A ride with Howard

Up Tunnel. He has a super ridculous new bike:


Yes, that's Campy 80th anniversary on there

Aeropress

We've been drinking mediocre coffee so much, I thought it was finally time to try my hand at it. Friends had been recommending the Aeropress coffee maker for a while, so I ordered it for US dilvery, to coincide with my visit,

and went down to Artis coffee for some beans (and an espresso of course)

I also had bought a small hario hand cranked grinder. The coffee was their Aricha natural Yirgacheffe. The results, without too much tweaking, were fantastic!

Off to the bay!

Tour de l'Aiguille

I did my MTB/VTT goal of the summer: ride to the Aiguille de Quaix. It ended up being a lot of walking the bike but was pretty cool

Back to Grenoble

We got a very early start to avoid any problems like last year. The moped was way-overburdened, but after a half hour we eventually made it to the port, returned the bike, got on the ferry

took a taxi to the airport
took the plane to Bergamo
Drove for hours on the autorute, stopping for coffee (two are mine)

Then more hours

and eventually home! Nobody ever said it was easy getting to/from Kalymnos.

Last climbing day

Chloe started the day by getting slightly turtled by a too heavy pack

And then we did some nice routes at a new crag (to us): Arginonta. We started on some 6's, then moved on to the left, where I flashed Lysistrati (yay!),

and then got shut down on No Sleep til Hammersmith (booo). We coordinated with Carl, to FINALLY, after all of these years do the above water traverse in Vathi, but could not convince his beautiful American climbing protege Rachel, who lives in Berlin, to come join us. We had lunch in Emporios and then putt-putted out to Vathi by way of Massouri to rent shoes and do a few other errands. It was a lot of mopeding. Maybe we'll rent a car next time. The traverse turned out to be a blast. I had planned on using a makeshift chalk pot,

but instead came up with a cunning and brilliant plan: fill my pockets with chalk! And because I am such a good husband, I would leave little chalk stashes at random places for chloe. So the traverse is long -- 350 meters, and there are a few easy cruxes, then some harder ones and then one stopper move. I latched it for a millisecond and then took the plunge. Being a pretty terrible swimmer, I exhausted myself doggy paddling back to port. A must do for the summer though! From there, we rinsed the shoes off, bought a gigantic load of baklava (to take home to Grenoble), had the moped guy check the bike over, returned the somewhat soggy shoes to the climbing store (note to self: bring our own shoes next time), then back to Emporios to pack :(.

One of the cacti was blooming -- apparently it only blooms for one night of the year

Telendos again!

Another Telendos day, this time with Carl!

We started out at Pescatore, where I flailed on OTR (went left instead of right -- oops), then flashed Y viva Pancho Villa and we pretended not to her the bickering American climbing couple.

and then we moved on


to the spectactular Eros crag. I fought like hell to get the flash of Adonis, but blew the crux, and then suffered through the sharp upper section. Then, on to Aphrodite, which was nice enough. And then... Panagia, which is the most desperate 7a+ I have ever been on. I took a few big falls on it but eventually thrutched my way up. Terrifying



By this time, it was almost boat time (you tell the boat captain when to pick you up, after negotiating with other climbers!). We shuffled down the trail and watched the other people climb at IROX and concealed our smirks at the by now overt fighting American climbing couple, having a bit of a time on Helvetix. Next, a boat ride back to Kalymnos

And dinner at Aegean! Carl hung out for beers.

St Photis

A nice, but very humid day of climbing at St. Photis



followed by... Food



And a swim in the bay. I stepped on an urchin, which I do not recommend

Galatiani

In all our trips to Kalymnos, we never made the big hike up to the Galatiani cave, so today was the day. We got an early start and met Carl at the crag, and he showed us around. I flailed on a few things, and had the joy of finding a bat in one of the last holds on Nymfi, BUT... Chloe climbed her hardest route ever -- K44, 7a!






We also stopped by and bought honey from a beekeeper with bee boxes right next to the road

AMAZING honey

And I got a few photos out near Emporios

Rest day

Secret garden

We climbed with Carl at the Secret Garden, and he showed me some of the classics. Even with running beta, I basically fell off of everything, which was a bit annoying.

Afterwards, we hung out with Aris, Katie, Carl and a friend of theirs from Athens in Palionisos. I ate some goat
,
Drank some beers, went for a quick swim in the icy cold water ("The coldest on the island!", Aris declared with his trademark grin"), and had some of the special goat that they were cooking


Palionisos has changed quite a bit since our first visit there in 2005. At the time, there was only a dirt road connecting Skalia to the town, and basically nothing there except the harbor. Now there are multiple tavernae and tons of people. I think I like it more in the "old" days. Still wonderful, though!

A new crag

We hadn't yet been to any of the crags between Vathi and Arginonta, and thought we would give ET a try. It ended up being a little difficult finding our way, but the routes were nice. We did the nice slabs to the left, like Iris, Orchid and Ibisicus, then went over to do the fabulous but slightly terrifying "Rose". Finally, my hardest onsight of the trip -- "Poppy", which I really enjoyed

Secret Garden

We climbed with my friend Antony's climbing buddies from Zurich today at Secret Garden.  No hard sends really, but a crap load of people:


Then back




and more food