Hey all it’s Tyler again with a new update from South America...

As you all know, I did a post on La Barossa (a climbing area in Balcarce, Argentina) about a month ago describing an ultimately failed climbing trip. Well this past week, Colin Barnard (one of my fellow combatants from the last trip) and I swallowed our pride and headed back to Balcarce for some redemption. This time we met a group of amazing climbers and had the chance to boulder with them for a few days. Pictured below is a handful of the climbers we met on our trip.

On our first day, Gabriella (wife of the legendary Tim Bratten) picked us up from our hotel and drove us out to their house at the base of La Barossa. Here we loaded up all the gear and headed for the “Boulders de Bosque” area on the backside of the sierra. We began warming up on the front of the boulder, pictured below is Gabriella on a V2 problem. We spent an hour and a half or so climbing through multiple V0, V1, and V2 problems. There were probably 7 or 8 problems just on the front of the boulder.

After our time at the front we moved around to the backside of the boulder to try our skills on some harder stuff. I began work on a V4 traverse that starts low and works up into the roof, topping out as you come out from crimps on the roof to a sloper, a jug, and high step mantle. On my third try I got the ascent and was super pumped about it. Pictured below are action shots of me moving through the traverse and up into the roof.

Abut this time a group of 6 more climbers showed up, all from the Balcarce and Mar de Plata region. One of them, Mariano Maceri, was an especially strong climber who I developed a good friendship with by the end of our trip. He and the others began warming up while I began to study the moves of the V5 traverse that comes from the opposite direction and works up into the roof. After warming up, Mariano came over and coached me through the moves. He sent the problem on his second go and after 5 attempts I got fully shut down, just didn't have anything left in the tank. Mariano also sent a really technical V6 after 3 attempts, pictured below is him working through the crux.

Overall, the climbing and community was awesome. I’ll have another post for day 2 and 3 soon...