It's been an odd summer, let's face it, it's not been rubbish, but we never got that 3 weeks of high pressure I was hoping for. Feeling the need for a proper baking Jen and I headed to Chulilla (for me, the 3rd time in 12 months!).
Late September was hot, 27 degrees, but thankfully the best climbing is in the full shade, and it made for lovely evenings on the balcony. Certainly made a change from the hard groundfrost back in Feb!
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| Las Lamentaciones, imposing from the balcony and best avoided in the summer heat! |
Let me just say this. Chulilla is freakin' awesome.There's a lot more if you can O/S 7c comfortably, however plenty at 7a & 7b also, and probably the 'best' routes I have ever had the pleasure of climbing. We spent most of the time at Chorreras, which translates along the lines of watercourses... Tufas! and Sector Oasis. Chorerras in particular is an amazing crag, 60m high, covered in streaks and tufas, with over 10 full 40m stamina fest 7a-7b's. There's pretty much no point in stars at this place, it's more a matter of opinion, that was the best route I've ever climbed... no
that was!
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| Wall climbing and hanging tufas high on Chorreras |
Full on 40 meter pitches really do make a lot of UK sport look small, and it's daunting at first, but it soon gets less scary, and more fun.
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| Jen onsighting a monster 40m 6b+/c classic at Sector Oasis |
As always, Chulilla was particularly full of interesting people. On the first day we met and climbed with Chris Sharma's 'Schedule Organizer', a chilled American dude called Jeff, and his wife, living in Siurana. A few days later we bumped in to Juan Carlos, a local who loves the climbing livestyle... it was this guy who inspired me to start resoling shoes! He was just as full of banter, crag advice and as encouraging as I remember from my trip with Chavwin last winter. It was great to show him my handywork and also to see his prototype full shoes in action, handmade & they look great.
Finally we bumped in to some Germans, who were great to hang out with, one's from Berlin. More on the to come.
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| Daniel enjoying the shade of Chorreras |
On our rest day we headed over to Charco Azul, an amazing blue gorge which was great for a swim and a chill.....
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| El Charco Azul, great for a swim (or a DWS slackline, spot the red highline if you can!!) |
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| Chulilla's answer to Chorro's Camino Del Ray.... Calmino Del Jen. |
One final thing. We went in the 3rd week of September. Never do this!!! Everything in the whole area is pretty much closed (shops, restaurants, pubs) 3rd & 4th week of Sept. Luckily we were in self catering and got by just about fine! :-)
Here's the ticklist.
