Sunday 2 February 2014

El Realet and the Penon de Ifach

 
With all the trainee's having gained the knowledge they needed to go climbing themselves we gave them the chance for some indepence at the crag and had a couple of days to go and play ourselves. Day one we embarked on a traverse of El Realet, a grade 4 knife edge ridge, which was fantastic all the way, good scrambling, exposure and a few abseils. The only complaint was the spiky spanish bush whacking we had to do at both the start and finish of the day. I don't think this ridge see's much traffic. We completed this in half the guide book time so enjoyed relaxing with an ice cream in the afternoon.
Day two was a trip to the Penon de Ifach, a superb chunk of rock which protudes from the sea at Calpe. I had climbed on this a few times before but for me this was a new route, and a guide book top 50 route. Diedro USBA. Fantastic route, with great climbing exposure and variety. I throughly recommend it. For Liam this was his first big route so well done to him for keeping his head together in such an exposed situation. What a fantastic end to a brilliant Spanish rock climbing trip. Back to reality now in wild and windy Scotland.
 
 
Me entering the knife edge section.
 
 



Views along the ridge


Stephen leading the way for Liam yet another exposed section.
 


Day two on Diedro UBSA, stephen with a sore ankle recently sprained and trying to recover. This is him at the second belay before we had to say our fair wells and low him off. We continued as a three.

Liam following up the steep by jug filled second pitch.

Dance on stances as we made sure we had the essentials (i.e lunch) out of Stephens bag before we lowered him off.


Short abseil into the final part of the route. Liam feeling slightly exposed at this point.
Josh having found yet another knee bar giving a hands free wave on the final pitch.

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