Here we go riding our bikes to a bar. Rotterdam is very much a bike friendly town.

With Chris' MuseumKart (a must for anyone visiting the Netherlands- a low flat membership that gives you free entree to most museums in Amsterdam and Rotterdam) I hopped in and out of a few museums and galleries in Amsterdam, a very colorful, artistic and historically significant place. Above is the Neue Kerk, a church built in a late gothic style right next to the Royal Palace. Other visits I made included the photography space, FOAM and the Rijksmuseum. Their is an impressive amount of great artwork in Amsterdam.

Our first stop was the sandstone climbing of the Pfaltz Region, Western Germany.

From Germany, we carried on to the spectacular Italian Dolomites. Above Chris racks up for a climb on Cinque Torri, a cluster of towers that offers great climbing.

The Cinque Torri Group, Chris as a reference for scale approaches lower right.

After a week in the Alps, Chris and I traveled down the Dalmatian Coast, first to climb in Paklenika.

Paklenika is a sport climbing paradise with a seemingly limitless amount of single and multi pitch routes. After a day climbing, one is inclined to take a dip in the Adriatic and eat freshly caught fish.

From Paklenika, Chris and I drove south to Split. Here we met Julie and Grete at the airport and the four of us boarded a ferry to Hvar. For the next week four separate stories create one as we will live and climb together by the sea.

Chris deep water soloing

Grete adrift at sea

As difficult as it was say goodbye to Julie and Grete and to the melodic blue Adriatic sea, we still had our eyes on a few routes in the Dolomites, prompting our return.

Here I am on our approach to the base of Punta Fiames with the town of Cortina below.

For a day we climbed with Enrico, a local guide. He introduced us to the Alpine School of Climbing- hardly ever place protection and move very fast.

Chris and I atop the summit of Juri Spigolo on the Punta Fiames Group. It was a well earned summit that from car to car took us 13 hours. At one point during the ascent it started to hail on us.