Sport Climbing Arco - May 2024

Hey there - My partner and I are going to Italy in May for a wedding on Lake Garda. We were initially thinking we would take a trip to climb in the Dolomites. But we have started looking at Arco, better weather, less snow, and closer to the wedding! 

In a perfect world, we want to climb some multipitch and single pitch sport. Multipitch in the 5.8/5.9 range and single pitch up to 5.11s. We normally climb trad but were thinking of traveling light for the trip and only bringing the sport gear. 

Would take any recommendations for Arco, places to stay, restaurants, and shops! Thanks so much, looking forward to hearing some beta!

Arco is fantastic, but the town literally revolves around climbing and tourism. Because of this, and because it is so compact with so much climbing and so many restaurants, it is really hard to give recommendations.
We’ve been twice, and stayed at Camping Arco both times, which is easy walking distance to town center. However, apartments are abundant and affordable from my understanding. Climbing wise, we’ve done Policromuro/Mason, Nago, Lago di Reina and Belvedere, as well as some other smaller crags I don’t really recall. Belvedere was the worst of the memorable crags, but had the best views, and softest and lowest grades. Policromuro was fantastic, especially at 6c to 7b, but polished.
Get gelato at Marco’s gelato shop. I don’t recall the name, but it is in the center of town, has a climbing motif, and everyone hangs there. 

arco is a great place to climb - soooo many routes and i've not seen any other town that is as climbingcentric.

- we stayed at 'the green one' (airbnb) in dro and loved it for several reasons: friendly people (living on site), inexpensive, roomy, quiet, and an amazing bathroom.

https://www.airbnb.com/rooms/30737248?source_impression_id=p3_1701189419_6ep2v4WK3J64ztcJ  highly recommended!

dro is about 5k north of arco and nowhere near as busy.  if you want to be right in the mix of things, arco would be a better choice and the camping zoo would be the epicenter:

https://campingzoo.it/en/experiences/sport/climbing/

- there are roughly half a dozen climbing stores in town that far exceed or rival anything i've seen in the US in terms of selection and price.  when we're there the dollar and euro were almost even and compared to US pricing everything was amazingly inexpensive.  if i were to go to arco directly (ie not climb elsewhere beforehand) and the dollar/euro was fairly favorable, i'd bring personal gear only and buy a rope and draws there.  to put things in perspective, i bought a 70m edelrid swift protect pro dry 8.9mm for 210euros (missed the 200euro sale a couple of days earlier).  that rope retails for $360 in the US.

- there is an excellent bookstore in town that has guidebooks in italian, english, and german...

- my sense is that may could be a bit warm.  we're there in october and it was quite toasty, to the point where it was too warm to climb most non-shaded, south facing stuff.  fortunately you can find crags with all different aspects (although many are S or SE facing).  we really enjoyed climbing at val lomasone (a bit of a drive, west facing) and la gola (shaded).  a lot of the multi-pitch routes (even the better ones) have significant sections of choss on them.  we found 'selene' to be one of the better ones - https://www.mountainproject.com/route/123219069/selene

- note that you'll probably encounter various degrees of air pollution...

- coming from austria, we found the food to be fair, but can highly recommend the local marzemino ;-)

I would recommend to just take a rope/draws and embrace the European sport climbing/gelato eating lifestyle. Just buy the guidebook while you're there. It's what, 30 bucks? Not much in the grand scheme of flying across the ocean. IMO it's pretty much always worth it versus just scraping by from random posts on MP or whatever random routes people have put on here or TheCrag. With that you can decide what crags would be best based on how you're feeling about grades and the sun (might be hot in May). Like others have said, Arco's a climbing mecca.

A guidebook is a must. If you have to be cheap, at least last time we were there, the city of Arco was giving away free guide book pamphlets at the ubiquitous tourist kiosks. These had Mason/Policromuro, Belvedere and some other super nearby crags. 

regaljay - wrote:

I would recommend to just take a rope/draws and embrace the European sport climbing/gelato eating lifestyle. Just buy the guidebook while you're there. It's what, 30 bucks? Not much in the grand scheme of flying across the ocean. IMO it's pretty much always worth it versus just scraping by from random posts on MP or whatever random routes people have put on here or TheCrag. With that you can decide what crags would be best based on how you're feeling about grades and the sun (might be hot in May). Like others have said, Arco's a climbing mecca.

Oh we are pumped on the Euro gelato life. Can I buy a good guidebook in advance? I just like reading and getting stoked in advance of the trip. Is all the other beta pretty straight forward? I.e approaches / avoiding crowds were possible? Not worried about the heat, were just on a casual trip to sample the excellent climbing (and gelato... like mainly gelato), not trying to limit project anything. 

There is an excellent bilingual Arco guidebook that I ordered online. It is huge with about 10k routes and also covers Lake Malveno. Although approaches tend to be simple, the book, being what it is, is ocassionaly sparse on details, and the Italian to English translations take some figuring out at times.
The only two crags we found crowds at were Belvedere (easy access, gorgeous setting, very meh climbing) and Policromuro, aka Masson (should not be missed, especially at 6c and above). 

Trevor Jones wrote:

Oh we are pumped on the Euro gelato life. Can I buy a good guidebook in advance? I just like reading and getting stoked in advance of the trip. Is all the other beta pretty straight forward? I.e approaches / avoiding crowds were possible? Not worried about the heat, were just on a casual trip to sample the excellent climbing (and gelato... like mainly gelato), not trying to limit project anything. 

you can get the guidebook(s) in advance here: 

https://climb-europe.com/rockclimbingshop/european-rock-climbing-guidebooks/guidebooks-for-italy/arco-and-northeast-italy-rock-climbing-guidebooks.html

i would recommend the arco 'rock' guide vs. the arco 'wall' guides

also note that you may run into surprises - eg nago was closed when we were in arco...

This sounds like it's going to be a great trip!  You'll have to write a real trip report when you get back.

Regarding gelato - I make it a point to eat a gelato every day when I'm in Europe.  As far as I can tell it seems to be the perfect food.

Hey everyone! I got the guide book and found a great place to stay! The stoke is growing for my Arco trip. Few questions, the guide book I got does not really highlight good, moderate multi-pitches. Any suggestions for a casual multi-pitch adventure in the area? Something below 5.10 and between 4 - 6 pitches? 

Also - planning on grabbing a new rope over there, as well as all the clothing and gear goodies that we may find. Any suggestions on what shops to check out while we are there? 

Regina de Lago had some nice moderate multi-pitch sport routes. Colidri has some long slabby affairs.
As for gear shops, there are many in Arco. We found Climbing Village on the main plaza to be outstanding (and cheapish). I think it may have been renamed to “Red Point.”  

Sounds so great!