Agrentina Files-Part 1

So the first objective upon arriving in Buenos Aires was to catch up on some much delayed connecting I had to do with some very special people. I also was hoping to rest but a very lively city and the previously mentioned back log of connecting took some energy away from pure recovery.
The first climbing related trip I took was to El Chalten which is of course the Mythic, Mega, and Amazing Arena for all the alpine climbers out there. I took the opportunity to show my lovely life partner about some facets of the climbing life such as waiting out weather, hiding under boulder problems to wait out weather, complain about skin issues on hard boulder problems and of course belaying.
The next stop for me was a bolting trip for the upcoming Petzl RocTrip in November here in Argentina so I thought it best to only boulder a little bit and instead put my attention towards sports climbing.
There is some nice sports climbing around Chalten but I found my interest was held most by the out of town crag known as El Calamar. This is a really special and strange crag because it is mostly rain protected and thus an extremely valuable asset for the weather temperamental region of Patagonia. The stone was kind of fractured and broken looking igneous rock with a thin layer of limestone running over it. It was very Rifle-esque in its climbing and choss level. But just as Rifle there were some very nice climbs to be done. I came agonizingly close to sending an amazing 8a+ called Crisis but broke a fairly crucial hold and had to settle for one hanging it several times, such is the existence of the very short climbing trip. But I was able to send some nice 7c+'s and 7c's in a couple tries so actually mission accomplished because I was able to get into the route climbing groove and get psyched for the climbing and more importantly bolting to come of Piedra Pirada.