Tsaranoro Atsimo, Avanà. Between October 1 and 7 Italians Paolo Stoppini, Paolo Tombini, Alberto Zucchetti, and I climbed a new route on the east pillar of Tsaranoro Atsimo. We christened out route Avanà, which in the local language means rainbow. We climbed 10 pitches with difficulties up to 7a+ (5.12a) covering some 500m of vertical gain. We encountered perfect granite along steep blank slabs that we protected by placing a total of 104 bolts—84 for protection and 20 for belays. We climbed ground-up placing bolts using a power drill and drilling from hooks or stances. It took us four days to complete our climb, and it was Stoppini and Zuchetti who did most of the leading. We had many problems with the batteries of our power drill, one of which exploded at one point. It was very difficult to re-charge them, so on our last day, with just one pitch to go, we were forced to carry a 10-pound gas-powered drill up the route. Avanà is a fairly serious route, considering that the bolts are quite distant from each other and there is no natural protection to be found.

Sandro Borini, Italy (translated by Rolando Garibotti)