It's fair to say that working a five day week leaves you living for the weekend. More often than not I'm overly tired by the time I reach a day off, but I have to force myself to get out at the weekends, otherwise I would be tirelessly working to work, rather than working to... 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 →
At our six month point in the trip I wrote a short review of that time to sum up what we had been up to. So I thought I’d do the same for the second! Each of the things on here have more in depth individual posts, that go into more detail, however this will... Continue Reading →
Every adventure has to end at some point, it’s usually a mixed bag of emotions and ours was no different. We finished our last week city hopping and visiting friends in the Netherlands, Belgium and France, each of which has their own post. By the time we were at the ferry port I was looking... Continue Reading →
We arrived in Amsterdam and managed to get a spot at the Vliegenbos caravan park, our first official night on a campsite in over 11 months on the road, not bad! We were keen to take advantage of the facilities, however we were keener still to get out into Amsterdam and tick off a few... 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 →
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 →
We finished our time in El Escorial, just on the outskirts of Madrid in a hail of rain. The day before we had managed to squeeze in one last boulder session at La Silla De Felipe II, in between rain showers. We climbed for a maximum of an hour before rain stopped play and we... 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 →
I have often sat at home watching other people's travels through social media, often with a huge fear of missing out on all the great adventures that are going on around me! Often it's work or other commitments holding me back, however I'm now happy to say I have been living a great adventure on... Continue Reading →
The afternoon after we had been bouldering, we had a lovely lunch overlooking the bay. We then drove down to Bolonia and had a walk down the beach, we had the whole beach to ourselves, apart from a few cows! We collected some shells and even returned a beached jellyfish to the sea, I'm not... 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 →
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 picked Ricote as a camping spot in our usual way, what's near us? What looks nice? As it turns out Ricote fitted the bill just nicely, although it was a little out of the way. That said it was worth an extra twenty minutes behind the wheel. The actual camper stop/wire is located in... Continue Reading →
As is becoming the usual on this trip, occasionally I accumulate enough things that go wrong and defy the perfect #vanlife perception that I'm able to write a blog post on it. I will also make sure the post has pictures of our van in only the best settings, as who takes a picture of... 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 →
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 →
So far this trip has been amazing, time and again I have experienced and written in this blog just how good of a time I am having. However just recently the trip has took a dip in form. Nothing major has happened, and that's part of the problem… we have had a couple of weeks... Continue Reading →
After leaving Croatia due to cold weather, we thought we would entertain even colder climates in Slovenia, and see how both the van and us would fair. On crossing the border we headed straight for Bled, and stopped at a service station for the night. In Croatia we had already given into the cold at... 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 →
Just as we passed the halfway point of the trip, I had a thought about these van life reality posts and how I may not have much to say from here on in, as it all becomes the same old problems, just in a different light. However that evening was the night of the creep... 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 →
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 →
How did I end up here? A series of decisions and processes have ended up with me living in a van, travelling, climbing and having the best time of my life, for the most part. Outside of the most part is covered in these ‘reality posts’, however I wrote that these would cover the good,... 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 →
As my journey through living full time in a van continues, I thought I would continue to shed light on the lesser advertised realities of my #vanlife experiences. This post just runs through the latest things that have gone wrong and anything that opposes the general perfect Instagram vision of living in a van. Rude... Continue Reading →
So far Slovenia has been a beautiful place, we have only a few places on which to base this opinion, but so far we have had a blast. The classic sights of Bled coupled with some Gorge and waterfall walks have been fantastic, however we still feel the need to itch the climbing addicts within... 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 →
We left Pompeii unceremoniously after the hassle from police for being in our van. We had planned to spend more time there, however this just put us off and we hotfooted it to Rome, where we found a couple of dedicated motorhome parking and service spots in Castel Gandolfo which were free! Oh why does... Continue Reading →
For our final foray in tourism, for the time being, we have visited Florence. Not somewhere I have ever thought of visiting, however Jess wanted to visit as she had heard from friends that it was a beautiful place to visit. I have to admit it was a very picturesque place, even with the crowds... Continue Reading →
The plan for a day trip to mount visuvius was simple, wake up in the morning, follow signs to the car park and then walk to the top, simple! The night before, jess had been doing some work so we needed a McDonald's to use the wifi, by the time this was done it was... Continue Reading →
Our adventures in Sardinia ended with a relaxing day on the beach followed a by the most efficient and relatively comfortable ferry journey to Naples, by relatively comfortable, I mean that me and jess shared a sofa in a corridor for the night, as we saved money by not booking a cabin! We made our... 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 →
As this trip is ongoing I thought I would continue to develop my van life reality posts as things happen and who knows by the end of it I might have shattered the Instagram #vanlife perception. So far on the trip we have travelled from the UK to Venice to Sardinia, this does not seem... 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 →
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 →
After the minor disaster that was the south coast of France, we were keen to move on and turn a new leaf, so we headed into Italia! We knew the Dolies was the next big destination, but the 7 plus hours driving were a little off putting, so we decided on a slight detour to... Continue Reading →
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