Four Go Mad In Font

God I love the end of May! It's the end of the academic year, no more exams or assignments for four months, although this summer will be marred by the prospect of a rather large dissertation. It's also the time the climbing section undertakes its annual adventure to the fantastic Forest of Fontainebleau, just south of Paris - Mmm, nice!

The trip is normally coordinated by Jim Dale and is only for three or four days. This year however Tony Craven, Brian Teasdale, Hattie and I decided to make a week of it and we all set off at 0930 hrs Sunday 25th May and headed for Dover. After a good journey, food, beers etc., we finally arrived at La Musardiere campsite near Milly la Foret about 2300 hrs and were let in past the automatic barrier by some fellow countrymen. Great.

Day one took us to 95.2 in the Trois Pignons area just up the road from the campsite. Unfortunately it was too hot and too difficult. Hat and I couldn't get off the ground on the yellow problems let alone lust after something more taxing. Brian and Tony were also unimpressed and so we bolted to Bas Cuvier just off the N7 Paris-Fontainebleau road (also noted for its good time girls who ply their trade openly - more of this later). Here we found excellent climbing and we started to shoot round the orange circuit without too much difficulty. Brian especially did his part for international relations while at Bas Cuvier. First he accosted a young Texan lad called Chris who was not a climber but soon became one. Chris, with Brian's encouragement and insults, started on oranges in trainers then progressed to a couple of blues in his bare feet. This was the point when we all began to get used to Brian's incessant banter with "NO! YOU TOILET!", "'Mongst it!" and "You like that, don't you?" When it was time for Chris to move off his parting words were: "YOU TOILET!"

Next on the hit list was a young Japanese lad who was struggling with an orange problem despite the fact that he was so tall he could reach the first handhold without stretching. Some delicate guiding from Mr Teasdale and more banter left the bemused Japanese at the top of the boulder with no problems. So happy was he that he offered up a prayer and gave Brian a traditional courteous bow. Henceforth the boulder became known as Yamamoto wall. Our next international client was a karate kicking Buddhist Spaniard named Raymondo (please keep reading, the story becomes even more bizarre) and a travelling South African fellow called Anthony. Ray was incredibly strong and was in fact on his way to Oxford for a couple of months. He kept Brian occupied on some of the harder problems, until it was time to take the piss out of an Englishman called Adam, who was from Gloucester.

Adam turned up with his group of friends and boldly stated that he'd climbed every blue in Cuvier except the one Brian was gallantly attempting. Brian, the gentleman that he is, stood aside and allowed Adam to have a go. After a couple of attempts Brian offered to spot Adam who said in a pompous tone "I'd rather you didn't, I don't know you" to which Brian replied "From Adam?" Believe me you had to be there and after much hilarity I commented to one of Adam's female admirers that we had learnt to filter out a lot of Brian's wittering - she said they'd learnt to do the same with Adam! Anyway after successive failures Adam stood aside while Brian walked up the boulder and off the top.

Later, back at the campsite, we bumped into John and Delphine Stockton who had arrived earlier that Sunday and were also there for a week and so a few drinks were had while taking the rise out of a neighbouring English group who appeared to have come to Fontainebleau to sit around a fire and read books all evening. Strange!

The following day, after a bit of climbing, we opened the West Midlands branch of the SOC by meeting a lovely couple called Hannah and Phil from Smethwick. They were on a five day special and kindly lent us their barbeque (Brian also commandeered John and Delphine's) so that we could cook a ton of assorted shellfish that Hattie had enthusiastically bought at a supermarch‚ earlier on. Brian thoroughly enjoyed the barbeque as we finally ate it before midnight.

Wednesday (I think) took all eight of us to Franchard Isatis and The Elephant where we climbed some quite difficult routes. Hattie and I really came on during the week (and came off a few times - ooh-er matron) thanks largely to Brian's constant verbal incontinence and enthusiasm. John took Delphine off to buy a pair of rock shoes so that she could get back into climbing after many years absence. In fact it was Delphine who introduced John to climbing but gave up when it was time to start rearing a family. That evening was a rather inebriated affair with the eight of us sitting around performing Fast Show, Monty Python impressions and double entendres galore thereby entertaining many of the surrounding tent occupants. In fact Brian commented to me upon the alcohol consumption that week to which I retorted: "I am not an alcoholic Brian. An alcoholic always needs a drink. I've always GOT one".

On Thursday the rest of the gang turned up and met us at Bas Cuvier. Jim, Ed, Geoff, Jess, Florence and John Smith and Neil Fenny had arrived about lunchtime, established camp and started the orange circuit some problems behind us. It didn't take long for them to catch us up. After a few drinks in Font we returned to the campsite and sat around drinking for some time. At this point Delphine related that at Cuvier that afternoon she had been sitting reading in the car park when a Frenchman had accosted her and wanted to know if she was doing business. After being sent on his way the man returned and tried again but to no avail. Although upsetting at the time Delphine could laugh about it and John wondered if he could get her to supplement his pension.

The rest of our time was spent climbing in glorious sunshine. In fact it was so hot that it was almost impossible to get on the rocks between 1200 and 1600 hrs. Other sites visited were Rocher Gros Sabots (supposed to be 91.1) 91.1 (eventually) and another crag near Beauvais with Pete T, Gwendoline and Mark which had rather dangerous landings.

On the last day we had a return trip to Cuvier to try and get Hattie up Orange 7 which had eluded her so far and unfortunately continued to do so. Whilst en route Tony started a craze for translating Brian into French with NON! VOUS TOILETTE! I then chipped in with NEIN! SIE TOILETTE! which didn't have the same ring to it. Unfortunately our foreign friends were no longer available to help us with either Japanese or Spanish.

The return journey was a nightmare. Jim and the rest got away about 0800 hrs on the Sunday and hopefully did alright. We left three hours later and once back in Blighty got stuck in traffic around London, got caught in a tremendous thunderstorm and lost the car keys at Donnington Services on the M1. Never mind.

What a fantastic trip. The weather was scorching, climbing excellent, beer cold and we hadn't laughed so much in ages. We also made new friends and hopefully Hannah and Phil will be able to join the SOC trip to Pembrokeshire over the August Bank Holiday. Thanks to Tony for organising the ferry etc. and the use and abuse of his car, Brian for the entertainment and Hattie for the nervous breakdown by dragging me around a bloody hypermarket on my holiday. Roll on next year.

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Four Go Mad In Font

Carl Rouse