Getting What You Came For

I had plenty of gear, just nowhere to put it. Quaking in a strenuous stem, I gave up trying to sling a sloping horn. Going horizontal out a three-foot roof, I used all the Corsican tricks I’d learned in the past weeks — I underclinged the rounded tufoni, heel-hooked precarious fins, and knee-scummed on lichen. I tried not to think about the rating. At 5.9, this was the easiest of the five ropelengths on La Lune Dans Le Caniveau (5.11). Fifteen feet later, my weight once again on my feet, I spied my next bolt. Nestled in a concave enclave, the stud and hanger had rusted a deep and all-too-familiar brown, and orange stains marked the rock below. the hardware was so corroded I couldn’t trust it to hold a baguette, much less my life. I reminded myself that I’d picked today’s route. And the trip. And the adventure. I clipped the mangy hanger and deliberated my next, unfathomable move. This, then, was Corsican adventure climbing.

Corsica is the Brigadoon of the climbing world: Most have heard of it, few know where it is, and nobody, apparently, has climbed there. Flipping through old magazines, I saw an article by Arnaud Petit: “Corsica: a mountain in the sea” [Climbing No. 152]. I had nurtured a mild obsession with the island ever since. “Have you climbed in Corsica?” I would ask every climber I met.
“Isn’t that in Italy?” most would ask in return.
“That’s Sardinia,” I’d explain, naming Corsica’s much larger sister island, to the south.
“Doesn’t it have something to do with Napoleon?” Well, yes, but I wanted climbing Beta, not a history lesson.
The Mediterranean island of Corsica is a French territory 50 miles southeast of Nice. The birthplace of the aforementioned diminutive conqueror, Corsica boasts a wild geography that beckons explorers of every ilk. Large for an island — 52 miles wide and 114 miles long — Corsica, chock full of regional pride and separatist tendencies, is essentially a country unto itself. It is also an adventurer’s paradise: Between the white-sand beaches and 8,000-foot-tall peaks (the highest on any Mediterranean island); an innumerable array of granite towers and crags; and skiing, rafting, snorkeling, and canyoneering, Corsica has it all. More than 10,000 people a year come to hike the GR20, or, in Corsican, the Fra Li Monti (“Between the Mountains”), a rugged 104-mile trail following the island’s continental divide past glacial lakes, remote villages, and peat bogs.

We — me; then-hubby, Eli; and our photographer friend Gabe Rogel — came to Corsica to investigate these mythic granite massifs. Spanked one too many times at European sport-climbing venues, I’d chosen Corsica as an effort in redeeming myself on the Continent. The last time I’d gone to Europe I’d packed light — quickdraws and sports bras — and had left wishing I’d brought a bigger duffle in which to hide, following the schooling I’d received at the Verdon and Ceüse. This time, however, I filled three bags with tag lines, offwidth gear, and triple sets of micro cams and RPs.