As the title says, I have recently been given a couple of days off scuba diving and as Jess was off climbing I thought I would join her! We headed to Hvar on the ferry, I managed to sleep throughout the whole journey, and on arrival we managed to find Olivia, who Jess had met... Continue Reading →
We were lucky enough to finally get Climbing again after a month off! We headed down to Weymouth to celebrate the wedding of George and Nicky, and lucky enough for both them and us, the weather gods were shining upon us! After the wedding we decided to stay in the area and climb as the... Continue Reading →
This is where we started the Climbing trip nearly a year ago, so it only seems fair that this would be where it ended. As ever when I arrive in Font I am immediately fond of the place, pulling down rugged roads, avoiding potholes and ending up at a car park surrounded by nothing but... Continue Reading →
The day after our ski touring adventure in Chamonix, we set off in the direction of home, and decided that we would pop into the Bourgogne region, as there was a bit of climbing there that we could get done before dropping Colin off at Paris Airport. We pulled into Saffres that has a basic... Continue Reading →
In my last post I described our trip to Montserrat, where we walked and climbed in the mountains above the Monastery. The views in this place were out of this world, towers of rock stood atop of a huge mound, and from a distance it looks like a hedgehog. We enjoyed our time there, although... Continue Reading →
I have not written a diary style blog post for a while now, mainly as there has been very little to write about, and rather than write a post for the sake of it, I thought it best to wait until something worthwhile happened! We headed north after Las Fallas, in the general direction of... Continue Reading →
This is the most common question we have been asked when we meet friends, each time it is asked, we mumble for a while between ourselves as we try to break down ten months of continuous travel, adventure and van life. It’s too difficult to pick one experience that has outdone the others, as... Continue Reading →
Many years ago, I looked into flights to Valencia with a plan to visit during the Las Fallas festival weekend, as it turned out my ideals were scuppered by super high prices of flights and accommodation. At the time I was travelling a fair bit in between work and this was right up my street,... Continue Reading →
When we left Costa Blanca at the end of January, it was after a months solid climbing. We had climbed so much that I even got to the point that I'd had enough of climbing and needed some time off. The casualty of this was a route called El Dorado, one of the top fifty... Continue Reading →
Let's start with a little moan, the bloody weather! I mean what the hell? I'm in Spain, and it's starting to feel like I'm still in England! Anyway moan over! We left Portugal in horrendous rain, and in two days we made it to a small town just on the outskirts of Madrid, called El... Continue Reading →
When we arrived in Portugal, we had plans to spend a couple of weeks there following the coast up to Lisbon, climbing as we went. As things turned out we only managed a couple of days on rock and for the rest, rain stopped play. We had a long drive from a service stop just... Continue Reading →
After spending a couple of days parked up on the beach at Bolonia, I decided that I was rested enough to have another days climbing… this later proved to be wrong! We got up earlier than usual, as we knew we wanted to make the most of the day ahead. Luckily we had managed to... Continue Reading →
This area first arrived on my radar when looking for sports climbing in the area. One of the online forums mentioned this El Helechal and it's great bouldering potential. All I could find in the form of topo’s was higher graded routes, most of which were out of my grades, however I still thought a... Continue Reading →
This is a tiny post more for information rather than telling a story of what I have done, although I'm sure there will be a little in there! We parked at the Aire that is located at the top of the town (36.445959, -5.278203), where we camped, it is quite comfortable and has water, waste and... Continue Reading →
We have had another week or so of play in El Chorro, and to be honest it's a week more than we expected when we first arrived. On our first week we only managed to climb a few single pitch routes due to a lack of a guidebook, and most of these were in poor... Continue Reading →
So it's the end of our first week in El Chorro, and the heavens have opened, leaving me with some time to write up a blog post of what we have been up to so far. In all honesty this first week has been a little up and down. First of all we drove close... Continue Reading →
We have continued our climbing tour through Costa Blanca, with a trip to a crag called Sax, again we were chasing top fifty and three stared routes from the Rockfax book. Sax had a lot of good routes, and looked like a great place to climb although the guidebook did say that the venue was... Continue Reading →
After what was a great day out on Toix the day before, we were to have a trying day on Mascarat. We woke up to an overcast day, and decided that a trip into Calpe for some supplies would give us time to gauge what the weather was doing. After this little jaunt the weather... Continue Reading →
The adventures in Costa Blanca just continue to come. Following on from our success on Parle, a sea cliff/cave climb, that tested our ability to the max, we thought we’d head north and take on another time and again recommended climb, Sonjannika at Morro Falgui. I initially found out about this route when searching for... Continue Reading →
We have been in Costa Blanca for the better part of two weeks and have so far had an absolute blast! My previous two posts have already highlighted some of the fantastic adventures that we have experienced here, such as the Bernia ridge, various quality single pitch crags, climbing on Toix on Christmas Day and... Continue Reading →
There have been some highlights on this trip for me and this day is another to go on that list. I'm not sure why, but this ridge has been on my wantlist for a while, I can't even remember where I first read about it, although at some point it crossed my path and ever... Continue Reading →
For near seven months we have been able to live in our van rent free, we have wild camped for this entire time! However we felt like we would treat ourselves to some normality over the Christmas period, and booked two nights at the orange house. We drove for just short of seven hours from... Continue Reading →
It feels like half the time, which can only be a good thing! When we set out we planned on a years trip and so far it is all going to plan. Of course there have been a few problems on the way ( no one mention getting stuck and wedging the van under a... Continue Reading →
So the last week or so has been both good and bad, mostly in terms of the weather. As an outdoor trip, we are constantly relying on the weather to show its hand and then we can get on with things or just chill out for the day. As it turns out, since we went... Continue Reading →
Another fine day, another fine climb, and another horrid descent. This is a simple way to sum up our second multipitch route in Croatia. We started later than planned, although we were pretty sure we could get up and down in the time left. This route was called Stargate and was further along the face... Continue Reading →
Finally the weather seems to be improving for a time and we are trying to make the most if it. The first afternoon of good ish weather we headed up to the crag near Split as we were parked in town. It's weird that for days all I have wanted to do is climb and... Continue Reading →
I have already reviewed my first week in Croatia, and although it has not gone to plan as far as the climbing/weather is concerned, we have still made the best of the time we have had here. The same has to be said of our second week we have been hampered by bad weather and... Continue Reading →
We drove into Croatia at night after a long day of freeloading wifi and power at the Bled tourist office, as jess has work, its only fair to say how good the office is and the information we received from the staff was above and beyond all other tourism offices we have use on this... Continue Reading →
In all honesty this second outing to the Dolomites has been one long hard week of fun! In eight days we have had seven of them out in the mountains, with one off in the middle, my body is feeling sore, but it has been worth it. Last time I left the area feeling disappointed... Continue Reading →
This is one of the classic Via Ferrata in the Dolomites, add to this fact that there is a bridge, we just had to have a go! Sometimes classic means ruined by the passage and polish of many climbers and although it did have lots of polish the route, it was still a really good... Continue Reading →
This climb was our fourth day on the bounce and it's fair to say I am feeling a little bit fragile after it all, it's time for a day off, however before that I will write a short piece on this climb. It's fair to say that the great weather we are having is the... Continue Reading →
Finally we have made it back to the mountains, oh how much I have missed being here! It sounds weird to have been travelling, climbing and diving across Italy and Sardinia, and the whole time I felt like there was something missing, and I've not realised it was this, hills, mountains, towering rock faces, amazing... Continue Reading →
So far this trip we have climbed, a lot, however our stint up the west coast of Sardinia resulted in more sunbathing than climbing. In all honesty the most climbing that we did was at Masua, and that was three single pitches, so not exactly pushing ourselves… that said, this part of the trip has... Continue Reading →
Following on from the last post where we have finally been scuba diving on the Isola die Cavoli near Villasimius, we found some free parking just down the road from the port and proceeded to spend a couple of nights there. It was a lovely location, although we were always on edge, with the fear... Continue Reading →
As I said in my previous post we made an on the spot decision to head to Sardinia after watching a video on Facebook. It was was literally 24 hours from driving to the Slovenia border to turning around and being on a boat to Sardinia. This is one of the great things about being... Continue Reading →
Whilst climbing on the South Arête of Sass de Stria, we could see in the distance a skyline broken by a hedge hog effect of rock. Sticking out in all angles and all shapes and sizes was the Cinque Torri (the five towers). This was one of the places on my climbing hit list in... Continue Reading →
We knew on completing our climb on the Vajolet Towers that the weather was changing for the worse! As it turned out, we moved to a new location, Canazai, which had a parking bay on the other side of town that had running water, toilets and bins, all useful when stopping somewhere! As I said,... Continue Reading →
We have been planning on getting to the Dolomites for quite a few months now, and finally we are here. Another outdoor playground to set out on a bunch of adventures! First off we have started the trip in the Catinaccio area, also known as the Rosegarten area. Local legend say that Catinaccio was ruled... Continue Reading →
Now that we have left Chamonix we seem to be on the move a little more, once again this trip will be mobile and we will be travelling to various new places, although where exactly we don't know yet as we are making it up a little, rather than sticking to a rigid itinerary. That... Continue Reading →
Before we left on this trip, I obviously did a lot of searching for van and vanlife, related things, as this is what we were setting out to do, and the internet can be full of useful information if you look in the right places. However, it is also filled with a lot of crap,... Continue Reading →
Many years ago, I was climbing in North Wales and me and my partner decided to pop into Plas Y Brenin as there is a bar there and an adventure presentation/talk on the Alps. Whilst enjoying a pint of local ale I watched and listened as the presenter (an instructor at the centre) talked through... Continue Reading →
By Christ the weather has been a big load of manure for a few days, and this time it’s was wet, cold and just plain horrible for days on end. As we are tighter than tight, we can very rarely do anything, as everything here costs money, so we spent a good period of time... Continue Reading →
It must appear to some that each of these climbs/posts are starting to roll into one another, however this could not be further from the truth. Each of these experiences is unique to one another. Sure, there are similarities, but each adventure has its own personalities, its own take on a similar story, and todays... Continue Reading →
In my last post In Descent Proposal, Voie Ravanel (D, 5b), Pointes de Bayere, I finished by mentioning that the descent had been hampered somewhat by a pain in my ankle. Although this pain was not so acute to stop, it was enough to keep me aware that it might get worse, especially on the scree... Continue Reading →
For a while now I have moaned about the weather here in Cham, it’s been okay, however I’ve always wanted it to be better! So the other day we got a window of what looked like good weather and we were going to take it! I started looking into routes in the mid mountains, as... Continue Reading →
We have been based in Chamonix for the best part of a month and have so far had some great adventures in the mountains. That said, there have often been down days where rest is required and there have been as many, if not more, bad weather days where restlessness is acquired. The past few... Continue Reading →
As the title says this is a rematch against this route as a few weeks ago, both Jess and me retreated from the route, the whole story is here, and involved lots of tiredness, rudeness, dysentery and a stuck abseil rope. All in all, its fair to say that we hated that day and did... Continue Reading →
We have had a barren spell of getting into the mountains recently, mostly due to the weather. That’s not to say we have not missed a couple of average days, when getting up at 6am, looking through the curtains and seeing nothing but cloud or rain, and on those days my bed is more inviting.... Continue Reading →
The weather here has been a bit poor recently and has kept us rooted to the valley floor, with rain, wind and cloud. However all this bad weather has enabled me to write a few more blog posts about climbing in the valley that I will publish later. That said, the days of sitting in the... Continue Reading →
Sometimes a post does not need a title, as the name of the climb is so cool! That’s the first thing that drew me to this climb, the second was its vicinity to the Index chair lift, only 20 minutes to walk in, and thirdly was the 6a pitch, as I’m hoping to climb bolts... Continue Reading →
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