French World Champion Climber Comes to Yemen

Photos by Guy Abert & Joshua Maricich

The Burj al-Salam hotel, one of the tallest buildings in the old city, has an elevator to assist guests up its nine stories.  French climber, Daniel du Lac, however, chose not to take it. Instead, he scaled the gingerbread façade, as local Sana’anis watched wide-eyed, astounded.

Daniel du Lac began climbing at an early age. Growing up in the Cevennes region of France, he lived the outdoor lifestyle climbing trees and rocks. In 1982, when he was six years old, he made his first proper climb in Corsica, Iceland, three pitches with no harness and no shoes. He joined an adventure club in high school where he began to distinguish himself as a climber. He won his first two tournaments and then went to the French junior national tournament where he finished 6th. He received attention for his efforts and was invited to join a club, which took him to his second junior French national championship. He competed in the lead climbing competition, and won, scaling a 5.12 B (advanced) route at the age of 14. He began training extensively, his early success in climbing chose his path for him, and he set out to become a professional climber. 2004 was his greatest year, in which he won the French national championship, the European Championship, and the World Cup for bouldering in China. His film, A Vertical Desert, was nominated for best climbing film in the Banff Mountain film festival.

These days, he prefers leading climbing trips and exploring new climbing areas to competition. And recently, the chance arose for him to come to Yemen. “I knew very little about the country, except that it was the land of bin Laden and blah blah blah” he says. “But this didn’t affect me.” This was his first trip to the Middle East.

“I made up my mind and I wanted to go, but the problem was to pay for it.” Yemenia and Felix Airways stepped in and funded his tickets from Paris to Sana’a to Socotra, and made the trip possible.

Watching him climb is like watching a vertical chess match, as he plots out his moves in advance to overcome his adversary. “I compete for myself. My competition is against the rock, not against the other climbers. It is an intensely personal competition.” He claims that his success in climbing is due to his ability to move his body creatively and his mental strength.

He opened seven routes in his ten days in Yemen, the most notable being on the tropical island paradise of Socotra. The cave, whose name is still a subject of debate, and a five pitch route up the side of the cliff of Ar-Har that has been affectionately titled “Yalla Habibi!”

“In Socotra, we’ve really only seen less than 10 percent of the possibilities, and of this small percentage, there is already huge potential.” And we’ve only explored about 1 percent of Yemen, but through the pictures we’ve studied, I’d say that the potential for Yemen to be a climbing destination is huge.”