Devil's Tower, El Matador,
While waiting for this byte intensive page to load with a selection of images from Devil's Tower, you might as well read about it.

It was another long road trip. We finally made it out here, far away from any mainstream crag. Bent, also from Denmark, was skeptical. Understandably, since he was not a crack climber. And didn't want to become a crack climber, either. I, on the other hand, was totally fired up, having been here before and knew how awesome it was. Bad mix. An already strained relationship got more tense.
We did a slew of classics and I felt ready for El Matador, a route I had eyed for some time. I had never on sighted anything that hard, but felt strong and very psyched. About this time Bent declared he was ready to take off. Our next stop was supposed to be Montreal, where he knew a woman that needed further exploration.
"Time to go", he exclaimed in his usual long winded manner. I desperately needed a rest day before El Matador, but couldn't see us sitting in the barren, sun drenched field that served as the free climber's campground for 36 hrs, with nothing to occupy us. What to do? I was in the best shape ever. Leaving was not an option.
I remembered reading somewhere about a place called the Needles in nearby South Dakota. Today, after Verm and the bouldering renaissance have left its permanent mark on the climbing community, everybody knows the area. Especially due to the Thimble, John Gill's high ball.
But my memory was of face climbing. Lots of it, I recalled. Bent loved that. An ardent performer in the discipline, he was eventually persuaded to go for a couple of days, on the grounds that we returned to the Tower for one more climb. As always it took some lengthy negotiations, sitting in the dark of the car, before an exact agreement was reached.
Off course the Needles was quite different from the grey limestone of Southern France, Bents heralded stomping ground. As we quickly gathered, in the Black Hills you don't just drive up for an afternoon of relaxed cragging. It would take weeks to get the head for leading on sight, to get into the weird rock, manage the substantial run outs or just plain top out on something. Bent was dismayed, but a deal was a deal. After numerous futile attempts to at least reach the first piece of pro on a couple of 5.9's, we hopped back to the Tower. Bent was silent. I felt bad for him.

I did well on El Matador. It is rated 5.10d and to this day it remains the hardest route I've ever on sighted. Thanks, Bent.