Spain with non climbing family
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I am looking for experiences/ advice others have about family climbing trips to Spain. I am planning on taking a trip there with my wife and two kids (age 3 and 7 at the time of the trip) during October, November, and half of December this year. |
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I recomend renting an apartment in Barcelona. There is plenty of stuff for the family to do, a great culture and world clases climbing at the near by Montserat. |
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If you can manage splitting time it would be great to do Mallorca for October then move to Barcelona for the rest. The island is a magical place and you'd find plenty of partners in October. |
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We visited Spain last year at the end of March. We visited Calpe, which has a bunch of villas nearby that you can rent, and at least 15 different climbing areas of all abilities. Rent was dirt cheap, probably more so now with the strong dollar. |
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What kind of vibe are you looking for as far as where you stay? Soller on Mallorca is just unbelievably charming, but if you're looking for world class culture and shopping you'll find Mallorca pretty sleepy. Soller isn't the prime location for a climber, but it made me super psyched to feel like the non climbers were well set up and was happy to do the extra driving that resulted from being there. Plenty of nice hiking and walking out of Soller also. I don't know what the weather will be like in Mallorca then, we were there in April and it was mostly perfect climbing weather. |
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Optimistic wrote:What kind of vibe are you looking for as far as where you stay? Soller on Mallorca is just unbelievably charming, but if you're looking for world class culture and shopping you'll find Mallorca pretty sleepy. Soller isn't the prime location for a climber, but it made me super psyched to feel like the non climbers were well set up and was happy to do the extra driving that resulted from being there. Plenty of nice hiking and walking out of Soller also. I don't know what the weather will be like in Mallorca then, we were there in April and it was mostly perfect climbing weather. We did vrbo or something similar and have done similar things elsewhere and always been glad we did. Usually a lot more comfortable for the same or less money as a hotel, especially with kids where separate rooms are so handy. I'd recommend our specific house except we had a big group and the place slept 10 or something, a bit overkill for you! Hard to miss in Spain though, awesome! I've heard some nice things about Costa Verde since you mentioned Galicia, but I think weather could be iffy then... Have fun! DavidI agree completely, Soller is an amazing place. |
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Thanks for the replies. My wife actually spent some time in Soller and she has mentioned how nice it was. We are thinking about there verses Porto Colom or Porto Cristo as they are closer to more of the psicobloc stuff and I feel like I could just solo easier routes if partners became an issue. I don't know about the idea of finding climbing partners in Soller, which makes me apprehensive about being there. I really want to check out Fraguel, and it looks like Soller is really close to that area. Does anyone have any experience with meeting locals to climb with around the Soller area or hooking up with other travelling climbers? Thanks again. |
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Hi Tom, |
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Tom Rangitsch wrote:Thanks for the replies. My wife actually spent some time in Soller and she has mentioned how nice it was. We are thinking about there verses Porto Colom or Porto Cristo as they are closer to more of the psicobloc stuff and I feel like I could just solo easier routes if partners became an issue. I don't know about the idea of finding climbing partners in Soller, which makes me apprehensive about being there. I really want to check out Fraguel, and it looks like Soller is really close to that area. Does anyone have any experience with meeting locals to climb with around the Soller area or hooking up with other travelling climbers? Thanks again.I struck up conversations with a few folks at the crags (mostly non-Spaniards were who we saw) but I never saw a place where there was a sort of climbing scene in any of the towns. Definitely not Soller. Personally I'd use online (here plus Ukclimbing) for that, the climbing is very spread out and most of it quite rural. Jose captures it well: Spain is just awesome...seemed sometimes to us like a USA worth of climbing (or more?) , but without all the intervening flat parts in between. |