Highline: slackline, sky, soul, mountains

You can see them hanging in the Dolomites around Lago di Misura. Or in frontal split on a slack towards Monte Piana. The tapes on which they walk are only 25 millimeters wide. Below, 600 m of vacuum.

The ideal situation to experience an asana, certainly the connection with everything feels. The immortal giants around, the mountains, the high sky that assists and observes, the nature that breathes everywhere. Not only yogic practice, but also songs, sounds, drums, instruments, melodies.

Some call them vacuum surfers, other highliners . Devotees to the void. At rest on a hammock in nothingness. To play the didgeridoo on the peak.

They all met in 2012 at the first edition of their world gathering. Eran 70. This year, 200 fearless souls arrived at the meeting on Monte Piana (2, 324 m). The most "good in class" so far? Théo Sanson, 26, who at Cirque de Baume-les-Messieurs, not far from Lyon, walked 150 meters of tape.

What does yoga have to do with it? It is propaedeutic to the discipline, it makes you enter into fear, you look at it, you breathe inside it, you breathe it inside. He trains not only the physical but also the ability to concentrate , working directly on breathing, the most powerful tool we have .

Yoga in the mountains, the benefits

Did you feel like joining us at next year's meeting? Let's start with a few tips on costs: a slackline is 2, at most 3 euros per meter. Among other expenses: two hoists (600 euros), a dozen carabiners (250 euros), the safety rope (60 euros for 150 m).

Other technical details : A meter of polyester webbing weighs about 70 grams against those in dyneema (good for the trickline) which weigh about half. Places of worship ? The Verdon Gorges in France or the Yosemite park in California.

Look for shots that portray Armin Holzer walking on the Rainbow, 51 meters long, while behind from the scenography they make the Monte Cristallo (3, 221 m) and the Sorapiss Group (3, 205 m the Point). Holzer is also at the head of a record: there are no news of tapes set up at higher altitudes than that which he placed at 5, 000 meters above sea level for a 21-meter course on Mount Muztagata, China.

Another record, this time of longline and not of altitude? The 494 meters long slack traveled in May 2012 by the Californian Jerry Miszewski. There are also ropes suspended in the water, as in the case of the primacy of Michael Kemeter, with 222 meters.

If you look for videos of Reinhard Kleindl you will appreciate the Austrian that goes from one skyscraper to another, yes, but these fearless ones go away in the peace of the mountains. Aldo Vamassoi, an Italian highliner explains: "The more you get used to, the less you concentrate on what you (don't) have under you. At a certain point you also get to sing". The hammocks on which they rest (often found also in 17 in one) are made with the same material as the parachutes.

The secret ambition of a highliner ? Connect peaks and towers never joined together before, with a rope. One could say that the highline is a kind of hypertext version of traditional mountaineering.

Meanwhile, we invite you to look at some photos (Album of hares), you will find highliners who surf or make the famous kneeling (with the rope behind the knee, the arms left as birds). And we suggest you take the opportunity of reading this article just to think of making friends with any void you live in ... you've never seen it become an opportunity for spiritual and material fulfillment.