Nomad – sealion

Climbing in the Bugaboos

Bugaboos. Bugaboos! Granite spires in all directions. Glaciers melting into streams. Frozen lakes and thawing ones. People dressed in colorful outdoor gear with helmet compatible hoods and crampons dangling in their hands as they come back into camp. Toilet huts built on site from granite blocks, with a view of the Bugaboo spire itself. Small patches of grass and slow growing green cushions flowering with purple, red and white beauties.

It’s magic. I didn’t know much before we came up here, not about the size of it not the natural splendor. It’s so freakin beautiful! I thought, granite – I like climbing granite. Mountains – I like climbing mountains. I love the view, the bird perspective, the far away from everything feeling and the fact that you can only trust yourself and your partner to stay alive. We are climbing safely, but the days are long ones, with approaches, climbs and rappels leading us into 8-15 hour adventures. Active days. Full on days.

Climbers descending the col at night, with Snowpatch on the left and Bugaboo on the right.

Beep, beep, beep! 5 or 6 AM, not super early but still early… We eat porridge and drink coffee in the morning, pack our gear, water and snacks: Nuts, bars, boiled eggs, carrots, then head into the alpine environment to practice mountaineering. Trudging up the steep snow to the col between Bugaboo and Snowpatch takes us about an hour, then we keep on walking over the glacier to the beginning of our chosen route. Gearing up with harnesses, ropes and trad racks, stashing crampons and ice axes for the return, or packing them to go. The person on the sharp end of the rope begins the ascent of the first pitch and the rock climbing is on. Through cracks, flakes, blocks and slabs we go, up, up and away.

Ah! It’s good to be here, amongst silent rock giants and moaning glaciers, with people whom you appreciate and love. The hours pass without us noticing. Already 3PM? Huh. We climb on. Some days we’re back at 6PM, some at 9PM. We boil water and eat freeze dried food. Devour it, hungry after many hours of pushing ourselves mentally and physically. Our tents stand on a hard granite surface at the Appelbee Dome camping. When the chit chat and planning for the next day slows down we brush our teeth and crawl into our sleeping bags, hide from the wind inside the thin tent walls. The camping is a silent one, most people wanting to go to sleep early and rest well before the next day’s undertaking.

There’s a mental simplicity underlining the time spent up here. There are no cafés to go to, no food to shop for, nowhere to drive, no computer screen telling the state of the world. When we are up here, we are separated from the normal everyday life. It makes a difference even for us, Tim and I, who for now are living like nomads. Though it can be straining to be up here, to carry those 35 kilos on our backs when walking in and to push up to summits 3000 meters high most days, the simplicity balances the effort made.

Then comes a resting day. No alarm goes of. When the sun hits the tent it gets to warm in the down sleeping bag and we crawl out. Get water. Boil it. Make coffee. Stretch. Eat. Swim. Talk about stuff, life, adventures, getting older. We’re still looking for what to do with our lives. Acknowledge that this is a pretty good way of spending a week. It feels longer, with a string of new strong memories binding each moment together. This place, magic.

For me, still struggling to fully get back from my knee injury, these days have made me smile. A lot. I could walk uphill for 4,5 km, gaining 950 meters of altitude, with a stupidly heavy backpack on my shoulders – and the knee felt good!

I could hike up the col with crampons and axe, walk the glacier, then simulclimb the Westridge to the Pigeon Spire and reverse the whole thing – and the knee still felt good!

I could hike up to the foot of the Crescent Spires, lead a 5.6 called Lions Way, scramble down a scree-turn-to-snow-slope – and the knee was not even on my mind!

I could climb an 8 pitch 5.9 called Wildflowers and really go for it as a team together with Tim, leading every second pitch. Most memorable was leading the last, strange 5.9 to just below the summit, stemming and pinching and jamming my way up flaky grooves, slowly formed through endless weathering of the hard granite. I lost my way in all the different flared cracks. It turned into a 5.10. Still, I pulled myself together and got through. Proud, thirsty and tired. And guess what, the knee still felt bomber.

If I would ever get injured again, I’d do the same thing. Rehab. Hang in there. Then get back into nature ASAP and let it work it’s magic. It’s been nearly a year and a half since I did my ACL surgery, another six months and all the nerves that can grow back will have done so. Then I’m gonna be ridiculously strong, because right now I’m STRONG.

Ah.

Be the change?

Writing. An activity best undertaken alone. But I am not alone. And so I write only short stories, jotting down thoughts from the small events shaping my everyday experience. These are valuable little texts, nuggets of information telling the story of who I am right now.

In between all of those texts I guess there’s a larger picture to be found, but it annoys me a bit that I’m not writing about that too.

The medium of Instagram, which is my main channel for now, is helpful and limiting at the same time. It’s contemporary in its essence, speedy and fast, forever flowing with new input, new pictures, new stories. I like that flow, like to stay in touch with all these different minds sharing parts of themselves through photos and texts.

But.

It’s just that I also set out on this journey with the intention to write. A lot. Long pieces providing my view on stuff like permaculture, urban food production and regenerative agriculture. Where are those texts hiding? Do I have anything to say? I wish not to speak what I have to say but to write it, to provide for a timescale which allows a maturing process to take place. I thought I would have more space for theses weaving, organic, interconnecting thoughts than I currently do, and so it bothers me a bit. I feel like I’m not doing my part.

At the same time, I couldn’t care less. Each day spent in nature gives me so much. Each day melting occurs inside me, layer after layer of ethically induced intentions dripping away. I’m shedding thoughts, not knowing what will be found underneath. It’s a deconstructing process, becoming aware of which ideas that are truly mine and which have been given to me through a cultural indoctrination. Who am I but a simple human being? Who am I but a person living? Who am I to believe I have opinions worth voicing and pushing forth?

I grew tired of Klara the Orator. She had to be always witty, clever, informed and charming. She gave hope to those who were looking for alternatives but she gave too much.

Now she has become an everyday philosopher, pursuing her ideals through writing while hiding in the open, gorging herself with a high intake of Nature. It seems to be working quite well. It feels good.

Is that because there is no home ground to bounce of from again and again? No constant that pleases or disturbs me? Nothing I feel that it is my job to take care of?
The ever-changing nature of the nomadic pattern is very forgiving in the sense that the only constants are created by me and my traveling companions. What food we eat, what time we get up, how many days we climb vs rest. Being on the road I am confined to a small bubble. Sure, we relate to the outside world all the time but we are mere visitors in the places we come to. We have no means to interact on any deeper level.

And so, something is shifting and changing inside me. I’m not sure I recognize myself, but I am aware that it has been my intention for a few years now to slow down and be a bit less aggressive. The pace I used to have had served its purpose, and now I have yet to become familiar with the Klara of today.

In the periphery of my mind I can sense that I’m worried that I won’t be enough when slowing down. That I won’t accomplish good things. That my life will flow away and leave me behind, working on some mundane task better suited for a non-philosopher who has less ambition to be a change maker.

Maybe it’s the feeling of loosing your purpose. Not that I feel fully lost, I’m just stumbling while looking to find the right path. I’m in the area of knowledge where I want to be: Horticulture, geology, ecology, but how do I want to manifest the work I can do? Gardening? Project managing? Guiding? Farming? Studying?

Trying to make a mind map figuring out the options I get frustrated. It’s like I don’t want to want all these different things anymore. It’s fucking complicated being a curious mind. I just want to dig in and do good, but w h e r e? This is when it would be good to have a mentor or someone else to pick the dilemma apart with and then put it back together in a slightly different order. I like the thinking, the questioning, the twisting and turning, but it needs to leed somewhere.

Here I am, sitting on a balcony of a small alpine hut in the middle of the Rockies. Taking the day of from the others, spending time with myself. Giving space for the kind of thinking that I used to occupy myself with back home much more frequently, but now thinking ”What good is it?”

Why do I try to think about what to do in April next year when it’s only July? Because I’m me. This is who I am, who I’ve been. Maybe I’m changed, maybe not. Maybe when coming home I’ll drop right back into being the same person as when I left, but I don’t think so and I don’t hope so.

This journey, I want for it to change me. Why else make it happen?

Äventyr, Research – och Tänkande

När jag drömde ihop den här resan tillsammans med Tim så hade jag en tydlig vision om att jag ville skapa utrymme för två olika delar:
1. Äventyr: Att klättra, fridyka, surfa mm.
2. Research: Att jobba på småbruk och gårdar för att lära mer om permakultur, agroekologi och regenerativt jordbruk.

Jag såg de två delarna som en bra mix av vem jag är, tjejen som ville bli äventyrare när hon var 20 men som inte kunde med för att det var för egoistiskt, och tjejen som älskar naturen och som försöker hitta ett sätt att arbeta mitt i den för att vara med och återuppbygga våra ekosystem.

Det visade sig dock ganska kvick att jag hade glömt att definiera en tredje och minst lika viktig del. Kanske borde jag ha vetat och noterat det redan innan avfärd, men jag var så fokuserad på görandet. Det jag glömde var mitt mer allmänna behov för Tänkande. Att få ta mig tid att insupa och fundera över geologi, vattenvägar, alla sorters växter och djur, mänsklig kultur, landskap mm. Jag ägnar alltid en stor del av min tankeverksamhet åt att observera och reflektera, och ibland blir en ju så att säga hemmablind.
Jag tänkte inte på hur viktigt det är för mig att ha utrymme att få tänka.

En ny formulering för vad denna resa handlar om kan således summeras med Äventyr, Research och Tänkande.

Eftersom detta böljande tänkande sker lika automatiskt i mig som att jag andas hela vägen ner i magen, så har det klivit in och tagit sin naturliga plats utmed hela resan gång. Det gillar jag! Jag har hunnit tänka j ä t t e m y c k e t. Nästa del av tänkandet är att också formulera det i tal och skrift för att dela tankarna med andra. Det har varit många långa samtal de senaste veckorna, och så småningom kommer de att ge liv åt nya texter.

Jag är glad för att de olika delarna balanserar varandra, vi har visserligen haft större utrymme för äventyr och tänkande än för research, men nu är vi på väg mot en gård för att tillbringa våra sista veckor i Australien med att plocka oliver, mjölka getter, rensa odlingsbäddar och allt annat som hör till en höst i detta klimat. Eftersom jag aldrig tidigare har varit här så ser jag fram emot att få lära mer!

Jag längtar efter att få vara mitt i ett grönsaksland eller bland träd, längtar efter att få använda mina händer för att hjälpa något att växa. Jag är trädgårdsmästare, eller snarare lärling. Det finns så mycket kunskap och erfarenhet att få fatt i, och jag älskar att när jag befinner mig i rollen som trädgårdsmästare så är jag rätt bra på att glömma bort det där med prestation och istället hänge mig åt den tydliga uppgiften framför mig. Rensa morötterna. Beskär fruktträdet. Dubbelgräv landet. Skörda salladen.

New Zeeland’s South Island. Two months of exploration has come to an end. The verdict? Yes, of course I liked it.

I grew up in a temperate climate in Scandinavia, a part of the world where population density is low and access to nature is high. I have learnt through the years that I dearly value that scene as a backdrop of my life, so whenever I come to a place with similar conditions it’s an instant love affair.

Troy, Tim and Klara at the farewell BBQ on the beach 🙂

The South Island was in that sense exactly what I hoped it would be, wild and perfect. We started and finished with climbing sport routes on limestone up at Paynes Ford, Takaka, Golden Bay Area. Tim was living there for a full 9-month climbing season back in 2008, so it felt like a home coming. “Hi everyone, I’m back! This is my wifey Klara. Klara, meet everyone.” We camped in his old spot, went to the same old supermarket, got a library card, danced away at the Mussel Inn, went swimming either at the swim holes or in the ocean etc. It’s very nice to be able to do that with your partner, to share old memories and build new ones at the same site. By now, Takaka is not only Tim’s place but also mine.

The climbing camp where we were living is called Hang Dog, and Troy – the manager – is Tim’s old friend. He was thrilled to have a solid climbing partner back at his door step, so while I continued with rehabbing my knee, managing basically the ten minute walk out to the crag and maybe two climbs each day for the first few weeks, Tim and Troy were killing it. It was so nice to watch Tim regaining his strength after having had half a year of muscle deterioration due to an inflamed lung and all that came with it. So much of who we are together as a couple relates to being active, which means that the past year has been an odd one for us. I feel grateful for being back in my body, and I’m grateful that Tim is back in his. Being strong, flexible, adaptable and agile both in mind and body is a virtue to me.

The fact that Tim is so much taller than me and thus climbs in a different style has been a bit of a tricky mental issue for me. Since 2011 he has been my partner for at least 80% of the time when climbing outdoors. I’ve seen him on the rocks for years, performing different moves. When I try to mimic them and use the same beta to climb past a crux, it is more often than not a failure. With the analytical, logical part of my brain I understand perfectly well the physical reality behind why it is so (monkey index etc), but for the emotional part of my brain, frustration is not far away. I want to! I WANT to CLIMB up there, get past that section, figure out the moves, do it clean. But – I’m not the same length as Tim.

When climbing indoors at the bouldering gym back home, there’s usually quite a few people of different length and strength around, and so I can watch and learn together with them as well. There will be someone who uses mostly the same beta as me, and I become a better climber from being able to find my own style.

While climbing with Troy at Paynes Ford, I had the chance to spend many hours together with a very strong climber who was a bit taller than me, but who still used most of the same beta. I would find my way through cruxes mimicking Troy, and then watch Tim do it completely different. It felt a bit like learning a new language, realising that your not stuttering anymore, your actually talking in complete sentences, able of putting them together á la minute without first constructing them in your mind. I come out of New Zealand a better climber, and that makes me happy and proud. Its a great feeling, evolving. My current plateau for leading is an Australian 20/French 6B, which brings me right back to where I was before my knee injury. At the end of our two months, I’m now back to climbing some four-six routes every day, depending on the status of the skin on my fingers rather than the status of my knee. If I’m still for too long, e.g. riding a car for a day, my knee still stiffens up, but as long as I stick to my rehab routine – 45 min every second day – it comes easily back in shape.

Phew… 😀

In all, New Zeeland and all the wonderful people we’ve been spending time with have treated us very, very well. It was a relaxed and happy start of our 16 months journey. Rejuvenated, we’re now crossing over to Australia for the next four months. Hasta pronto, little island!