Wednesday 22 February 2017

Climbing at Reconco, Costa Blanca, Spain

The day broke with a hazy sunrise...



But the sun soon found its strength and we took another walk along the deserted beach to stretch our legs after breakfast. The sand is immaculate - mainly because a team of cleaners walk the length of it daily, with a tractor and rake it to pick up anything that got washed up over night! We almost felt bad putting footprints on it! Clare even found something to climb along the way. 



Around midday, we sped out of town in our 'caffe latte' Fiat Panda, heading for the cliffs of Reconco. It's a brand new car with only 600km on the clock, but the engine was straining to reach 70mph. I think it's designed more for shoppers. In about 40 minutes, we were parked up and hiking uphill to the base of the deserted crag.

 

Being inland, we had much different views today. The area is very barren and dry. The haze remained all day, so the sun was never baking us, but it was still warm enough for t-shirts, even though a slight breeze was blowing.

 

The limestone climbing was excellent. Long pitches, very generous bolting and flowy moves between sharp water worn pockets all made for a very enjoyable day. And we had the crag to ourselves too, so there was never any pressure to move on. In fact we'd stop for a sunbath and some food between each climb - we are on holiday afterall!



Most of the routes we did were nice and long too at about 35m in length. You really could get zoned in on the climbing and enjoy some sustained movement. On some routes we used all 14 quickdraws that we'd brought. Most of the climbs even had a krab to lower down on, so we didn't even have to expend any time or effort re-threading the ropes.

 

On the way home, we stopped off at a big supermarket and stocked up on fine foods and a nice bottle of Rioja, before getting home for showers and a much needed big feed.

Costa Blanca - Reconco - Main Cliff:
- Espolon Aureli 4+,5**
- Pata Chula 5+**
- Desconeguda 5***
- Sexta 6a**
- La Llagrima 6a***

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