Easter eggs

Easter always comes welcome with its bank holidays bonanza. This year is more welcome than ever, with the royal wedding and the Early May bank holiday all within reach, making it possible to leave the island for eleven days, taking only three days off work. So, next Thursday I’m off for eleven truly royal days climbing in Terradets!

Last year I spent two weeks over Easter in the Amalfi Coast. At the end of the holiday I was celebrating my first 8a. To date, that is the only 8a I ever climbed and I started to doubt about the actual route grade. However, the story around that climb is what matters the most to me.

In November 2009 I spent four glorious days in Ravello, visiting the Amalfi Coast for the first time, with my wife, a furry man from Scotland, a night screamer from Genoa and a longhaired, tattooed man with no clear origins. There we met another friend: a ginger oldie from Naples. It was the ginger oldie and the furry man who first told me about the high quality crags spread across the Amalfi Coast. Yes, I know, my friends are the best.

The area is mostly known for the breathtaking scenery, the sea, the beaches, the local cuisine, the picturesque little vertical towns that have impossibly been built over the centuries, etc. Local climber Oreste Bottiglieri started developing most of the crags some time ago at his own expenses giving climbers some of the finest climbs on the planet. I had read and heard a lot about it so I had to go and see with my own eyes.

When I first arrived the sheer beauty of the place itself shocked me. This is something that cannot be described. It must be seen. We went straight to the nearest crag for a quick aperitif before dinner and despite the pouring rain after the warm up I was certain I was in climbing paradise.

On our third day climbing we went to Positano. We walked down from Montepertuso, went past La Selva and ended up at Brigante Mirabella’s crag. Here I met Guntabaar.

Guntabaar is a 20 meters long 7b+. It’s very steep and it’s pure, concentrated fun on tufas and stalactites. When I started climbing I was enjoying it so much that at some point I totally forgot where I was. After clipping the last draw I realised I was going to on-sight it. 7b+? That can’t be! In fact, a small stalactite broke in my hands and I fell one meter short of the chain. I sent it on my second go, but I felt like I had been robbed! I was totally gutted and very much upset…

Guntabaar had an extension, an even steeper section followed by a roof and a tricky exit. Graded 8a altogether, it was first climbed by Marzio Nardi, strong climber from Turin, who runs the B-Side climbing centre: the climbing factory that manufactured me...

It was a sign from the gods. It was as if Guntabaar was telling me “you wish!” “Yes, Neapolitan bastard, I want and I will, and I’ll be back for revenge!”

Easter 2010. Here I am. I have been training hard all winter for this moment. I have worked Guntabaar Extension for two days and rested for one day. He’s winning the battle, but the war is not over yet. Tomorrow I’ll be flying back to London. Last week I had a vertigo attack. I was unable to stand still or walk unaided. I couldn’t eat anything without vomiting and I lost a lot of weight. I spent a day in hospital and for the following two days I was knocked out. I still feel severely unlevelled, unable to tell whether I am at an angle or not. I will not look for excuses though. Today I feel strong. I am a land-to-air missile.


As I start climbing, however, suddenly I feel a bit less like a missile and more like a sinking boat. I am going to lose this war. I decided to warm up on the route itself. Clip after clip I get to the chain, but now my confidence is very low and I am scared. 


Obviously I take it out on my wife and then leave to have my lunch alone dismissing the day saying “next time I’ll just go and clean it”. She looks even more disappointed than I am beaten.


The sea below is so calm and shining, the sky is cloudless and everything looks so peaceful. It’s a wonderful spring day in the most wonderful place. Yet, I am so nervous and angered at myself. It’s amazing how climbers are able to ignore the most beautiful things and waste their attention on a meaningless thin line of rock.


As the time goes by, I slowly start to forget about that line or rock, until I am finally at peace with the world again. Despite the vertigo I have just spent two amazing weeks. It really doesn’t matter if I don’t send it, it was hubristic to come here expecting to have it all easy. I have enough of this. We still have half-day holiday and I don’t want to spend it here grunting. 


I walk back to my wife, give her a hug, a kiss and decide that, whatever happens, tonight we’ll celebrate the end of our holiday. In fact, she climbed her first 7a only few days ago and that alone is something to be happy for and celebrate. 


I start climbing and this time I feel like the first time I met Guntabaar. We’re friends again. I am able to climb with a smile on my face, enjoy every move and lose contact with reality. This route is so cool! Then I hit the higher crux. I went past the 7b+ chain almost without realising it. All of a sudden I feel the pump in my arms and the sequence I carefully planned when on the ground looks impossible now. I jump for the big jug that I know is there and I make it. Just. I am hanging off one hand and I am about to let go when my wife shouts “ale Nic!” 


It’s a wakeup call. This is our last day holiday, she’s not climbing and she’s down there, belaying patiently as she always is with me. If I can’t do it for me, I should at least try for her. I manage to match hands and bring my feet high enough to heel hook the stalactite in my hands and I am now inverted. This is my patented koala rest, the sign I am wasted and desperate. As I hang there trying to recover the unrecoverable, I realise I just went past the hardest crux of the route. Not exactly in style, but still... unbelievable! I can’t screw it now. There is one more crux, less powerful, but more technical. It should be my forte. Enough rest, time to go. I am really pumped now. Every move feels like the last one. Past the last crux, last clip, last move et voila! I am at the top of my first 8a.

So, in last year’s Easter egg we found welcome surprises. I hope this year’s Easter egg will have space for even more surprises. Maybe a 7c on-sight or an 8a+ red-point, but both would not even compare with what I know it’s already in there... let’s hope he or she has a good ape index...