Banff Mountain Film Festival Brevard: Pura Vida Adventures

Pura Vida Adventures is offering both climbing and canyoneering courses the weekend of the Brevard showing of the Banff Mountain Film Festival on March 17th and 18th. Experience Adventure with Pura Vida by day and watch the adventures of the fil festival by night. All courses are open enrollment and start at 8:30 am each day.

2 Day Rock Climbing Course, 3/17/12-3/18/12, Cost $275 a person

This course is designed to provide you with competence and confidence on ropes basic rock climbing skills. It covers all skills beginning climbers shoul learn including proper gear and how it should be rigged, belaying and rappelling techniques, knots, prussic knots, and climbing techniques.The second day goes into natural and artificial anchor building for top rope set up. This program also allows for a sufficient amount of climbing time to gain additional climbing experience.

American Canyoneering Academy
3 Day Technical Canyoneering Course 3/16/12-3/18/12 Cost $350 a person
This program includes proper rappelling technique, basic knots and their application for canyoneering, ascending techniques, basic haul systems, canyoneering movement and an adventure canyoneering trip. . In addition it includes an additional day of practicing canyoneering skills along cliffsides at a dry site.

American Canyoneering Academy 2 day Technical Canyoneering Course 3/17/12-3/18/12 Cost $275 a person
This program includes proper rappelling technique, basic knots and their application for canyoneering, ascending techniques, basic haul systems, canyoneering movement and an adventure canyoneering trip. Includes an Adventure Canyoneering Trip.
For more info or to register for any of these courses email contact@pvadventures.com or call 772-579-0005
Canyon Instructor, Joe Moerschbaecher is certified through the American Canyon Guide Assoc.
Pura Vida Adventures is accredited by the American Canyoneering Academy

November Instructional programs with Pura Vida Adventures

Pura Vida will be offering two open enrollment instructional programs this Nov. The first Technical Canyoneering for beginners will be held Nov. 12 and 13 and the following week Nov. 19th and 20th will be an intro to rock climbing course. Cost for each course is $300 if you register for both courses the total cost is then $500 saving you $100. All equipment will be provided for both courses. Programs are limited to the first six participants. Read below for more details about each course.

Canyoneering: Technical Canyoneering for beginners, Nov. 12th and 13th. This course will focus on skills and techniques used in a canyon environment. The course will focus on rope skills and rigging, in addition we will discuss canyon movement, the canyon rating system, and canyon equipment. Cost: $300 a person. More details available here
http://www.pvadventures.com/Canyoneering/index.html

Intro to Rock Climbing for beginners, Nov. 19th and 20th. This 2 day class is designed for participants who have never climbed but want to learn how, as well as people who have climbed but want to become more independent so that they can climb on their own. Topics include: Climbing movement, proper belaying and rappelling technique, anchor building.

This course is designed to provide you with competence and confidence on ropes basic rock climbing skills. It covers all skills beginning climbers shoul learn including proper gear and how it should be rigged, belaying and rappelling techniques, knots, prussic knots, and climbing techniques.The second day goes into natural and artificial anchor building for top rope set up. This program also allows for a sufficient amount of climbing time to gain additional climbing experience.

Please contact us at contact@pvadventures.com or 772-579-0005 for further questions on the courses or to reserve a spot.

American Canyoneering Course in Puerto Rico

Pura Vida Adventures' canyoneering guide Joe Moerschbaecher recently returned from an American Canyoneering Association Canyon Leader Course in Puerto Rico.

The course included 4 days of canyoneering instruction including techniques, rescue and rigging.

Days 5 and 6 of the course included continuing instruction and the canyon leader exam.

During the exam participants were timed in their ability to ascend a rope pass a knot and continue ascending the rope then descend the rope pass a knot and continue descending the rope. The second timed portion of the exam consisted of rigging a releasable system rappelling a client part way down then converting to a lowering system. After converting to a lower participants then had to convert to a 3:1 haul system followed by their choice of a complex 5:1 or compound 6:1 haul system. This first portion of the exam was the objective portion looking at times for completeing the taskS and mistakes made along the way.

The second day of the exam was more subjective and looked at how participants operated and applied the systems learned in a canyon. During this portion of the exam participants rigged releasable rappels, guided rappels, ascended and rappelled ropes, practiced pot hole escapes, and various other techniques.

The course was taught by American Canyoneering Association founder, Rich Carlson.

During the course Rich emphasized minimizing the gear needed in a canyon by carrying the most multifunctional pieces of equipment possible. Some of the new pieces of equipment Rich introduced to participants included the Purcell Prussik and VT Prussik.

Pura Vida Adventures owner, Joe Moerschbaecher was very pleased with the training stating, "Rich Carlson and the American Canyoneering Association does a top notch job in canyoneering instruction covering all the issues canyoneering participants and guides may encounter in a canyon." Pura Vida Adventures will be sure to take many of the principles and techniques learned in the course and apply them in both our guided canyoneering trips and instructional courses.

Joe's training with the American Canyoneering Association (ACA) will not end here in Jan. he is headed to Phoenix Arizona to continue working on his canyon guide certification through the ACA.