Dave MacLeod's 'Oceans' - the attractive orange scoop on the southwest face of the Eagle Boulder, has always repelled strong climbers, and appeared as a total mystery to most. Given 7b+, it seemed within reach of the indoor-trained beast, but this is Dumby and requires a more tenacious and arcane approach! It was good to see it reclimbed and classed as one of the best at Dumby by Niall McNair and Fraser McIlwraith, before the rain returned on Saturday 26th January 2013. They rated it a 'hard 7c' and one of the most unusual and classy of problems at Dumby. The first move twisting up to a poor undercut, then stepping feet through on poor slopers to a vicious cross-through to a crimp only leads you to a further, heart-fluttering power sequence to the lip... many mats and much spotting help secure this, which makes a lone ascent even more impressive. Now on the list of favourites to do, this approaches the magical formula in bouldering: poor footholds, masonic handholds, unusual moves, technique, torque, power and commitment all melded into one.
Shamanistic zoomorphs, lithic graffiti, hallucinogenic tableaux, territory markings, knife-sharpeners … rock art – l'art rupestre – is so far beyond our traditional 'linguistic' history, it does not have an interpretative alphabet or a single line of confirmed meaning. There are many interpretations of the 'gravures' (carvings) and 'abris ornés' (decorated caves) in the hidden bivouacs throughout the forest of Fontainebleau. The sandstone marks easily under the nib of a hard flint from the deeper calcareous geology and this soft stone canvas has allowed our European ancestors to carve the stylised and modernistic strokes we might note as remarkable in a Picasso painting. Most of the carvings involve complex hash-marks and grids, overlaying each other, occasionally with mandala-like boxes. Sometimes there have been carved astonishingly beautiful anthropomorphs, (stylised human-like figures), or zoomorphs, (deities or humans manifesting in animal form) or argu...