Friday, January 30, 2009

© in Yoga?

I was researching Bikram yoga, because there is a class offered by CUYS on Saturday mornings that I'm considering going to at some point. (Sidenote, amusingly, CUYS's website says this:

This class will be conducted "in the style of" a Bikram class, although the heating may not quite reach the prescribed 40.5°C favoured by Bikram, due to architectural constraints.

complete with the unnecessary quotation marks. I was highly suspicious prior to reading the website that they'd be able to successfully get a Cambridge room to the appropriate temperature, and that just confirmed my suspicions.)

Anyways, my research revealed that Mr. Bikram is quite a controversial guy. He believes in "competitive yoga," as well as completely commercialized yoga, raising some people's hackles (although that train has already left the station). But what really is interesting is how aggressively he's attempting to assert his claimed intellectual property rights in Bikram yoga.

The first thing that he seems to have done is trademarked the use of his name in relation to this style of hot yoga. So unless you are licensed by him, you're not supposed to go around calling your hot yoga class "Bikram" (sorry, CUYS). This doesn't seem to be a major problem, I don't think (although I've already forgotten what we talked about in relation to TMing names during one of my IP classes in the fall). But the bigger problem is that he has also attempted to assert copyright in the series of poses ("asanas") that make up a Bikram yoga class. So if you run a class called "hot yoga" and use those asanas in that order, he's going to say you're infringing.

Now, as far as I can tell, he has settled out of court with a few studios, and never actually brought his copyright claim to trial (although this is only based on a couple Google links -- tell me if you know otherwise). But I think that this is still a problem (chilling effects and all that).

I'm not sure if he's trying to assert copyright in the poses individually or in the series of poses together. One website I saw did indicate the first, but that seems ridiculous -- you can't copyright a pose, even if it is part of protectable choreography -- it would be like copyrighting a word out of a book. Silly. So I'm assuming that he's attempting to assert copyright only in the series of poses, meaning that if you used the same poses in a different order, you probably wouldn't be infringing.

So I figure that he's probably trying to claim that the series of poses are a choreographed composition and therefore copyrightable. But I can see some pretty clear distinctions between a choreographed dance and a sequence of asanas. The dance is ultimately a performance, the yoga practice is not (well, I may put on a performance doing yoga, but that's different). Plus, if you start to protect what is essentially a sports training exercise as intellectual property, you are starting to go down a pretty slippery slope -- can I become a basketball coach, come up with a training regimen for my team, and prevent other teams from using it through the use of copyright? (Hmm, maybe I could try to protect it as a trade secret, though ... that could be interesting.) Anyways, using copyright to protect yoga messes up all the incentives. Of course, it depends on exactly what theory you think it is that copyright is based on, but even the ones that might suggest protecting yoga do so tenuously at best.

We actually talked about the possibility of patenting sports moves in my patent class last year (I'm surprised Bikram hasn't gone down that avenue, too), which again we ultimately decided was a bad idea, because none of the justifications for patent law really applied to the development of sports moves (we specifically discussed this in the context of the Fosbury Flop, and whether Dick Fosbury could/should have patented that move).

Ultimately, though, I think Bikram has a TM claim, but nothing more, and is just being silly. But how interesting!

How my garden grows

For Christmas, Nick's mom got me, well, a lot of stuff. Including an amaryllis plant. So it came as a bulb, and the story was that it would take 8-12 weeks to flower once you started watering it.

So, while I was away on vacation, Nick's mom started the watering process for me so that it would bloom in late February. The problem is that she seems to do a much better job at caring for plants than me. When I picked it up from her a week and a half ago, the shoot was fully grown (and it was a bit challenging to transport back to Cambridge in the car, since apparently it is also a bit fragile).

Since then, it bloomed incredibly quickly. One of the two shoots it developed has fully bloomed and is actually going downhill a bit now, and the other shoot is very close to being fully bloomed as well. (After the flowers die and fall off, you can save the plant and try to keep it alive for future years, which is tricky, or else just let the whole thing die.) Here are some pictures of it from various points last week.



















Thursday, January 29, 2009

International Climbing Celebrity

Last night, one of the five CUMC climbing cars going to an indoor gym went to the newly opened Harlow climbing gym rather than the standard Mile End. I was in that car, which was good -- I was happy to check out the new wall and excited that it was all routes (as opposed to the more bouldering-based Mile End). I knew that I would have to pay a one-time "registration fee" of five pounds that all the walls in England seemingly have (I still don't know why), but I wanted to see it, plus it was a little closer to Cambridge than Mile End.

Pros
Harlow did have some good things going for it. The taller walls were reportedly about 40 feet high (they did feel like at least 35), and they had some good angles. They didn't have much in the way of severe overhangs, but they also didn't use up all their available space with highly-featured slabs (although they did have a few of those). Most of the taller walls, in fact, were unfeatured plywood -- which I strongly prefer to the messy overfeatured walls that are so common in England. There was both a lot of leading and a lot of toproping, unlike a lot of other gyms in England where most lines are only one or the other. There were probably about 40 stations in total, but I bet that at least 10 of them are never going to have anything harder than 5.7 on them -- they're sort of the equivalent of station 1 at MetroRock, except that they take up about a quarter of the total stations. But that's still superior to Mile End's ~15 stations for routes.

It's closer to Cambridge than Mile End, and stays open later (10pm as opposed to 9:30). There is no nearby kebab shop that we have to spend time faffing at outside in the cold after climbing, either (although there is an indoor cafe that three of the five of us went up to to get snacks at -- my belayer wanted to go with the other three to get snacks, but didn't quite dare ask to go, so I didn't let him -- so I didn't have to be involved in the snacking). So because it's closer to Cambridge and stays open later, we get about 2.5 hours of climbing rather than the ~1.5 we get at Mile End. Finally, crucially, it is much, much, much less crowded than Mile End -- there were probably only about 25 people in there in total (at Mile End, the tiny section of routes often ends up with 25 people in it alone, with probably at least 100 more in the various bouldering sections on Wednesday nights).

Cons
There are a lot of these. The biggest problem was with the routesetting. The gym sets by hold color, which is as okay as it can hope to be at the moment because (a) the holds are still new and easily distinguishable and (b) there is equal variety among holds of the same color as there is between holds of different colors (but I'll move on to holds separately in a minute). So the hold-color system itself isn't the biggest problem. The problem is that rumor has it, the gym only has one route setter so far. Which I believe, based on the routes. So the majority of stations only had one route on them, although there were a few with two. (On stations with two routes, they give a grade to the route you can do by using both colors, which always annoys me -- that's just un-thought-out rainbowing and shouldn't be counted as a route on its own.) This route setter has some interesting quirks. His easier routes are terrible. Literally right-left-right-left the whole way up the wall. A ladder. And his routes in the 5.10 range were sort of BK-style routes -- the holds started to get further and further apart. However, in the 5.11 range, the routes suddenly started to get surprisingly better, so I started to suspect that the route setter was more lazy than just bad (although sometimes he was definitely bad, too).

The problem, though, is that the route setter seems to be applying an artificial curve to grading his routes (just like HLS!). The routes are all a lot more similar in difficulty than the grades would suggest. The 4's and 5's (the grades were done in French) were somewhat more challenging than they should have been, but the 6's and 7's were soft. There were a few token "hard" 7's and an 8a, but the apex of the bell curve was probably barely 6a and then dropped off steeply. I suspect, though, that the setter probably doesn't climb much harder than 5.11, and I suspect that the hard 7's and 8a would be choss piles. The grades weren't extremely consistent among themselves, but they also weren't unacceptably way off from themselves (although, like I said, the hard 6's and easy 7's were soft and squishy).

Another issue is that I'm not sure that the setter has anyone check his routes after setting them (including himself). There were at least two routes that I did that were all very consistent with a sudden ridiculous crux that is way out of character. In one of them, a little foothold would have made an obvious difference, and I'm not sure whether the setter actually ran that route and realized his problem. The other one was a 7a. I had already onsighted two "7a's" (which were really only about .11a and .11b, respectively), and I was happily making my way up this third 7a, which seemed consistent with the first two. The problem was, though, I suddenly got two the final two holds before the top jug, and there was a GIANT move. Like, you could either do an all-out dyno or do some arete work that was completely out of character with the rest of the route (and it's not even clear whether or not the arete is on) (I eventually did do the move using the arete). What's the deal? I'm not sure that the setter ever really ran the route. Or maybe they did but got bored before doing the final move. The distance of the final move isn't obvious from the ground because perspective makes it look smaller than it is. So even though the setter is generally good at setting things that are in the "real 5.11" range, the setter's laziness messes things up for himself.

The next issue was holds. All the holds are made by the same company -- Top30. It appears that Top30 made the short featured walls, as well. The holds were all quite basic small shapes. There was nothing interesting at all. I think oftentimes when gyms set by hold color they're limited to only buying from a few companies so that they don't have, say, yellows that don't quite match other yellows. But, as you can see from the photos here, these holds are particularly dull. No giant green teeth, that's for sure.

The other problems were more surmountable, but still bear mentioning. One is that there is still no heat, and apparently there may not be any installed for a while. I was aware of this possibility going in, so brought a hat and several fleece coats, but they need to get on top of this (although it's not unmanageable -- England doesn't get that cold). It's also sort of set in a weird position apart from a general sports center -- lockers/changing rooms/bathroom are in one area and the wall is up one set of stairs, down another set of stairs, and actually in a separate building from the main one where the changing rooms are. (I'm actually pretty sure that it would be extremely easy to walk right into the climbing wall without paying if you knew where you were going.) They also only have about 10 parking spaces on site (oh England), and if those are full you have to park about a five minute walk away. (I stepped in a puddle in my flippies on the walk back to the car.) As hinted at, they use too much of their real estate on featured slabs (and, yes, the wheelchair rappel station...), but they do have a high proportion of tall, simple plywood compared to other English walls. Also, there is no bouldering at all -- I wouldn't mind a little bit. If I owned it I would rip out the featured slabs and replace that section with a bouldering cave.

So those are the cons.

My absolute favorite part, though, was when a girl came over to me and said

Sorry, but do you climb at MetroRock?

Umm, YES.

It turns out that she had been at Harvard as a post-doc for two years doing astrophysics, but had since returned to England and was now at Cambridge University as of a few months ago (she hadn't heard of CUMC). She said she was there with her husband and they had been debating whether or not I was the same as the person at MetroRock. So she and her husband apparently go down to the Castle in London quite frequently, so I can communicate with her if I'm interested in getting rides there.

But yeah, what can I say? I'm noticeable.

Photos up on Facebook

El Chorro Pictures. The first set are ones I took, the second and third were taken by Nick. A lot of them I've already posted in my El Chorro stories.

Wednesday, January 28, 2009

...And England, Again

Monday, January 19, 2009

On the final day of our El Chorro trip, Nick and I got up around 9, but had to pack up everything and check out. We finished the last of the cereal (but not the last of the UHT milk...I think that got donated to the free bin). Unfortunately, the sun wasn't really making an appearance while we were packing and it became clear that it would probably be cloudy for most of the day.

We stashed our stuff at Almona, but by this point it was around 11 and the Hampshire team had left for the day (as expected). We also had to do a final run to the food shop in town to grab lunch food for the day, and then headed up to an area very close to where we had climbed on the first afternoon at the far left end of the Frontales, Sector Castrojo. I took some pictures of the valley while Nick read the guidebook.

El Chorro Valley

Nick at Castrojo

We did a quick 4 or 5 to start (we weren't sure which route we were on), and then Nick led a very very long 6a. Thirty-five meters, according to the guidebook, and I think it may have even been longer because he went to one set of anchors that was a few meters higher than a different anchor. So to get him down was a bit of a challenge with our 60 meter rope (I was aware that the route was going to be pretty long, but was surprised by the fact that the middle mark was at about the third bolt when he got to the anchors). I got us both to about the same height -- the very top of a more-or-less low-angle slab about 15-20 feet off the ground, and we were able to both detach from the rope and come down from there.

I was going to lead it, but there had been intermittent raindrops the whole time Nick was on it and they looked a bit more steady, so we decided it would be best for me to toprope so we didn't lose gear if it started to really rain. So we did that, but by the time I was at the anchors it had actually stopped raining. Coming down on toprope wasn't quite as bad as getting Nick down since the anchors were slightly off to the side, but we still ended up pretty high up on the low angle slab.

So we ate lunch, and then Nick started up another 6a+ that had anchors that were about 30-40 feet higher than the anchors on the nextdoor route, a 6c+. Right as we were pulling the rope, we felt a few more sprinkles, so I started to lead it quickly. This time, though, there were fewer sprinkles than there had been on the earlier 6a, and they stopped by the time I got to the top. While lowering, I kicked over to the anchors for the 6c+ and put a directional on them to toprope through, but didn't bother cleaning the 6a+ because that would involve a lot of fancy ropework. So instead we just clogged up 2 routes (or three, if you want to be pedantic -- the 6a+ shared a first bolt with the climb on the other side of it). Which wouldn't have been a problem when we arrived, since the crag was empty then, but we felt a little guilty because since then, multiple other parties had shown up, including the Hampshire "OPRA team," led by Guy. (Zeb, Max, Luke, and Earl were still at Makinodromo.)

Anyway, Nick did the 6c+ cleanly on TR after a quick false-start at the bottom crux, and I flashed it clean on TR.

After cleaning all our gear off the three routes, it was about 2 in the afternoon, and Nick and I had to head down at 2:30. Guy had just led a good 7a+ that Nick and I wanted to TR, but in the meantime two of the other Hampshire kids had gotten on it. Nick and I stuck around until about 2:20, but it was clear that there was no way we'd have a chance to get on it the way things were going, so we headed out.

We went back up to Almona, and collected our gear and packed it into plane-appropriate luggage. We then drove off, but stopped on the way out to take a few more pictures of El Chorro.

El Chorro

El Chorro

Railroad Bridge

El Chorro

Me in our car

Then Nick and I headed back to the car rental place in Málaga, about an hour away. We had to find a gas station, since we were supposed to return the car full, and then headed into the rental place. I was expecting them to squawk like crazy because the car was really dirty, inside and out (especially from where I kept putting my feet on the dashboard), and the mud-spray around the wheels kind of indicated that we had off-roaded it (as much as the little tin box could be off-roaded). But they seemed to say it was fine, and we headed onto the shuttle and into the airport.

At the airport, we checked in without too many hassles. (I wore all my coats to make sure that our luggage all fit everywhere it was supposed to.) The bag weighed 20.0kg's, but got a "heavy" tag to warn the baggage handlers it was 20. But we had no problems. I had to put my carry-on into one of the crates to prove that it fit, but it fit fine.

Then Nick and I headed into the waiting area, and had to wait around forever to get a gate. Eventually we decided to head to the gate area anyways to try to figure out which gate ours would be. We finally saw an EasyJet plane make an appearance at a gate that was going to be ours, but at that point it was already only ten minutes until our scheduled take-off time. We followed it to its gate (which had still not been officially announced yet), and pretty much everyone else did, too. Because there are no assigned seats on EasyJet, everyone stampedes to get to the gate first.

As we start the (slow) boarding process, it becomes clear that while they are not enforcing a "one piece of hand luggage" rule that they have, they're very strictly enforcing that the "one piece" (the largest piece) fits into a crate. So before I get up to the front of the line I put all my coats back on so that my luggage will fit. The problem is, though, that I forgot that Nick had put his little "travel folder," which was fat because it had our guidebook in it, in the front of my suitcase, making it bulge. I assumed that the suitcase would fit, since it had fit at check-in, but I forgot that then the folder wasn't in it. So it didn't fit, and they were saying that they would have to check it (other people were all having this problem, which was really slowing down boarding).

But what they did was just put a tag on the bag, told me to walk down the ramp to the plane, and have people take it there to put it in checked luggage. But the ramp was long, with twists, and no one was watching -- so I just took the tag right off the bag and carried it onto the plane with me. HAH.

I was right towards the end of the line at this point, but Nick had saved us seats. I was mad at him becuase his folder had caused me hassles, so he had the job of fitting the suitcase into the already-completely-full overhead bins, but he somehow managed it and kept it from being checked. Excellent.

The plane took off about an hour late after all the hold-ups at boarding, but it turns out that the flight isn't nearly as long as advertised, so we ended up landing at Gatwick at about the time we were supposed to. We then had to take the Gatwick "Express" into London (the train is "express" in that it doesn't stop, but actually takes as long as the trains that do stop because it moves very slowly), take the Underground across to King's Cross, and get the train to Baldock, where Nick's car was. Except that there was "rail works" going on on the tracks near Baldock, so the train ended a few stops early and we had to take the buses provided to Baldock. Then we had to walk from the Baldock train station to Nick's parents' house (at least 15 minutes). Of course, even though it was 11:30 by this point, they'd cooked us a three course meal. So we ate that quickly and then re-packed the car with the El Chorro stuff, the stuff that we abandoned there on Thursday when we realized it wouldn't fit on the plane, and stuff that had lived there over Christmas like my mirror (that needed fixing), my bike (that wasn't supposed to be kept outside in the cold during the break), and my plants (Nick's mom was in charge of taking care of them.

Then we had to drive back to Cambridge, which took about an hour, and we arrived about 1:15 am. We had to unload all my stuff from the car, and then poor Nick had to drive all the way back to Orpington so that he could get to work in the morning. But even though we both got back very late on the Monday night, we both had a good adventure trip.

Tuesday, January 27, 2009

Poca

Sunday, January 18, 2009

On the second full day of our El Chorro trip, Nick and I again got going relatively late in the day. We were planning on attempting to find the Hampshire kids, who were going to climb at Poema de Roca (or, as Earl called it sometimes, Poca), a cave section with hard and not-so-hard routes in the middle of the Frontales. However, when our alarm clock went off at 8:30, it looked distinctly cloudier than it had the day before, so once again Nick and I hit snooze for half an hour and got up at 9.

We had another breakfast of cereal and UHT milk (ew ew ew) and packed up some of our stuff. The rest was already in disarray in the car from yesterday's Camino/via ferrata adventure. By this point, though, the clouds seemed to have mostly cleared and it was getting distinctly sunny.

We got to Almona by about 10:15, but Zeb had warned me that the Hampshire crew was probably leaving around 10. So we continued up the road to the same spot that we had parked at the day before, and passed the Hampshire crew (walking) along the way. This time, though, rather than park there we opened up the gate and drove through it so that we could park further up along the dirt road closer to the cliffs.

Once we were parked, we had to sort out all our gear, and by the time we were ready the Hampshire crew had again caught up to us. At this point, we took a different approach than we had the day before (when we went to the Arab Steps) to get to Poca.

Frontales with Poca, the most obvious cave, visible on the right

Once we got to the cave, we started out by warming up on a 5+ and a 6b (which actually ended up being my hardest lead of the trip). Then we had lunch and headed over to a 6b+. First Nick tried to lead it, but got scared on a runout between the fifth and sixth bolts. Then I tried to lead it, and got scared before I even got there. Then Nick tried to lead it again, got all the way up to the last bolt, and finally decided he was too pumped to finish it. Too bad; it would have been good for him to get. He did a good job on it, though. I eventually toproped it.

Meanwhile Zeb worked on Swimming Through a Shark Attack, eventually sending.

Zeb on STASA

Zeb on STASA

Zeb on STASA

Zeb on STASA

It was mid-afternoon by that point, so Nick and I headed over to the nearby Solarium where we did a couple of pocket-y easy 6's. Nothing too exciting, but they were good. At that point, Nick had decided he was exhausted, and we headed back to Poca to see how things were going.

At this point it was starting to get a little dim and cold (there was a lot more shade), but Zeb was doing a final run up the route Poema de Roca, a super-popular 7a. Meanwhile I tried a nearby 7a on toprope, but didn't make it to the anchors.

View from Poca

Zeb in a hole on Poca-the-route

Zeb on Poca

Zeb on Poca

Zeb on Poca

Zeb on Poca

Me on Viejo Amigo

Me on Viejo Amigo

Me on Viejo Amigo

Me on Viejo Amigo

At that point, the Hampshire crew went back to Almona and Nick and I went back to Finca for dinner, where we cooked a mini-omelet with our remaining two eggs, and also cooked some pasta and some pasta-with-sauce.

Then we headed back to Almona. We had discussed possibly picking up Zeb, taking him to Finca, and getting him to help us finish the wine discreetly. However, that clearly was not going to be a possibility, because when we got to Almona, it turned out that in the last few hands of their game of hearts, Earl had overtaken Zeb and Luke had hit 500, the stopping point. Zeb lost in the end. And he was curled up in bed in the fetal position.

Loser

Nick and I hung out at Almona for a little while discussing plans for the next day. Nick and I were going to head to the far left end of the Frontales for climbing in the morning (we had to fly out in the afternoon), while the Hampshire team was going to head out to the long-approach Makinodromo. Nick and I were going to store our stuff at Almona for the day after checking out of Finca, but we probably weren't going to see the Hampshire team themselves (there was a hidden key).

So that was that! We headed back to Finca for bed before our final day and flight back to England.

Monday, January 26, 2009

Sunny and Scary

Saturday, January 17, 2009

Nick and I woke up relatively late on the first full day of our El Chorro trip, and weren't really out of bed until 9:30 (sunrise was only an hour earlier, though). 9:30 in El Chorro, by the way, is 8:30 GMT and 3:30 EST (which I was on about 3-4 days prior to this), so I didn't feel that guilty. Excitingly, it got sunnier and sunnier between 8:30 and 9:30 (we kept hitting snooze), so that when we woke up it was clear that we would have good weather.

We ate breakfast (cereal with UHT milk, yum yum) at Finca, and then went down to Almona to figure out our plans for the day. It was a rest day for the Hampshire team, but Zeb and Luke were going to hike up to the crag with us so that Luke could do an hour of meditating and Zeb could stare at his project for an hour. First, though, Nick and I had to head to the tiny "supermarket" in town to get more lunch food and groceries.

Finca la Campana

Once we drove the 2-3 minutes into town, we realized that Nick's wallet was back up at Finca. We drive five minutes back up to Finca, pick up the wallet, and then drive five more minutes back into town. We find the shop, get groceries (lots of pointing -- my Spanish doesn't go much beyond "ocho"), and head back up to Almona where we stash our extra food for the day and pick up Zeb and Luke.

downtown El Chorro

Almona Chica

From there, we head uphill to the Escalera Arabe area. This area has a fairly long approach, particularly because there is a gate blocking the dirt road that takes us closer to the crag, so we park outside of the gate (although we then observe other people simply opening the gate, driving through, and closing it again -- it's not locked). On the walk, Nick notices the sparkly wasteband of Zeb's pants and comments, "They're not boy pants, are they." We then have to walk for at least half an hour up to near the crag, at which point it takes us a while to figure out which sector we're at.

Nick consulting the guidebook

We eventually figure out that we're near Sector Sergio, so Nick and I do two long, easy 6's and eat lunch (Zeb and Luke head out of sight over to their route-studying/meditation area). From there, Nick and I decide to head up to the Sector Arabesque because there is a 6a that shares anchors with a 7a face climb that Nick and I want to top rope. So we hike up the centuries-old "Arab Steps" to get over to that sector.

Nick on the Arab Steps

Nick starts up the 6a, but at the last bolt gets nervous. He claims that there is a solid 20-foot runout from there to the anchors, and the climbing isn't particularly easy. So he comes down, and I start loading myself up with bail biners and slings to go up and investigate bailing possibilities and texas rope trick possibilities. I'm only at the second bolt, though, when Zeb makes a return (Luke went back to the house rather than repeat part of the approach back up to where we were). So I immediately get Zeb to agree to fix it and lower off straight from the second bolt.

Zeb does fine leading it, although he did take his time moving past the sixth bolt to the anchor. He also helpfully puts a directional in so that we can easily try the next-door 7a as well.

Zeb on the Flake

Then Zeb belays me while I toprope the 7a, ultimately onsighting it (it's a nice face climb). Then Nick topropes the 7a (a couple hangs but he does it pretty well), while I belay and Zeb takes pictures of his shoes.

Me on El Arabe Perdido

Me on El Arabe Perdido

Zeb's Shoe

Zeb's Shoe

After this, we decide to head down because there are a couple hours of daylight left and Nick is dying to do the Caminito del Rey (which I have discussed earlier here). The Camino is an elevated pathway through the gorge that was built in the early twentieth century to allow dam workers easy access to areas they needed to get to. When the dam was opened in the 1920s, the King used the walkway to get to it during the grand opening, giving it its name. Since then, the walkway has fallen into some serious disrepair, but it is still used by climbers to access some of the climbing areas at El Chorro. It's protectable by via ferrata. By this point, Zeb and some of the Hampshire crew had already walked the Camino during one of their rest days, and more of the Hampshire crew had already done it earlier in this same afternoon. Nick and I figured that this was our once chance to walk it with Zebby as our "guide" (since today was a rest day for him), so we headed back to Almona to get our gear sorted out for that.

La Almona Chica

Almona's Backyard

We are finally parked and walking in to the Camino by about 5:30 (with sunset at 6:30). We've packed our headlamps. Even the approach is a little tricky -- we have to walk up a hill to the railroad tracks, and then scramble down a slope with a little bit of scree before we can get onto the via ferrata.

The Gorge with the Camino visible

Intransitable

We meet up with Earl and a Hampshire team on our approach (they're just coming off the Camino). Just getting onto the Camino is actually the crux of the whole thing. See, the section of the Camino that intersects with the railway tracks and was the originally-designed approach has been purposely destroyed to prevent people from accessing the Camino too easily. Instead, one must approach from below the Camino on a series of iron bars drilled into the side of the cliff and then ascend up third-class terrain to get to the Camino itself. Meanwhile, on the descent, one can either come back across the iron bars or can head straight to the modern end of the Camino (which traverses across the same section as the bars, just much higher up) and rappel back down to where you would start the bars. So Earl's team was rapping down when we came across them, and Zeb convinced Earl to leave the rope for us to use on our return so that we wouldn't have to come back across the bars at the end.

Bars for approaching the Camino

Hampshire team descending from the end of the Camino

We also figured that, from that point, it would probably take at least an hour for us to travel the entire Camino, meaning that if we went the whole way we'd be returning in the dark, and no one was looking forward to trying to get me back in the dark. So we decided that we would just go to the bridge that was about a third of the way along the whole thing. Getting there contained the most "exciting" parts of the journey as well as the best views; the rest of the walkway was more mellow. That way, we wouldn't need to break out our headlamps for getting back.

So, Nick, Zeb, and I started off. We began with the hardest part -- crossing the iron rungs. Meanwhile, we clipped in to a variety of pieces of metal sticking out from the rock at waist-height, some of which looked sturdier than others. Zeb started out behind me, with Nick in front.

Approaching on the bars

Approaching on the bars

At this point, though, Zeb was already impatient and so switched to going in the front, while I had Nick behind me. At this point, we had to do the third-class scramble up to the Camino itself.

Scramble to the walkway

This scramble was a little challenging because it wasn't all protected, although a lot of it was. The rungs were far apart, meaning that even with our extra-long slings we could only barely be clipped into two at once, and had to shuffle back and forth a bit. There were some parts where our sling simply wouldn't reach the next rung, and we had to unclip entirely from one to get to the next one. But it wasn't too bad, and we eventually made it up onto the Camino itself.

Once on the Camino, it turned into a more standard via ferrata with wires on the side to clip into while we walked along.

Via Ferrata along the Camino

Via Ferrata along the Camino

Before long, though, we came to the first section (of two) where the cement had completely fallen away. Here, we had to walk along the outer iron rung of the Camino. There were a couple different techniques for doing this, but I chose to face into the cliff and shuffle my feet along sideways while leaning forward (across the gap where the cement should have been) onto the rock itself (and, when the rock was too far away to lean against, only onto the via ferrata wire).

Mind the Gap

Mind the Gap

Mind the Gap

Mind the Gap

From there, it wasn't long until we could see the "bridge," which was actually simply built over an existing pipe that connected the two sides of the gorge.

The bridge

However, before we could get to it, there was another section we had to cross similar to the last, but longer. This time, the wall itself was too far forward to lean against, so I had to lean only on the wobbly wire, making it more challenging than the last crossing.

Crossing near the bridge

Crossing near the bridge

Crossing near the bridge

From there, we could see where we had come from, as well as where the path went.

Towards El Chorro

Towards El Chorro

Towards Makinodromo

Once we had gotten across, there was a wide, semi-natural platform where we unclipped and were able to take a few photos.

Nika after the bridge

Zeb and Nick after the bridge

At that point, Zeb reported that the path got a lot less interesting, and that it was almost time to turn back. Before that, though, he showed us a tunnel into the rock off to the side that he said had once been used to pump water through. We got out our headlamps and headed through that to an opening in it. Then Zeb went back around to the outside so that we could get pictures of him on an exposed section of the Camino from the opening.

The tunnel

Zeb on the Camino

Zeb on the Camino

After that, Nick and I walk out through the tunnel to find Zeb. We don't see him immediately, so Nick heads along the section of the Camino where he was, while I head back towards the bridge in the other direction in case he got an early start back. Next thing I know, Zeb is behind me. Turns out that he had gotten behind me by returning into the tunnel directly from the exposed section of the Camino he had been posing on. You can walk directly from there into the tunnel on a walkway connecting the main Camino to the tunnel, but there is no via ferrata for this part. I'm glad I didn't see that.

Unprotected walkway from the tunnel to the Camino (on the left)

We collect Nick (who seems a bit worried that he hasn't found Zebby yet) and start heading back along the way we came.

Across the bridge:

Across the bridge

Across the bridge

Along the second gap:

Along the second gap

Along the second gap

On an easy section of the Camino:

Camino via ferrata

And along the first gap:

Along the first gap

Along the first gap

From there, though, we entered new territory. We had come up from the right here (coming up under the metal bar), but now, instead of going back that way, we continued on straight to the very end of the Camino:

Fork in the road

As mentioned earlier, this path doesn't lead straight to the railroad bridge anymore, but instead comes to an abrupt end that you rap down from. Earl's rope was still there, so that's where we headed.

End of the Camino

Our team had access to one GriGri and one tube-style device, so we figured the best plan was for Zeb to lower me with the GriGri, counterweight-rap off me, and then for Nick to rap himself down with his own tube-style device (in theory Zeb could have lowered Nick too, but Nick weighs, um, more than me, and it was a skinny rope).

Lowering me

Underside of the Camino

So we made it! We still had to scramble up the hill to get back up to the main dirt road, but that was fine. We took a few scenery shots of the sunset and the gorge on our way out.

Sunset in El Chorro

Sunset in El Chorro

Sunset in El Chorro

At that point, we headed back to Almona, picked up our food, and then back to Finca to cook our dinner (at Almona they were cooking something very onion-y -- which was true of all their meals). I discovered that the one picture decorating our room was actually of the bridge in the gorge (Nick was surprised I hadn't noticed that already).

The bridge

Dinner was an omelet with 4 of our 8 eggs (plus bacon and cheese), except that two eggs sort of "escaped" in the process, meaning that after making four eggs into an omelet, we only had two left over for the following night. So after dinner we checked out the free box, which had some good pasta and pasta-with-sauce that we took for ourselves to use the following night. There was also beer in the free bin, but we didn't take that because we already had an abundance of wine and we couldn't donate anything to the Hampshire crew (no alcohol allowed).

After dinner, we headed back to Almona again to use their internet and watch the hearts game. Earl was quickly closing the gap between him and Zeb (Zeb was in the lead), but Zeb was still pretty confident. Then we headed back to Finca for the night. Good adventures for the day, but not quite enough climbing and a little too much time on the scary parts of the Camino!