Monique 40-metres up Fish Eye (8c or 33) at , .

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O r s u m Oliana Monique Forestier’s epic battle with FISH EYE, her first 33. photographs: Simon carter t’s late, very late and yet again I throwing themselves wholeheartedly, yet home early for sore tips or lack of skin; find myself standing at the sink precisely, at the hardest route on the cliff. here your entire body gets pummelled. filing layers of dead skin away from A project, a line so ‘perfect and pure’ I love that there is a lot of climbing in Imy hands with a coarse foot file, as Adam puts it, ‘that it has just enough a route; you are in for a long fight. You which I’m sure was meant for a horse. holds, nothing more, nothing less, to get have to stay completely focused, never The seams between my first and second you to the top’. So minimalist in fact, get sloppy, have to really want it, and finger digits have burst open and when I that the only line I could see was the line keep pushing and pushing no matter how rinse away the suds there are red gashes of quickdraws guiding the way. When pumped you are. This is what I find very staring back at me. This has become this project goes down it is whispered to satisfying. the norm – permanent weaknesses that become the world’s first 9b+ (38). The route that lured me in was the can spontaneously erupt, mid-climb, My husband Simon, daughter Coco stellar Fish Eye. It is a 50-metre line that without warning, sort of like the blasts all the way up the centre San Andreas Fault, but not quite. of the steadily over-hanging cliff. My worries are caused by the established it and incredibly dry air in Spain, not he said he named it so because tectonic movements. of the ‘fisheye’ perspective While unsavoury weather bowing the cliff when he stood batters northern Europe, the beneath it, unlike my theory that Spanish winter come spring has it was named after the ‘fisheye- been one of the driest in years. like’ pocket at the top crux. In These exceptional conditions a nutshell, Fish Eye starts with have lured climbers from their 28 metres of physical punchy training hovels to fondle the climbing and then you reach the fantabulous lines at Margalef, first crux – made up of 13 hand Siurana, Terradets and Oliana – moves through blue rock, which which seems to be the flavour of incorporates a series of under- the month. clings, long spans and a deadpoint The atmosphere at Oliana throw to reach the rail. Here you is electric, super-charged, with need to work really hard to gain a international names sending rest if you’re to get anything back. Oliana’s test pieces in rapid-fire Following a solid move off the succession. It’s a particularly rail, it’s sustained running between positive scene with no short pockets until you gain the final supply of encouragement. Local open hand grapefruit rest before lady, Daila Ojeda sent Mind the last crux. Like the fruit, it’s a Control (34) just before our slippery sucker making the rest arrival and soon after we were Guillaume Lebret on Humildes pa Casa (32), one of the classic lines at Oliana. not so much of a rest. Now you’re lucky enough to witness Caroline at the 42-metre mark and from Ciavaldini () and Sasha ‘The and I climbed here for weeks earlier this there its 14 hand moves to the anchors, Dispatcher’ DiGiulian (USA) gobble it year. I hadn’t realised it before, but I’d skipping one clip along the way. up for breakfast. The graceful Evgeniya been searching for such a place most My first time on Fish Eye was last Malamid (Russia) snaffled up Fish Eye of my climbing life. I enjoy all aspects October. I spent two days working the (33) then onsighted La Marroncita (31) of climbing, but technical and gymnastic route and didn’t get higher than the and Humildes pa’Arriba (30). But the I love most of all. Oliana is rail. Humbled, I turned my attention most extreme climbing I witnessed was my nirvana; here resistance and super- elsewhere, but wasn’t inspired. I that of and Chris Sharma endurance count for a lot. You never go retuned my attention back to Fish Eye,

ROCK | winter 2012 19 Chris Sharma working his project, which would be a contender for the world’s first 9b+ or 38. determined to get to the top in any much knew all the way up that I didn’t fashion just to sample what it was like to have the fitness to see this thing through try a route of this calibre. When I finally to the anchor. But I was climbing it and dogged my way to the top I was hooked, therefore in with a chance; a slim chance, line and sinker. When my last day came but I was there all the same. Some days I around I had made progressive gains and didn’t get through the lower crux or make linked to the last crux. I didn’t know if I it much higher than the rail, so the second would return to Spain anytime soon but time I reached the last crux was another none the less I trained like a mad women surprise. In fact it was my warm-up burn possessed for three months just in case. and I felt so good on the bottom that I just decided to keep going. I was carrying

Then earlier this year I returned to a cold pump but the whole cliff was Monique climbing through the lower crux, 28-metres up Fish Eye. Fish Eye. I reached my high point, or yelling ‘venga, venga’ and it motivated the last crux, after only four days. I was me to keep pushing. When I left the last very surprised to say the least. I pretty rest I felt pretty fresh but when I went to screaming, again. It was frustrating. The crimp, my fingers refused to bend – they draining nature of the route and the short just laughed back at me. I did not try this afternoon window, meant that I tactic again. only got one shot each day when I made I cannot recall anything special about it that high. the third time at the last crux, only that I By now I’d reached the stage where I fell off – again. After some more dogging thought it would go down the next shot I thought I’d solved the puzzle. I was for sure. It sucked me in. I kept trying psyched and charged with new hope it, but I debated in my mind whether that I could send the route with this new spending so much of my trip on the one Coco Carter, Daila Ojeda and Sasha DiGiulian sharing beta for sequence. But at the same time, I had an route was the best thing to be doing. But Mind Control (8c +), Oliana, Spain. IMAGE: Simon Carter inkling that I’d changed the sequence then again I knew I wouldn’t be back in unnecessarily. a hurry. What I should have done is step The fourth go up at the last crux I away for a while to give my poor fingers rushed the moves and didn’t seat my a chance to heal. Hindsight is a wonderful fingers in the shallow pocket properly. thing. The tape slipped and so I fell off once The sixth go up at the last crux I had again. The fifth go up at the last crux I three fingers taped with deep splits held the pocket, got my hips in, reached underneath. It was just a ‘see what up tall for the crimp, got it, but got happens burn’ and surprisingly, all of a it badly. My next foot placement was sudden, there I was staring at the last crux Coco Carter inspects Chris Sharma’s tools. IMAGE: Simon Carter out, my arse sagged and so I fell off again. I could smell the rain in the air, the

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It sucked me in. i kept trying it, but debated in my mind whether spending so much of my trip on the one route was the best thing to be doing.

wind picked up and I felt the rain falling. adjusted my foot placement only slightly backpack, but more likely a reaction to I rushed from the rest before I was ready. (as I’d planned, back to the original a vaccination or a hereditary condition. Again I came off screaming and a flood of sequence), drilled into the shallow pocket, Later it was diagnosed as acute Brachial bitter disappointment washed over me. grew three inches, crushed the next Plexus Neuritis. It’s a nerve condition When the rains came, they threw crimp, squeezed the life out of the right that basically ‘turns off’ some of the everything they had down on Oliana for pinch and continued to the top in what nerves – and in turn the muscles – of three repugnant days. Then as quickly as seemed like effortless slow motion. the shoulder. This turned out to be the they arrived, they stopped and the sun first of three episodes, with each bout reappeared signalling the resumption of Clipping the chains was a release. taking months or years to sort itself out. my private battle with the unyielding face. It was an emotional moment, perhaps So, it had been a long road to get to this The seventh go up at the last crux I was the most personally satisfying in all my point with my climbing – and to have the fresh and I thought this time for sure. years of climbing. It had been quite the opportunity to try harder and satisfy the But it was not to be. I don’t know for the journey, all the more rewarding because inner voice that had been niggling me life of me what I did wrong or didn’t do it hadn’t gone smoothly. In fact, when I for years. Thank you Fish Eye for the right, but I had already decided to walk think about it, I’d waited a long time to good times. away and try other routes. push my climbing like this. Years ago my When I came back to Fish Eye a few climbing had been progressing nicely. days later I was psyched again and hungry Then in 2007, while in Madagascar, one Monique has been climbing for 15 years. She is to succeed. It was day 20 on the route. I day out of the blue I felt burning pain 39, a mother, and lives in the Blue Mountains. She charged through the bottom of the route down my arm and was barely able to is sponsored by Aussie Bodies, Black Diamond, feeling stronger than ever and made it function. I don’t know what triggered Scarpa and Sterling Rope. Her website is: up to the last crux for the eighth time. I it, perhaps impingement from by www.moniqueclimbs.com.au

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