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Bleau de grès 6

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In this guidebook, you will find the most beautiful TD to ED boulder problems of the bouldering mecca around Fontainebleau. Some of them have not been described elsewhere, and the guide also contains the most beautiful 5th and 6th grade boulder problems not marked as part of a circuit. The purpose of this guide is not to be exhaustive at any price, but to assure that the listed problems, according to the particular characteristics of each area, give an incentive to climbers to try them. In short, De Grès 6* is the very top guide for the Bleausard Sixtographiste*.

So, dear friends, take your climber equipment, follow your top guide through the forest and have a good climb.

The authors

* De Grès Six (a French pun, literally meaning “of sandstone six”) is pronounced like “degree 6”, i.e., grade 6.

* Fontainebleau is called Bleau by its residents, and a climber frequenting that spot is called a Bleausard; Sixtographiste corresponds to the 6th grade on the difficulty scale.

The keys of the topo guide

In our opinion, the keys of this topo guide are obvious enough, and we think that readers will be sufficiently accustomed to the use this kind of topos. All of them are first of all based upon the universal knowledge of cartography and maps, making long explanations useless.

We simply advise users of De Grès 6 to consult succinctly the following summary, and the overview maps of the areas. That way, one gets acquainted with the groups of nearby sites and their presentation order, and one will be able to search fast within each area.

However, the geographical maps of the guidebook have been sketched rather roughly and approximately. So we advise you wholeheartedly to buy the very useful IGN maps TOP N° 2316 OT and 2417 OT (scale 1/25.000), so you can find your way around in the forests around Fontainebleau.

Here and some precisions about the writing conventions used in this guidebook. First of all, remember that the boulder grades are not perfect indications of the difficulty level of a problem, as they cannot simultaneously integrate the physical features of a boulder and the physiological qualities of a climber. Next, a number of them will appear to be under- or overestimated (although most of them will appear to be correct enough, except, of course, in case of obvious writing mistakes). However, according to the opinion of many climbers, a few quotations would have passed the limit of the 7th grade. So, sometimes, you will see a complementary quotation between brackets, e.g., 6c (7a), in order to inform you about its trend. There are also the classic playful problems, in which a boulder is done with or without a certain hold. Therefore, sometimes but not extensively, an extra quotation is given between brackets, to explicitly denote such a playful problem, e.g., la Lili 6c (6c+ without the chipped hold).

Furthermore, behind a number of boulder problems a symbol called a "coup de cœur" (♥) will appear. This indicates, in our opinion, those problems that should not be ignored, either for the strict beauty of their line, or for their remarkable technical interest.

Last but not least, an explanation about the terms "exposed" or "engaged" that sometimes complement the name and quotation of a boulder problem. These terms are approximately synonyms, but we give them a different meaning. For us, the term "engagé" (engaged) applies to high blocks with a danger mainly related to that height, while the term "exposé" (exposed) applies to a potentially bad fall, even from a modest height.

Moreover, the lack of indication of danger doesn't mean lack of danger! These terms are just additional information, because all boulder problems are in fact engaged and almost all of them are exposed, as the risk of an accident is always present when climbing.

Order now for € 19,85 excluding shipping costs!