Yosemite
The vibes in the valley… although the high traffic, climbers or non, it’s worth to be there at least once in his life. But attention: take it in the right dosage!;-)
Highlight to me has been the life on the wall, by far. I climbed two times El Cap, once per “Nose” and the second time by freeclimbing “El Nino”. It’s somehow hard work, but sleeping on a portaledge, calculating water and food and entering in a symbiose with your partner, transforms the hard hauling etc into a pleasure. Here are some pics form the Nose (it’s a busy route, but you can’t miss that if you’re a climber) and El Nino, a 13.c route with more crimps then cracks. But no traffic and people on that one:
The Rostrum
A must! I’ve rarely climbed a multipitch with such a big variation: Offwight, chimneys, fingercracks, an overhanging roof, technical climbing on crimps. Simply WAOH! It’s also a very famous route, so the best is to go late, around noon, so you can fully enjoy the climbing way behind all the people left at the parking at 6am. The vibes up there are magical!
Separate Reality and Power of Tales
You all probably know the famous roof of Separate Reality, another must and so cool to climb! I went foot first in the crux on the lip. Just one pitch below, there is another (very hard) crack to try: Power of Tales. I tried that together with Barbara Zangerl, but we both failed. Reason to try it again during my next trip!
Other things To Do in the valley:
Jumping nacked in the river after a warm climbing day. Drinking a fresh beer in the Meadows. Filling up your water tank at fern springs.
Red Rocks
I’ve only climbed 3 days in red Rocks and one route I would absolutely recommend: The Original route at Rainbow walls. A 5 Star route, a little remote with an outstanding view on Las Vegas
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Towers around Moab
We climbed 4 towers in total while being in Moab. The experience has been unique on all of them, even if the climbing was just ok on some. But one route has had all! 5 star climbing on a totally rad tower in the middle of nowhere: Moses Tower and the route “Primerose Dihedrals” and just nearby, the tower “Zeus”.

2 hours off road driving from Moab to settle down totally alone, a 30 min walk from the towers. RAD!!!
Pic.: Benoit Merlin
Indian Creek
Well, what to say about that place….one of my favorite places on earth!
It has been my second time in the creek and it was so cool to see my personal improvement since spring! It felt very natural to me to place gear and also I did way better with my jamming, in all different types of cracks. I climbed a lot onsight and flash, always by giving all I had! One route I tried this spring, called “Death of a cowboy”, a 13-, I was able to tick after two more days of investment. Very proud about that!

Big lesson how climbing large cracks by Sam. I got my ass kicked on that route called “Big Baby”.
An 11….
Pic.: Benoit Merlin

We also spent lots of time watching paintings and visiting ruins of the Anasazis. There are so many in the Creek! Pic.: Nina Caprez
You certainly heard about Trumps plan to drastically reduce the size of Bears Ears and Grand Staircase Escalate National Monuments. There are different options for donating money to help the cause. Here are two different links:
Thank’s and hopefully we can all continue to keep rocking there!