treated to another incredible view, the lights of the Milky Way Galaxy stretching up over the river. I'm not sure which was more impressive... the dancing lights of the Aurora to the north, or the glowing ribbon of the Milky Way to the south. Either way, it made for one spectacular sky!

Thanks Sheri...

While sitting in the auto repair shop in Oakhurst, I had contacted Sheri Fenley (The Educated Genealogist) to see if we could meet up for a day or two. She had been unable to attend the Genealogy Jamboree in Burbank earlier in the month and since I was (sort of) in the area I thought I'd stop by to see her on my way north.

It was a relatively short drive of 150 miles or so from Yosemite to Stockton and I arrived at Sheri's place about noon on Saturday (June 26th). It was non-stop talking for the next 10 hours and most of the day on Sunday! What did we talk about? Our families and Genealogy, of course!

On Sunday, I joined Sheri and a few members of her APG Chapter for lunch and a behind the scenes tour of the San Mateo Historical Museum Archives in Redwood City. It was nice to meet some of her cohorts and see the resources available in San Mateo. Sheri wrote a little about that excursion.

Monday morning photos as I was leaving.

Sheri was saying “Goodbye, Becky!”

Thank you, Sheri, for being a gracious hostess. I very much enjoyed meeting your family and spending time with you. Thank you, Thank you!

Driving in Lesvos to Polichnitos and Agiassos, and going off road

Because Lesvos Island was a big island, in fact the 3rd largest island in the Grecian archipelago, Dutchman and I decided to rent a car so that we can see farther areas. This was after a week of going around with the scooter.



Lesvos Map







Our holiday base is Anaxos located in the northern part of the island and we are going to Polichnitos and Agiassos.







Polichnitos



For this trip, we have decided to go to Polichnitos and Agiassos, and I was also hoping, Plomari, but that never came to fruition. Just before reaching Polichnitos we saw this abandoned (military) runway. Dutchman is fascinated with airplanes, he once was a spotter (mostly military aircraft), so we did a detour and inspected the runway. It was barricaded but what the heck, we will check it out =)



Dutchman said that the airport could have been used during the years when hostilities between Turkey and Greece were heightened. As you can see, Turkey is just a stone’s throw away. Both had a very turbulent relationship and past, let us just say that both nations are friendly with each other now but there is still work to be done.







In Polichtinos, we stopped to take our lunch. Dutchman and I are not big eaters, we usually eat light and healthy. We also share our food. And because of the heat, we always end up ordering the usual local refreshing Greek snacks suspects—Greek Salad and Greek Yoghurt to go with our lemon soda and water. In Greece you always get a basket or plate of bread. They gave us buttered garlic bread.



The Cafe Toulipa was a nice temporary oasis for us. It is located on the intersection of the village with an open terrace that has ivy crawling on its wooden trellis. A perfect retreat on a warm summer day since the foliage gives a cooling effect.









Nevertheless, Polichnitos town was almost dead! There were barely people walking on the streets, Maybe because it was sweltering hot, but anyway, we have decided to move on...













Off-the-beaten-path



We drove down to the beach and pondered if we should stop for a quick dip but decided to drive further until we reached the junction. There is an unpaved road going up the mountains, a short cut actually to Agiassos, and well before we knew it, the adventurous in us kicked in. We are going off road with our little car!



The off-the-beaten-path is a narrow gravel winding road in the mountains where we barely saw a soul during the entire drive. I watch too many CSI’s and Investigation Discovery episodes these days so being in the middle of the wilderness I cannot help but think of grisly stuff. Let’s not go in there, but you can imagine the torture going through in my head as we drove through this deserted part of the island.



It was a long slow drive of half an hour. Not a nice place to get a flat tire or problem with your motor. Here is a quick video:








As we drove on the gravel road passing by the lush vegetation of olive trees and pine trees, we never saw a single soul. A bit eerie.







Agiassos



Finally we reached the main road to Agiassos. In this part of Lesvos we noticed more pine trees than olive trees. I love it that the island is quite varied, not only in terrain but in vegetation as well.



Agiassos is one of the pretty places in Lesvos and I really wanted to see it, however when we were there we could not find parking. The village sits high up in the mountain and we will have to park somewhere before going up. A heated debate ensued in the car about going into the village or not.



Anyway, without going further into detail, we turned back the car to the direction of Anaxos, in the northern part of the island where we are staying. My heart was so heavy, but sometimes we just have to let certain things go.









The only 2 pictures of Agiassos that I took, taken from the entrance of the village. You can already see and feel that this village is going to be pretty, but, helaas...

Mother Nature's Curves

For those of us who are Monk-like, straight lines are the way to go. They are clean, they allow you to line things up nicely and they just make sense.



I noticed when editing some pictures from the Sunken Garden, that Mother Nature really isn't so much into straight lines. In fact, Mother Nature has glorious curves to most of her creations. Some things are simple circles and ovals.





Some are more twisted and are complicated in their form.




Some have a bit of a pattern to them, even if it is a rough, loose sort of pattern.


There are bold curves, that make bold statements!





And then there are the sort of luscious curves that have me thinking va-va-va voom curves are here!



As much as I love straight lines, I gotta admit that Mother Nature knows what she is doing with all of those curves! Just stunning!

Balanced Ice

This was one heck of a beautiful piece of ice, and it sure was a lot of fun (and a challenge!) to photograph. It was a challenge because it rested atop a 6 foot high pile of plate ice that at it's core was solid ice, but on the surface was not. The surface was lined with loose plate ice anywhere from 1 to 3 inches thick. I had to scramble to the top of this ice pile in order to get this photo with this perspective from my wide-angle lens. It was kind of like trying to climb an extremely steep sand dune... for each step up I slid almost a complete step back down, except this wasn't soft sand. It was cold, hard ice that with each step broke into a million pieces. Eventually, though, I made it to the top of the mound and got up close and personal with this piece of ice. The formation you see here was only about two feet across, and I was only about two feet away from it with my 17mm lens. The way the sky was reflecting within the ice was awesome, to say the least. I sure do love this time of year, it affords countless unique opportunities for photos!

Fall Aspens

We took a trip to the Jemez Mountains last week to see if any of the aspen trees leaves were turning that nice shade of yellow they turn in the fall. there were lots of beautiful trees. And there was one squirrel that wanted his photo taken. These squirrels are called Abert or tassle eared squirrles.

The Tides at Cobscook Bay

One of the advantages of having a campsite at the end of the road and overlooking the bay is being able to watch the ebb and flow of the tides. This area is known for having some of the highest tides in the United States. And, I will admit, I was fascinated with watching the water move in and out of the bay.






High Tide. After the storm. September 19th at 2:25 p.m.





Low Tide. September 20th at 9:36 a.m. The Island is no longer an Island.




High Tide. After the storm. September 19th at 2:37 p.m. The view from a neighboring campsite.





Low Tide. September 20th at 9:39 a.m. From about the same spot as the previous photo.

3/9 Friday Pit Profile

Autumn Sunset, Grand Portage Bay

A recent sunset over Lake Superior. The clouds lately for our sunsets have been spectacular. Nice variety in the clouds and some amazing colors. Definitely better than August's sunsets, which most of the time didn't have a single cloud in the sky!