Huh?

Taken a few hours after this shot, the expression on Vida's face says everything.

Satisfaction

Satisfied after a day of climbing in the sunshine.

Equipment

Maja showing off some climbing equipment at the Lim Bay. There's nothing better than leaving a cold, grey Ljubljana and going climbing down by the sea where it's nice and warm.

Reflections of climbing

Taken in Vipava this weekend in the beautiful, warm sunshine.

Gone surfing

Here's the video from this Saturday. I'm so new at video that I'm learning as I go along, every step of the way.

The surfer

Nejc started surfing a few years ago, about the time I started climbing. Since I started playing around with video, we've been talking about making a short video of surfing - and today we finally got around to it. We left early, since the wind was supposed to be the best in the morning. It was a cold and relatively gray day, the light was definitely not the best for photography, especially in the end, when this was taken. The water was quite warm and Nejc wasn't cold at all, while I was freezing on the beach.

I spent most of the time shooting video, but I took a few stills (photographs), around twenty in all, with this being the best. The video will come later, I'll need much more time to edit it all.

The path

 

I've finally gotten around to editing all of my photos from last year's trip to Triglav. When I come across photos I like, I sometimes play around with them on the computer - this one seemed more interesting when given a bit of an old-fashioned look. This was toward the beginning of the hike, and we quickly found ourselves out of the forests and in the high alpine trails. The path we chose is one of the rockier and more dangerous ones, but it was a great two days.

Last climb of the day

 

Blaž climbing in Verdon - this was taken right around sunset, which is why the colours are so warm and inviting. It's moments like these that make climbing so rewarding. I can't wait for some sunshine so we can hop down to the seaside and climb on rock again. Spending all winter climbing on artificial walls gets boring pretty quickly.

Oh, and the photo was taken on film with my old Konica.

Edit: you've probably noticed the large size of the photo... Blogger has increased the maximum size of the photos and I'm trying it out. I like it so far - comments are welcome!

Arrgh, these cloudy days

Last year, a cloudy snowy day at Krvavec. Grega was obviously very angry :) If possible, he chooses the hard way to go down the slope. It was very cold and there has been so much snow, that we couldn't make it to the chair lifts with his mighty car, as we usually do. So we took a few descents and of course, a few photos . The problem was heavy snowing and me and my camera were soaked wet. I have left my flash at home, so I had to push the darks a little higher, where the noise comes from.


When LADA NIVA stops, everybody stops:)


Actually, Grega was so angry, that he wanted to jump off a cliff...


And also the angry girl Nika was pissed off...


So Janez took a piss, of which he was really proud...


...we stuck the board into the snow...
and found the closest bar:) END

Mountain biking

We already have quite a few photos from climbing on this blog, though we've only been climbing for a year or so. But I've been mountain biking for much, much longer. The biggest reason that there are practically no photos here from mountin biking is that I never take a camera. They are usually too big and heavy, and while riding, there's rarely any time to take photos. With sports climbing, there's usually more free time to hop around and do some photography.

This shot is after we've returned to the car, we went on a nice, 5 hour ride to the tri-border between Slovenia, Austria and Italy. I like the ray of light that's shinning on red part of the frame of the first bike (which is, along with that helmet, mine :)).

Grounder

I couldn't care less for watching sports, but baseball is one of the exceptions. Maybe it's just a bit of nostalgia :)

Above the valley

I think this photograph was taken in Osp or Vipava, I'm not sure, since they are very similar (and not too far apart). Both are well-known climbing areas, though they are usually too hot in the summer.

Livestrong

Tadej climbing at Ljubljana's Roman wall. The title of the post (Livestrong) comes from the Lance Armstrong Foundation, which (according to their words) helps unite people to fight cancer. The yellow wristband Tadej is wearing is a well-known symbol of this foundation.

Climbing silhouette

Another shot of Barbara. I took this a few days ago at Ljubljana's Roman Wall. This wall dates to the Roman times, though it's been renovated twice - once by the architect Jože Plečnik, and a second time in the early 90's. It is often used for recreational climbing, especially by students in Ljubljana. We went climbing in the late afternoon, and when the sun started to go down, the light became incredible. The photo below, of my sister, was taken maybe ten minutes before this one.

Going up!

I took this a few months ago in one of Slovenia's larger climbing areas, Kotečnik. Barbara is doing the climbing, and the photo was taken on slide film with an older Canon EOS film camera.

Edit: I didn't even realise it at first, but because of the light, she looks like she's climbing into the sky. Or am I imagining it?

The pitch

Another baseball one. The guy in the white t-shirt who has just thrown the ball is called the pitcher, since the kids are pretty young, one of the coaches does the pitching. If they did it themselves, it would be much slower and more boring, this way, there's more action for everyone involved. The dark lines over the photo are from the fence I was shooting through. The longer the lens, the less you notice things which are directly in front of you. With a really long telephoto lens, you can shoot through a fence (tree branches, whatever) and it won't show up on the photo. Yay for physics!

Hit!

Taken at a baseball game not long ago, this kid is from my brother's team - the Zajčki (which translates to rabbits :-) ).

Arco climbing - part 2

Barbara bouldering during our last day in Arco. Nataša and Uroš found a wonderful climbing area 5 minutes away from our camp. It had a bit of everything, though it was mostly short routes and boulders.

Welcome back to the second part of our Arco climbing trip! I don't plan on writing much, I'll let the photos speak for themselves.

Carabiners are one of the most important pieces of safety equipment in climbing. I was hanging of this shiny nice one while photographing from the wall :)


Nataša in the middle of a route that many of us
would consider hard. She, on the other hand, took some
time off to pose for a couple of photos.
The same route as above, this time on the way down. Yes, those
really are some amazing rock walls in the background.


Life in Italy is just so relaxed. I caught this lady chatting with some neighbor during one of our walks around the lovely little town of Arco.


Mmmm the food in Italy is wonderful. Twice, we bought fish
from the local store (they were half the price we would have paid
in Slovenia) and roasted them on a barbecue at the camp. In the background,
you'll notice some wonderful local wine - again, criminally cheap.


Tadej reaches for a small crack to hold on to. This particular wall was
one big slab with very little to hold on to - just some cracks here and there,
footwork and technique ruled the day.


A minute later, he's gathering rope to clip in. I imagine
it must taste like chicken.


These are my magical climbing shoes which climb by themselves.
If anyone from Rock Pillars ever reads this, the original photo
is on sale ;-)


One last view from atop the wall. Beautiful, I know.

Frequent flyer

This is Gregor, catching some air on a recent ski trip to Austria (the same trip this photo was taken). This wasn't the easiest of photographs to take. First off, I only had 3 shots left on the roll of film (Fujifilm's Sensia Dia/Slide film), and I had forgotten spare rolls in my car, back in Ljubljana. Besides this, these conditions are not easy to photograph - shooting into the sun with shadows in the foreground and on the main subject isn't easy, especially with the simpler light reader in my old EOS 10s. I metered off the shadowy snow in the foreground and hoped for the best. Also, I had no clue where exactly Gregor was going to come over the hump, since I didn't see him until the last minute.

All in all, I got lucky that the metering was as good as could be, and that I caught him in time to be able to get a nice composition. Though it might look like a small jump here, it's actually quite high, especially if you're not ready for it.

Vertical limit

Yesterday we went climbing to Vransko, which is a village covered with free wireless internet and where you can find beautiful rocks just near the village. You can park practically under the wall if you want, so there is no walking to the "crime scene", which is why fathers and mothers who are climbers like this place as well. In front of the wall there is beautiful green grass when you can rest and the routes are quite easy. The hardest one is marked 6a, so Grega mostly went just straight up.