surf and climb day

After weeks of rain and work keeping me indoors, was good to have a full day outside on the weekend. The day started early for surf class. Waves were about half a meter, and currents weren't that strong, so was a good "beginner" setting. I switched from a long board to a lighter and smaller funboard, and did alright with it... still want to get to the little boards which I think will be more manageable with my size.

Got some nice waves but had a lot of trouble getting back in the water again... as I was getting back in this series of pretty huge waves came in - I dismounted from the board and dove down, and then it was that washing machine effect of foam, board pulling at your leg and water wooshing all around. Worse is getting back up from air only to realize there is another wave coming... and then worse yet is mounting back on the board with hair disheveled, bikini all over the place and other surfers shaking their heads at you "took some waves in the head, eh?" Oh well...

In the afternoon headed for a route called Urbanoide (5.9). Its two pitches with really easy access, the hike is like 10 minutes from the parking lot. It was a pretty hot day and at 3:30pm, when we started, the rock was really hot, but around 4pm it had cooled down and was pretty nice.


The climb is fun, crimpy and slabby, starts easy and gets a bit harder with a stemmy/mantelling move where you have to trust a foot placement that doesn't seem like it will stick. The hardest move is in the start of the second pitch, before the first protection. The climb is not that well protected though so I wouldn't like to lead it... luckily I didn't have to :)

The second pitch of the climb finishes in a ledge with a pretty sweet view, looking left you see the sugar loaf, looking right, the lagoon, looking straight, the Christ statue. Looking down, some fancy penthouse pools in buildings (where apparently my friend who was with me climbing once saw people doing it).

There is a third short pitch to the summit, and a possible way of hiking down from there... but given that my friend wasn't really sure how and where the top bolts were, and the hike down involves passing through a favela (recently drug-traffic-free favela, but a favela, and that it was night, we decided it was best to rappel down.