Ascents in Bucegi Massif

On descent. Some minor avalanches going on in the upper caldera (above the entrance point from Bucsoi), then reasonably uninterrupted good snow down to a bit above the canyon upper end, where I took off my crampons and descended on dry paths to the bottom. Got super lost for a while on the valley exit (fresh, springtime vegetation) and while this is pretty normal for me the group behind me got super lost too, so I dub the "estuary" below the intersection with Rapa Zapezii the Morarului triangle

Perfect snow, little cracking, all obstacles covered. 10-15cm fresh snow above 2200 or so, but really stable. Should be in conditions for another month lol.

At above 2000m, right above Turnul cu Jnepeni, there's a far steeper bifurcation to the right I took for a hundred meters or so. Really cool chimney with two chockstones, and a still-barely-continuous snow ridge in it that led to some pretty fun mixed climbing. above the chockstones the snow disappeared and it all looked quite gravelly and bushy so I downclimbed back to the main line. Pretty sure this is the entrance to Valcelul de sub Varf, but need to read up more on it.

Retreated at the canyon - a bit too much rockfall going on around me to risk it in the Costila particle accelerator.

Snow, good. Traces of major rockfall at 1900, with microwave-sized boulders still flying around, not good. Our initial plan had been Albisoara Rasucita, but between that and there being less snow than we hoped for....nah.

Probably a fun easy slab route when not covered in crap

A family of worms crawls out of a pile of shit. Baby worm asks: mommy could we climb in Montserrat? Yes son, we could. Mommy but could we climb in Meteora? Of course, my dear. Mommy mommy, but could we even climb in Costila? Certainly, nothing's stopping us. Mommy, then why are we climbing in fucking Caraiman?

Amazing conditions, perfect snow and just the right amount of drytooling

Up to the Window and rappelled back. Dry start, poor ice on the second major obstacle, more snow above (gets kinda shitty under the Window). Not that cold, but 90km/h gusts, and not a lot of space between.

Rappel line we used with 2x60: one end of the ropes one from the Window to just above the piton at the entrance in Furcile lui Baticu, one 15m one from that to the bolt, one long but not full length one to a 2-piton belay station (on a ledge to the left of the chimney proper) and another end-of-the-ropes one to a few easily downclimbable m above the start

Good snow, all covered

Really cool, highly featured ice, the initial pillar almost feels like dancing. Did this once in the morning, came out of it super pumped. Spent the day running laps on the mini-waterfall above it, trying to train my brain in wasting less energy. Tried it again at the end of the day when I already felt tired and beat, came out on top with barely any pump. Yay learning

Worst approach-to-technical terrain ratio ever. 2 very short pitches, at most M2, on friable bullshit that the new bolts improve but can't fix, and you do about 1500m altitude diff on trail and grass face for it. The company was lovely though, and at least it was good cardio, am not feeling v peaky these days

On descent, horribly loose avalanche boulders under the Blid

Almost no snow

Good snow up to the Amphitheater, almost none after. Obstacles covered in the lower side, above we had a fun lil bit of drytooling, and an ice chimney that unfortunately mostly had ice on the exit

Really cool conditions (mostly dry in the lower side, hard ice patches) but after the approach from hell we were out of time. Rapped down from below the Furci icefall (not yet formed).

Horribly aerated snow up to Saritoarea Mare. Some sort of unholy marshmallow consistency. Nasty rimaye next to the first obstacle

Lovely walk on perfect snow. Rock obstacles barely uncovered, easily downclimbable

Perfect consolidated snow in the lower part. The obstacle below the intersection with Rapa mica was recently affected by rockfall. The lower slab is full of crap, the upper right exit is blocked, and the upper left has you go through a new and poorly consolidated chimney and exit thru a sharp-edged window for a committing, exposed move on friable crap.

Between this and the hopefully-not-tuberculosis cold from hell, I had bad vibes about continuing so we rapped off (we added a second piton to the rap station over the second obstacle - crack could be deeper, but it should do)

Full start-of-season mixed conditions: wet in the lower third, snowed up in the middle third (I put on my crampons before the second window, later than would have been best), some ice in the upper third (2-3cm thick, easily separable from the rock below, we had some warm days before this). Made for easy but surprisingly cool climbing, esp somewhere in the middle where Baza decided against the classical, pitoned up traverse solution, free soloed some M4 mostly direct, then since I was on toprope and the M4 thing looked a)swingy and b) built for tall people I tried an overhanging direttisima version, maybe M5? There's a really bouldery fit-in-a-tight-box-and-then-do-a-long-move-over-the-overhang bit. Loved it.

20-30cm powder. Snowfall looking lovely in our headlights

Up to the Portita. Beachtime, and vibing away with the mountain goats.

Initial plan was Hornul Ascuns, and this as approach. God, but it was less weedy 2 years ago

We were expecting 100% bushwhacking to get there, so imagine our surpride when we got a relatively bush-free scramble, leading to a great view

From Seaca Costilei to Malin

Nice and dry. Main line. On lead for the main obstacle (only bit we roped up for). There's a manufactured bolt in the middle of it but it's not very useful.

Partner not feeling well. From the Great Traverse, one can retreat down to the Sarutul Pamantului belay on Terenul de Fotbal in 1 55m rap, and then down the line of the route.

At least I know the way now.

On the northern side, a very fun walk on a nice path with amazing views and 1 easy (if exposed, assuming you're taller than me) rock move.

On the southern side, it's all grass of the sort that gets damn slippery in autumn, so it was a careful and focused traverse.

Views on the north side are really out of this world though. Heavily recommended.

The day's plan was Brâul de Sus, but I wanted a belayer for my preferred approach on Valea Adanca, and I couldn't persuade anyone that climbing northern gullies on a day with a meteo alert for high northwestern winds would be type 1 fun. No worries, you can get there on Valea Morarului + grass slope, even if it's boring and you don't wanna. Had a Freudian moment when I came to the intersection between it and this gully though, looked at the red arrow pointing right and continued leftward, still being somehow sure I was on the right path

Realized this wasn't Kansas anymore maybe 150m higher. Up to Brâul Mare al Morarului, the gully is technically very easy ... which made it climbable even while covered in lubey gunk. How to make a 2+ friction slab feel like 4+, basically. Downclimbing it would have been shitty, and I didn't want to descend the left face on 6-7 20m bush rappels either, so I continued upwards, thinking to reevaluate my situation on Brâul Mare. Was quite cheered up by a message from a friend with an encyclopedic knowledge of the area* telling me that the iffiest obstacle of the route was right under the Brâu but otherwise life should be smooth sailing, which arrived just as I was navigating it successfully.

Now, the thing about Romanian scrambling grades is that they rely on the "official" detours being taken. Following the geological line, or taking non-official detours, can lead to a far more fun day than you'd expect given the grade. The second part of my friend's message said that after Brâul Mare, I should leave the gully proper and climb the dwarf pine patch to the right until the end. Dwarf pine bushwhacking for a few hundred meters altitude difference is not my idea of a good time though, and I could see a decent grass face on the left up to Brâul de Mijloc, so decided to find my own way instead.

The grass face went fine. Brâul de Mijloc was also where I thought I'd find it, but rather than traversing on it until the middle of the dwarf pine patch proper, I thought I'd try my way a bit higher on the grass+rock portion under it before rejoining. These tend to be famous last words in Bucegi - for those of you who hadn't had the pleasure, a problem with these slopes is that they're very friable (both the grass pillows and the rocks easily detach from the substrate). So when the angle gets high enough that you're climbing rather than walking, you'd better be very careful about what you're doing, and there's no guarantee you'll be able to reach a point 30m away without gambling your life. It's micro route finding all the way, looking for the holds that are secure enough to take a bit of pressure and the line that will allow you to climb with the minimum pressure, and the micro route finding led me to almost the top of the gully before I could rejoin the bushes (my favourite species in the world by then). Probably the most committing thing I did this year. It was a very fun adventure for this one particular climber in that one particular mood on that one particular day, but I have to rate this Don't Bother because the "official" line will have you dislodging dwarf pine bits out of various orifices for a week after, and the line I took .... well, the sort of thing where you're barely even climbing but if anything breaks you die and everything is very friable and completely unprotectable is a typical style in the wilder corners of the Carpathians, but a very acquired taste.

P.S: the wind was fine, as I guessed, the area would be in the lee of Omu/Bucsoiu/Creasta Balaurului.

*If any of you want a guide for scrambling in Bucegi, Andrei Badea from BackToNature is your man

Hornurile Vaii Seci version, retreat on Braul de sub Streasina rather than up on Caraiman to save some time. Still missed my train tho.

The inferior part (up until the end of Valcelul Mortului) is pretty much dry - led or soloed most of it (exception: Saritoarea lui Zangur, where I really didn't like using a rotten log and an even more rotten piton as pro, with my last good piece (red Totem) halfway between me and the ground)).

On account of life being very wet, we didn't try the initial chimney of the Hornuri version directly, but did the "classical" version that avoids it on the right. Rest was led by Baza, wet but not horribly so. An extra piton was added in the Big Chimney at the beginning of the crux (rock looks like that's where the Great Snake Accident of 2023 happened).

Took us 12h from Busteni to the top - I'm not the fastest lead, plus we had a lot of pitons to test and hammer back in.

Descent on Braul de sub Streasina + Valea Spumoasa + Braul Portitei + Jepii Mici. Don't really recommend the Spumoasa trick in summer unless you absolutely have to, top part is a shitty grass slope where one slip means you end up a few hundreds of m lower.

Starting section is really difficult, understood from other climbers there were parts of the rock broken making the first 5 moves harder. There is also a risk of hitting a tree behind you when you fall. Approaching for the right when you have a top rope makes it on par with the difficulty level.

Before the top the trail vanishes & I finished it in CuCu