February 2019 Part I (Chulilla, Spain)

"I haven't pooped in two days."

"You haven't pooped in two days?!"

"Yeah."

"That's terrible."

I went back to Siurana for another week in late January, but it was just too cold.

Even for me, infamously trying to convince partners "It's not that bad!", I had to admit it was that bad.

One windy 45F day, I realized that of the 11 people here, climbing at the most popular crag in Siurana, I was the only person who didn't climb at least 5.13. And many of those other 10 people? Projecting 5.14 or 5.15.

Unsent project be damned, it was time to move on to warmer conditions.

I want to be competent.

I don't actually want to be the best. I don't even want to be amazing, by any stretch of imagination.

I just want to be good enough. Capable of directing my course in life, of taking care of my self, of being responsible for me.

Sometimes, I go through these streaks of feeling like, yes, I am doing it. I am brave, I am able.

Other times, I feel like everything I've built up is a sham and even that sham has crumbled and I don't know what I'm doing anymore or why.

It's an awful see-saw of a ride.

The dirtbagging conditions in Chulilla are fantastic.

While I prefer the long, vertical routes of Siurana, the lifestyle in Chulilla was better. Just outside of the sleepy town was a huge dirt lot where people could camp for free. The climber's bar opened early, welcoming the public to use their restrooms (versus burying their surprises in the dirt) and the climbing shop in town offered 2 euro hot showers. Every day we woke up, walked down to the bar to lighten our loads, strolled to the market for groceries, racked up, and walked to the climbs.

Showers were more of a once-a-week thing.

On rest days, the dirt lot turned into a circus of yoga, hula hooping, juggling and stovetop cakes.

Somehow every dirtbag in Spain is a pro at juggling. It’s kinda absurd. I tried myself, but didn't get so good at it. With time, perhaps.

"I Congo on with all of these puns."

"We're Ghana end it eventually."

"Welsh, Irish you were right!"

I can't comment much on the climbing in Chulilla because honestly I didn't climb very much while I was there.

From what I hear, it's good. There's a lot of tuffas and more variety than at Siurana. And more slopers and polish, so the range is a bit more extreme in terms of good and bad. Routes continue to be absurdly long in Chulilla, so an 80m rope is essential.

On the plus side, I got really good at making dog sounds. For better or for worse, I'm now proficient enough at dog whines/barks to confuse most humans and many dogs.

My two favorite things in Chulilla were appetizer hour and wordbuilder hour which were not necessarily mutually exclusive.

We quickly realized you could buy a bottle of nice red wine for 2 euros, a block of cheese for 3 euros, and a fresh baguette for less than 1. Given this special situation, it became a mission for us Americans to consume as much of these three items as possible before our inevitable return to the States where wine and cheese are only so cheap if they taste like cardboard.

And thus, appetizer hour was born.

While two of us prepared dinner, another was responsible for preparing and feeding everyone appetizers.

Wordbuilder hour was another fun daily activity where we tried to define the day's new vocabulary words and show off our memory of previous days' challenges. It became a game to bullshit definitions for words I'd never heard before and see how close I could get.

One weekend there was an actual circus in the next town over.

The circus part of the event was great, but the concert part rang true to its Spanish roots and didn't begin until nearly midnight.

We didn't stay that late, so instead we got to sit through 3 hours of soundcheck in preparation for the concert.

It's a special kind of hell-- having to sit through an endless soundcheck but never getting to hear the actual performance.

Another daily activity was Joke Time.

Steven had a little Dutch calendar in his van which had a terrible joke for each day of the year.

My job was to pull off the paper tab for each day and read the joke aloud.

In Dutch.

I'd never studied or even listened to Dutch in my entire life prior to this point. I had no idea what the rules of phonics were or what Dutch sounded like.

And yet here I was, reading Dutch jokes aloud for all to hear.

This was the worst part of Clinton's every day.

Things only got worse when we discovered a German novel in someone’s van.