Work Now, Climb later

Climbing has taken a back seat since arriving in Bandung. The first indication of this came perhaps just before Christmas, in the Harau Valley, in West Sumatra. My interest in the Harau Valley was first sparked by the casual mention of a group of self-sufficient climbers in the Lonely Planet and the subsequent Internet searches that gave a hazy view of definite climbing possibilities. The Valley is a stop-off on the backpacker trail, with the waterfalls of Lemba Harau incorporated into tours to the area around Bukkitinggi. It consists of a single road around which there are villages in a rural setting which back onto distant rocky outcrops. As you continue up the valley, the rock gets closer, the dwellings get fewer and sweeping 100 metre expanses of yellow orange and blue rock rising from emerald green rice fields continue kilometre after kilometre and lead finally to the village of Harau itself. We stayed at the Echo Homestay, a place very close to nature providing an ideal location from which to set out on day trips into the valley itself.

The Eiger Wall

While we managed to fit a visit to the place into a one week trip as well as cart a rope, shoes and harnesses along on the trip, we didn’t get any actual climbing in; in the three days we spent there we only took a look at the rock and the astounding scenery around from ground level. In retrospect it seems like a genuine missed opportunity, and in writing this I realize just how upset I am, while at the time it felt like we tried, although perhaps not with a full effort, to get onto the rock and get some climbing done. By the time we had psyched up to give it a go on the afternoon of the second day, the rain began and didn’t let up before we left to Danau Maninjau on the morning of the third.
While the circumstances and the rain were perhaps partly to blame I can’t help thinking that a fear of the prospect of having to down climb, of the bolts (which were for the most part in good condition), and of my unfamiliarity with the conglomerate rock all went together in creating a certain reluctance to climb and prolonged the climbing until it was, by accident, too late to do so. The trip to Maninjau made up for the lack of climbing for the most part.

In Bandung, we found a local climbing wall within the first week through a friend of Anja’s and went down a couple of times initially and then, when I started work I managed to get it together enough to trek down twice a week at 9 a.m. to have a rewarding pre-work climb. The wall is at a local outdoors shop Eiger on Jl. Cihampelas and by Indonesian standards is pretty good. It is a fully free standing 25 metre overhung, bendcrete-esque artificial wall with holds, bolts enough to get you to the top at about French 7a climbing. Inside, the shop has large glass windows looking into a small bouldering wall made of similar paneled climbing wall with a flat section, a stepped roof, overhung by about two metres and another by around one.

Coming from the UK and having worked at both The Edge in Sheffield and the Manchester Climbing Centre sets my expectations of how a climbing wall should be far too high. Having just one lead wall and small bouldering area at the Eiger Climbing Centre, both with questionable safety issues puts a slight damper on the whole experience. Still, the walls present enough of a challenge to keep me occupied. Throughout the month of March though, I haven’t been down. I put this down to the fact that I haven’t been out on rock since arriving in Indonesia. It really does kill the motivation. Let’s face it, indoor climbing just isn’t the same.

All in all, now that the dry season seems to be making a, appearance, I hope to be able to post some information about climbing around Bandung in the coming weeks and to be able to get motivation back up to the level it was prior to leaving the UK. Bandung has much in its favour in terms of climbing: the local competition climbers who, while perhaps being unable to go outdoors as much as one might hope, are always ready and willing to share a session. So Citata becomes less of a dream and more of a reality.