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La demande, verdon gorge 10-Jun-2014 At 1:42:19 AM vwills

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La demande: trip report

We have been fortunate this year to have been travelling on a climbing holiday around morocco, Turkey, Greece, Northern Italy and now France. Up until this week, when we have 35 degree days in the Ecrin, the weather has generally been pleasantly cool, although it did get rather hot the day we did the classic 6a route La Demande at verdon Gorge last week. I thought while sitting around sweltering on a rest day to do a quick trip report as it has been one of the highlights of the year to date. Hopefully I can embed some photos later.

The route was first climbed in 1968, so it is almost as old as me, and like myself showing some signs of wear, but still an attractive proposition :) The name "the question" comes from a marriage proposal at the top between the first ascensionists, and Dave was a little concerned that he was being set up.

There is quite a bit of information on the net, but not a lot of it practical. You can either get to the base of the route via parking at col du Sampson and walking for 30 minutes through old hydro tunnels, or abseiling 4 times down from the dalle Grise abseil to jardin du eccureils ledge, and then abseil again another 3 times (with double ropes) and traverse to the base once in the gorge. UKclimbing logbook reports and forum discussions had "helpful" advice from people who did the route in the 70s (it was harder in their day as there were no bolts and the chimneys had 15 m run outs) or more recent discussion from people that climb E7 " no need to take a rack, it took us 3 hours", and lots of comments such as "bailed due to heat, or thunderstorms, or benighted".

The day before, after cruising up the 280m arête du belvedere 6a+ in the spitting rain in 3 hours and having lunch in La Palud sur Verdon, we did the walk to the base. The line is very obvious, a searing slanting crack that goes left for 150 metres, then right for 50 metres before being engulfed in some very large chimneys for a total route length of 320m. The gorge itself is absolutely spectacular and plenty of tourists do the hike for 5 hours from chalet de la Maline to the col du Sampson.

We were concerned about the heat, and other parties on the route so decided to head off at 6am and walk to the base and carry a second thin rope. This was for abseiling, and for pack hauling the chimney pitches. If we had to bail then abseiling down the route would then be possible, and we could walk out. (Head torches needed for the tunnels). Making the top we could do the abseil descent with our 2 ropes, or try our luck hitching. It would also be possible to call a cab if you are prepared and don't have the luxury or 2 cars.The distance by road back to col du Sampson is over 15km, and there are no short walking tracks due to many side ravines. Double thin ropes would be ideal, but we didn't have them.

The base was easy to find and started with a 15m solo up a pillar to start up the climb. Dave led off what turned out to be the most slimy polished pitch on the whole route. The rest of the route was a bit polished, but not so as it detracted or felt insecure. There are quite a number of bolts on all pitches but we supplemented this with a full set of link cams, a #3cam, a set of c3s which was a bit of overkill, and a set of nuts and slings for trees and were very happy to have this supplemental gear. It was pretty easy to follow the line, though on top of pitch 7, under an overhang, the route traverses hard right, then up and then back left again. There are old pitons and threaders straight up which looks a bit unpleasant.

It was possible to run pitch 2 and 3 together which I did, and also the final 2 pitches: 12 and 13. Of course other people simul climb, or even solo, but we are not that talented.The guidebook gives different grades for pitches, but pretty much 95% of the route felt 6a in the good old school sense. It was very sustained, mostly with good belays, many of them with some shade. We alternated pitches. There is a semi hanging belay at the end of pitch 5 and one at the end of pitch 7 and unfortunately I managed to score them both. There was a bit of a breeze, I wasn't dehydrated, but I felt like my brain was frying in a solar furnace. By the time Dave joined me at the top of pitch 7 my mental faculties were rather strained by the heat. Seconding the next pitch felt like slow motion with the brain only able to compute one move by one limb at time. It was most bizarre. Fortunately the chimneys come into the shade at about 1pm, and we were now in them and I soon recovered. We estimate the temperature on the rock face was about 32 degrees. It was a good reason to make dave lead the chimneys. He has seen me flailing around in chimneys before, so he didn't argue. The chimneys need full on back contact so if we hadn't hauled the packs I would have had to drag it dangling beneath my feet. Needless to say Dave found the chimneys straightforward (he was climbing in the 70s!) and I had an ascent that consisted of multiple grunts, moans and exclamations of "c'est horrible!". My iliac crests are still a bit bruised. The quality of the route continued right to the end with exciting moves just before and after the last belay. It was just great the entire way with no boring bits at all. One of my top 10 routes ever.

There were brilliant patches of vegetation tucked away including a whole spray of violets, and an amazing pine tree growing out horizontally in the chimney section that I gratefully laid down on at one point. Huge vultures circled, and early on I had the unpleasant experience of seeing someone falling, a split second before his BASE jump chute opened, and I could calm down. And of course the view of Verdon Gorge.

We topped out just after 5pm, having started climbing at 730am. We could have gone a couple of hours quicker, if I hadn't slowed things down with heat stress, and we hadn't had to lick the entire contents of Dave's pack top pocket free of the chocolate that had melted over everything. Mostly we moved fairly consistently.

The car park at belvedere du carrelle only had 3 cars when we arrived and we waited for 15 minutes with little hope of a car heading the way we wanted to go (the road turns one way a little further on and most tourists do the full circuit). I was just resigned to moving to the abseil point when fortunately we were rescued by Germans who were much more chatty to us when they found out we were Aussies and not poms. Another lift on the main road from another kind German back to our car, and We were soon tucking into a nice 3 course meal at our hotel. The only casualty, a roll of tape, lost to gravity,and my hat. Highly recommended, but probably only if you can confidently jamb and chimney your way up old school 18s. A tape glove on the right hand helps.