A short trip to Croatia in between the training sessions results in the first ascent of the first Croatian 9b! We made a family trip to the Paklenica area in August. I bolted two lines in this massive cave of Vranjača and first ascended the easier one (9a/a+), which I called "A je to" after my favorite Czech cartoon. I am glad my Croatian friends knew the cartoon as well! I worked on the sequences of the harder project to the right of "A je to!", but I ran out of time to finish it off.
A je to! is super power endurance route without super hard moves, whereas B je to! has a very hard crux that makes this route so hard. 2nd the day of this trip, after a very hard fight in the crux, and still very close calls on the upper part, I clipped the anchor of this project. Actually, I came up with this name ("B je to" means "it is b") even before I started trying. I was a little hesitant about whether it deserves the grade 9b or maybe a slashgrade fits better (then the name doesn't make any sense), but considering good conditions, crux that fits my style and pretty good sensations of my body recently, I propose 9b. If it ever gets downgraded, we might have to find a different name! :-)
The ascent was filmed, and stay tuned for the video, which we will release on my YouTube channel in November.
Pics by Kuba Sobotka
