A couple of days climbing near Rio Cuarto

Headmaster Enzo shoeing up by some boulders he found

As the month of July turned to August, during the second week of our winter break, we went a few days to the city of Rio Cuarto en Córdoba, where my wife's family lives. There is good climbing in the Province of Córdoba but until a short while ago there hasn't been any established climbing close to Rio Cuarto, so I tended to get a bit anxious after a few days at the in-laws' house. Recently, though, a friend of ours who climbs, Enzo, took a job as Headmaster at a bilingual school in Rio Cuarto. On a Thursday after getting off work, he took me to a small zone of boulders he discovered, bordering the river just outside the town of Achiras, less than an hour drive from Rio Cuarto.

We started up with some of the easier problems that Enzo had done before

Enzo begins a boulder problem from a sit start

Looking at the next move

Me chalking up a move higher on the same problem

The top out by a fence

Enzo on a traverse problem

The highlight of the afternoon was climbing a brand new (and very nice) V2 that actually took us a few tries to send. Well, I guess I had the excuse of not wanting to fall off haphazardly while still being (just barely) less than six months after surgery. We also worked a harder (V3 or maybe V4) variation of the problem, coming in from the left, that we couldn't do. At any rate, I felt happy to be climbing some new boulders in a new place so shortly after surgery.

On the following Saturday we headed out to Alpa Coral (about an hour drive from Rio Cuarto) to try some new routes which had been bolted near the river. There are about 12 established routes, mostly 5.9s and easy 5.10s, in a pleasant setting (good for swimming on a hot day), The climbing is not spectacular (the rock is so-so and slabby), but four out of five of the routes we did were both fun and interesting. Plus the area along the river is really nice.  

Me nearing the top of a 5.9 with Gaby on belay

There are something like eight different routes on this small cliff band bordering the river:

A friend of Enzo is top roping a route on the left side of the cliff

A friend of Enzo top ropes a 5:9

I managed to onsight the following 5.10a:

Enzo belays me entering the crux of a 10a

This short, tricky crux bulge is actually kind of steep