The Story of My Life Pt 1: Here and Now

Victor Baudrand
3 min readJan 15, 2021

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Quebec City, Rock Climbing, Salt Lake City, France, and Blogging.

My story starts in Quebec City, Canada, where I was born. My mother was also born in Quebec City Canada and my Father from France, so I grew up naturally speaking French at home. As a young kid, I constantly moved around the world for my parents’ work. Living in places like Africa and Thailand was amazing but my parents who had been immersed in climbing in their young adult life began to miss the adventures that the mountains provided.

Second place finish at my first climbing competition at a small gym in Northern Thailand.

In 2011 we moved to Utah and we fell in love with the climbing, biking, and skiing that the mountains provided so close to home. All through living in international countries we always climbed in local gyms as a fun family activity, so when we moved to Salt Lake City, Utah, where I immediately joined the Momentum Competitive climbing team.

What was once just a fun activity, soon grew to be an addictive passion that has shaped who I am today. For the last 5 years, I have been competing in climbing competitions in the United States, like the USA climbing competition series for youth, along with the Canadian circuit for sport climbing and bouldering. This past three years I have qualified for the Canadian National youth team and represented Canada in finals at the Youth World Championships in Innsbrook Austria and Moscow Russia which has been a long-time goal of mine.

2018 Youth World Championships final in Moscow. Go Canada!

Although climbing competitions are a crucial part of my climbing life, recently outdoor climbing has been the majority of my focus, in combination with finishing high school. I love the process of climbing difficult routes, but being able to share the mountains and crags with friends and people who are as passionate about the sport is equally gratifying.

The global pandemic has affected how our lives operate, with online school being an option, I have used this opportunity to get ahead and finish high school! With that being said with the help of my father’s French citizenship I have obtained a French passport which has allowed me to begin my adventure through France during this current Pandemic.

I arrived in Paris only four days ago, and life has not ceased to stop throwing wonderful French pastries at me. I have lots of plans and goals for my time in France. Being consistent with writing these blog posts is one of them, another is eating as many baguettes as I possibly can, and lastly is to improve my climbing and expand my knowledge on the infamous French climbing culture.

These blog posts will share everything that I have done during my trip, as well as my experiences with foods, climbing areas and gyms, people, different socioeconomic classes, architecture, and the effects of the current pandemic.

This is a travel guide created by a masked French Canadian climber who lives in American. discovering all of the intricacies of France. While I believe that paving your own adventures is important, a little help from someone who has already been there can go a long way. I hope people and climbers are entertained by the highlights of my stories and adventures as a masked American traveling and discovering all of the intricacies of France.

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Victor Baudrand

I’m an 18-year-old from the US, currently living and traveling through France to pursue competitive rock climbing, and taste lots of delectable French pastries.