UKC

Is anyone here familiar with the layout of this crag, or in possession of a guidebook? It overlooks the village of Dolni Zleb on the left/west bank of the Labe river [the Czech name for the Elbe], a couple of kilometres upstream from the Czech/German border. I'm trying to work out which bit we climbed on some years ago, for which it would be very helpful to know the order in which the various "sektors" are encountered on the crag and in particular which ones are closely/immediately adjacent to Sektor Monolit; I know we were in that general vicinity because I took a photo of somebody on this route: http://www.czechclimbing.com/cesta.php?key=11110 , but none of the other routes on Monolit seem to fit the bill - although Google Translate often comes up with something even more confusing than the original! The Czech website database lists all the climbs in various orders, including the alphabetical order of the sektors, but not - so far as I can discover - in their actual order along the crag. Any help would be much appreciated.

In reply to Ian Parsons:

hi Ian was climbing there last Friday. Was about to look it up but we leave our guild books in Germany. will try to work it out tomorrow
Tony

In reply to Tony & Sarah:

Cheers Tony. I almost emailed you, but thought you might not be on the same continent as your library! I'll try scanning and sending a couple of other route photos to see if they look familiar.

IP

In reply to Ian Parsons:

Hi Ian

I have a copy of the guide Labske Udoli from 2005 and it includes all the climbing at Dolni Zleb. There is a map/diagram centred on Sektor Monolit: Blueberry Hill and Gilotina are the two adjacent sectors to the north and Otec and Smolar to the south. Otec appears to be a large free-standing block.

I hope this helps
Chris

In reply to Ian Parsons:

Did you take your photo of Psi Zivot from the vicinity of one of your routes? I don't think you could do this from many routes as Psi Zivot appears to be rather tucked away.

To the left of Psi Zivot but still on Monolit are:

Taky cesta VI
Sportonvi nemehlo VIIb

If you were on the face opposite there are these climbs on Smolar:

Prejistina VII
Inox VIIc
Levy inox IXa
Ferum VIIIb
Dekanuv omyl IXa

I think the climbs on Otec would be out of sight of Psi zivot

All the many accents are missing from these route names.

Chris

In reply to Chris Shorter:

Excellent, Chris - and thanks very much; this could well narrow my field of search considerably.

My shot of Psi Zivot would have been taken while wandering around the near vicinity in between climbs - ie from somewhere on the ground like this one http://oldmatterhorn.pedromagician.com/image.php?id=2721, or possibly a bit closer to the base like this shot of Guma Guar https://www.boulder.cz/data/fotky_viceucel/gumaguar6_xa_levybreh_monolit.jp... We would have actually been climbing - probably - somewhere "just round the corner"; very close, but most likely not within sight. If my memory is correct I recall a fairly prominent buttress with an impressive wall [aren't they all!] facing downhill; would probably have been called Talwand or Talseite over the border in Germany. I belayed someone who was trying one of those classic bold wall routes with the first ring at somewhere in the 30-50ft region with the next one out of sight; probably IXsomething. Possibly at the right side of this wall was a vertical arete with a couple of small overhangs, climbed mostly on its left side; VIIIc? On the left side of the buttress's left wall, next to a gully/chimney, was a thin crack that led up and slightly left to the underside of a large roof on the left arete - at which point one traversed left round the arete, climbed up to another roof, then back round to the right to a point above the first roof and up a groove to finish; VIIIa? This assumes, of course, that all three routes are on the same buttress rather than three separate ones; it was 17 years ago. Anyway; I'll crank up Google Translate and see if anything fits. Thanks again.

In reply to Ian Parsons:

Perhaps this might help you
http://www.skalnioblasti.cz/5_index.asp?cmd=6&sektor_id=339
or try interactive map here
https://www.horosvaz.cz/databaze-skal-cr/

In reply to Ian Parsons:

Hi Ian

Although it's only about 45 minutes from my home, I've never visited the crag and so I cannot provide any further knowledge. In fact, I've only ever climbed on one day on Czech sandstone and that was before I moved here.

I can scan the pages and send them to you if you send me your email address. It's in Czech of course. After 7 years living here, I do speak some Czech but I've never learned the technical words for features on a cliff or climbing terms. The descriptions are pretty brief though and I think the authors are relying on climbers just following the kruhy.

Google Translate often gets words wrong if you don't include the accents. Unlike in French, for example, the accented characters are actually full letters in the Czech alphabet - they don't just vary how the letter sounds. There are 42 characters in the Czech alphabet. There are words which only differ by the accents and have completely different meanings. Also "ch" counts as a single alphabetic character and is not a c followed by an h! It doesn't sound as you would probably expect either, which cause some Czechs to mangle my name - I'll have to adopt the Central European Kris one of these days. Words also keep changing according to which of the 7 cases or 4 genders apply to its use in a particular sentence - a dictionary is often not much use as it only gives the basic version in the first case.

Chris (or maybe Kris!)

In reply to Ian Parsons:

Hi Ian, we have just discovered both our Dolni guides 2005 & 2017 are still in Germany. We were actually climbing in one of the new sectors, half a kilometre up river from Dolni itself.
We have actually followed the route in the picture and thought it was quite tricky.
So sorry we cannot help you until the spring when we return.

Tony & Sarah FKK93 (German Sandstone Club )

In reply to pavelk, "Kris", Tony & Sarah:

Many thanks everybody - we're almost there. And Pavel - wow; loads of useful stuff there, including the clincher. UKC at its most helpful.

The "VIIIc?" righthand arete is definitely Korist [VIIIc] at Monolit. The "VIIIa" leftside crack line with a couple of flanking moves past the roofs is pretty definitely Indian Krak [VIIIb] at Indianka. The "bold wall" is probably one of the older [pre-sport] routes on either of the faces to the left of Korist or to the right of Indian Krak - pre-2000 and likely featuring traditional rings; I'll probably figure out which one in due course. I'll post links to photos when I've solved a temporary glitch in my machine.

Excellent, everyone - and thanks again!

Korist is the obvious righthand arete in the upper photo here:

http://www.skalnioblasti.cz/5_index.asp?cmd=6&skala_id=8098

I'd only found shots of the left side of the face - as in the lower shot - in which the arete isn't visible. To be honest, though, I should have got it from the description in the Czech Climbing database - "pravou hranou"; easy now I know what it means! But the photo nailed it - thanks to Pavel.

Indian Krak is on the left side of this face:

http://www.skalnioblasti.cz/5_index.asp?cmd=6&cesta_id=57294&cesta=...

It follows the left-leaning crack to the first roof, steps left round the arete to get up to the second roof, then comes back round and climbs the groove to the top. Enjoyable route.

Cheers chaps!