Author: Alena Ostapenko, Kharkov, Ukraine

"Now then, let's go girls" or "Crimean moments

At last I could climb my head off! I visited the Crimea this year for the first time and come to conclusion that travels abroad simply do not leave enough time for such pleasure. But I'm really craving for something hard to climb.

We arrived to the Crimea on August, 22 and had return tickets on September 7. Well, we had to hit the ground running.

The plan - minimum was to send all the routes 7b/c in Nikita that I had done earlier.

It was plain sailing - already after 3 days of climbing I felt that was ready to try something of 8a (note: I haven't sent any 8a line before this Crimean trip). More skilled climbers advised to try "Eskadron" and first go I had two falls.

The same day I tried it once again aiming not to get the top but to pay attention to body-control and arm and legs position - my mate and partner Alexander Zilinsky (a.k.a. Zilya) helped me in that. Then I decided: after a day of rest I must climb it. And decided to hang quickdraws by myself to test and precisely remember the heaviest sites once again.

And there you are: I set teeth for this line, made the first move - the most important and heavy for me and "Eskadron" bent to my will!

This is my first 8à-line in Crimea. Further there was a rain of congratulations, a small party in the evening on the occasion of my sending of "Eskadron", Zilya's sending of "Parallelny Mir", 8b + and our friend Lilya's birthday. Cool!

Next day I was very tired: couldn't climb anything.

Finally decided to have a rest and then to visit the Red Stone.Climbing in Red Stone has its own specificity. After laid-back climbing I decided to try "Fiesta", 8à.And sent it third go. This line did not appeared difficult to me: steady resistance climbing with "strong fingers ".

On September, 5 Lena Krivonos sent Alexis, 8a, and recommended it to me as a real line.

On September, 6 I got limbered up on easy routes and then headed to try Alexis. First go I fell from bouldering site in the middle of the line. I tried it many times until the sympathizers prompted me some very strength moves.I organized myself, started climbing and fell right from the last but one quickdraw.

Climbing the crux I felt sick because of hard exhaustion.

While I had a rest for about an hour Olga Yakovleva came (fortunately!) and prompted a technical and several times physically more simple variant of sending the crux. I tried only the crux. And after a short rest, but hanging on by the skin of teeth (with pierced before on a sharp hold my index finger) finally I could do that!

It was my third 8à-line for this short trip.

Girls! All of this is real!

Trust in yourselves; be not afraid of rocks and heavy lines!

Let's go girls!!!!!!!!!!!