Curacao, july 2018 to july 2019: a recap

Click here for Dutch version

It has been longer than I had hoped. About time for an update!

The last time I wrote to you, I had just bolted 1 route on the Caracasbaai island, near Fort Beekenburg: Unchained! The development of that area for rock climbing is the reason I'm writing now, but it will have to wait until the end. First, we have to catch up.

In the summer of 2018 we did a one-week cruise in the region: Bonaire, Aruba, Panama City and Cartagena in Colombia. Such a cruise is quite passive and you are only briefly in one location; still, I thought it was a good way to see something of the region in a short time. Moreover, a cruise was on my 'bucket list'. The journey from home to the accommodation was the shortest ever, 20 minutes by car to the harbour...

In September 2018 I traveled to the Netherlands for the second time. At the beginning of September the weather can still be nice in the Alps. So I drove my motorcycle to the Lienz Dolomites. Where I spent a little week in the Karlsbader Hutte with Ezra, Howard, Bas and Dick. Sunny and beautiful routes - both rock climbing and with the motorcycle.

Back in the Netherlands I conducted another month of training. A kind of "I'm back" ritual was already developing. Buy certain things, arrange stuff, visit friends - and make combinations to make good use of the available time. To Antwerp for a day of movies, for example, combined with a visit to the Decathlon.

Only climbing in Belgium got less attention, because I now realized that outdoor climbing on Curacao is a much more accessible than in the Netherlands. 10 minutes driving instead of 2.5 hours, quite a difference. What was unforgettable was climbing in Dave with Imma from Curacao and then bumping into Lammert who said his farewells to rock climbing.

Once back on Curacao I did some work to improve the user-friendliness of the existing climbing areas. With Bernice, I also explored the sea cliffs at Jan Thiel, an impressive wall of about 30 meters high. Inspection showed that only the last 8 meters are solid enough to climb, unfortunately. Yet I set an abseil anchor - for the adventurers. It was a good opportunity to gain experience placing a titanium "U" anchor ... I received a donation from the Dutch Climbing and Mountaineering Association in the form of a large number of titanium bolts and anchors! Thanks to Harald and Robin from the NKBV; and Menno, my neighbor, to whom I could send the bolts from the Netherlands via military mail.

In terms of work, the fall of 2018 was very active. In addition to my usual activities for my European client (development of new training courses, videos and an online training here and there), I was also busy establishing contacts to provide local training. But that is clearly a matter of: "first sow, then reap". It is beneficial to work with partners to get in touch with potential clients. That requires trust and building trust takes time. When I write this, I have just started my first official local training. I also obtained accreditation for the new version of ITIL. And I did a basic Papiamentu course. Twice a week, in the evening ... certainly took some getting used to it in the beginning because before that I was used to going to bed quite early!

Around new year I was back in the Netherlands with my family. That was the third time for me. This time it was just to visit family during the holidays. In 2019 we travelled back to Curacao again. I performed my first dive. I will again! There was a visit from family and acquaintances. I picked up running again and left the asphalt. And I was busy at Flipside Skatepark creating new boulder problems.

Shortly thereafter I returned to the Netherlands for the fourth time to go skiing in Austria, in March 2019. That was not planned originally, but it happened because I had to reschedule a training cycle.

My fifth time (and last so far) in the Netherlands was in May. Again to work, but also in part with my family. We visited Fontainebleau. In May I was finally able to put an end to the misery with my motorcycle, which I was no longer able to insure; being a non-resident of the Netherlands. With the help of my friends Howard and Martijn we found a solution.

It is now summer vacation again and we have had a "staycation" week. We were (also before that) still exploring the island, because we have not yet visited all the beaches and have not yet hiked everywhere. We saw lots of new places ... Boka Ascension ... Boka Patrick ... the Aven of San Pedro ... Santu Pretu ... and there is so much more ... Jona is going to summer camp also to go climbing. After the holidays he goes to group 3/4.

All in all the balance after a year and a half is that I am still very happy on Curacao! I have come to appreciate some things in the Netherlands, even things I did not expect; for example, how green it can be in May. But the other way around is true as well. The temperature on Curacao has much less variation than in the Netherlands and also the time between sunrise and sunset doesn't vary as much (we are close to the equator), this provides life with a stability I really like. The island has a lot to offer outdoor sports enthusiasts.

My friends Howard and Ezra are coming here for a week in November. This fact, combined with an incredible number of bolts from the NKBV that are just gathering dust in my garage and the discovery that Hilti RE-500 (pretty much the best stuff for setting bolts) is sold locally, brought me to decide that I will no longer climb outside (I am still practicing on my wall inside, don't worry) or start other projects until phase 2 of the development of the climbing area on Caracas Bay Island / at Fort Beekenburg is finished.

That's why I started again a few weeks ago. Inspecting lines of possible routes, cutting a scrambling route to the top, pruning to get to the bottom of the routes, setting temporary anchors, cleaning routes and test climbing ... a tough job but many hands make light work. Masha danki Andy, Bernice, Claudio, Imma, Jamie, Rob, Samuel, Shannon, Shirley! I publish my plans as part of this blog. My goal is to make sure that these routes are bolted so they can be climbed in November. When the guiebook is available, it will be published here.

Life is still very dynamic. If I have to tag a motto to the past year, then I choose: ku yudansa du mi amigunan (with the help of my friends) thank you all!

To be continued again!




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