I had already been in Hueco once, back in 2008. I always wanted to go there again and since Kilian had also been there a long time ago, he too was psyched to go back. At the World Cup in Vail last year I asked my friend Melissa Le Nevé whether she and her boyfriend Jacopo Larcher would like to join us. The crew was completed by Austrian's Spielberg of climbing movies Hannes Mair and his asisstent Elias Holzknecht, both really good friends of us. The journey began with a long flight from Paris to Atlanta, where we had a lay-over because of heinous weather conditions. The next day, we finally arrived in El Paso, where the sun was shining. While everything was covered in snow in Austria, we enjoyed texan sunshine for two and a half weeks.
We had planned our trip well ahead, because we were aware of all the regulations and restrictions of bouldering in Hueco Tanks. We had made reservations for the north mountain, 90 days before we wanted to climb there, we booked tours with Rickie O' for the other three mountains. With all this planning and organizing the rules for bouldering in Hueco did not bother us too much and we only waited twice in front of the gate. Although these two times were more than enough....
Our daily routine consisted of a long breakfast, driving to the park, climbing until the park closed at 6pm and eating burritos at the best Mexican restaurant 'El Pasito' . We had a really good time and we climbed a lot of cool boulders. We didn’t spend much time projecting, because there are too many boulders in Hueco to try. The longest time I spent to climb a boulder was two days. I really enjoyed climbing with another strong girl. Melissa and I have known each other from the worldcups and it was cool to climb with her in a totally different environment. We had a lot of fun together and it was motivating to see her doing hard moves, because it showed me that I was capable of the same. Although in the end the two of us always found different beta and I think we only climbed a few boulders exactly the same way. For me it was interesting to feel how much stronger I had become over the years. I remember that on my last trip I had been to the problem called 'Diaphenous Sea'. Back then I could hardly do the easier moves. This time I did the boulder in two days’ time.
The only downside of this trip was Jacopo's finger injury and I hope it'll get better quickly! All in all I really had a good time in Hueco, climbed a lot of new problems, ate lots of burritos and burgers and I enjoyed the American lifestyle of eating out day by day and walking only if impossible to drive.
