Tuesday 21 February 2017

Climbing at Sella, Costa Blanca

Waking up and seeing this from bed was a pretty cool way to start the day... Clare really stuck gold when she booked this apartment - especially as it's cheaper than camping!



Made a slow and luxuriously leisurely start of things, before walking onto the beach and dipping our toes in the sea. It was quite windy, but nice and warm, but not warm enough for us to want to swim! The sand was hot to stand on though. 

 

We're staying north of Alicante in a huge tower block of appartments. In one direction is the vast expanse of ocean, and in the other, a vast expanse of buildings. In between is a long beach. Today it was deserted, but in summer it must be jam packed. 

 

Some good friends of our happen to be nearby climbing. Purely by chance, they'd spotted that we were heading to Spain on Facebook - a few texts later and we realised that we were basically in the same place, so we drove up to the climbing area in Sella to say hi!

 

About eight or nine years ago, I actually ran a rock climbing course here, but I have absolutely no recollection of the place. (Why is this?!). About a month ago, there were huge floods here (and even snow!) and some very bad land slides. Driving up the hillside to Sella, it was clear that the place was in a mess. Rocks and mud had been bulldozed away, so that a path through, along the road, could be made as a single track. Soon enough, we found our friends and enjoyed a fantastic days climbing. 

 

We climbed a few of the classic routes, included a three pitch one. The sun shone, we wore t-shirts and the rock was warm to touch. And in between climbs we caught up on each other's news. Utterly brilliant. 

 

At the end of the day, we still had much to talk about so we went to the small town of Finistrat, where the guys were staying. We left the hire car on the edge of town as we didn't dare drive on the narrow streets, then took a walk in and out of various alleyways, past the old church, down some steps, until we found a bar. I got a round of drinks in for less than the price of one drink at Manchester Airport!

 

Costa Blanca - Sella - Sector Marion:
- Cartujal, 5+***
- Marion, 5,4+,5***
- Cul de Sac, 5,5+**
- Prussik, 5+**

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