after tearfull huggs goodbuy we finaly are set on on the road heading to where ever we fancy. the destination dover. we settle down to drive and the miles fly by and soon we're there. the ferry over just a quick then hurray were in france. a quick 100 miles and were pulled over preparing our home for the night.
03 jan monday - font
arrive in font to find all is very damp try a few problems but finding not very psyched almost get "jet set" but cant quite make the distance on the last dyno. check forecast, rain for the next week. decide to sack off france and head to spain and the sun, distance to go 750 miles. quick shower + top up the water and were on our way, get a good few hours driving in then time for some lunch. then off for another driving stint start getting higher and are greeted by many snow flurries, some quite heavy. getting a bit tired so stop for a coffee and a stretch. feeling loads better we continue then i am abandoned by my passanger who decided to go to bed :( as we still have 600 miles left and im super awake decide to push on and get some quality singing to radio time in whilst eating up the miles. distance to go 480 miles.
04 jan tuesday - somewhere in france
wake up to find it bitter cold at -6 get the heating fired up and go and stretch legs in car park, the water tank has been dripping and we have an iceicle from the tarmac to the bottom of the van, 480 miles to go. another epic days driving with the welcome break of finding a service station where we can fill up water and empty waste a good shower is welcome. all filled up we continue through france towards barcellona
passing into spain we're well happy our 3rd day of driving is heading to an end. we pass barcellona and head towards llieda looking for a place to stay passing 2 truck stops with no spaces we venture further, totaly knackered we find a place to stop and quickly get to bed.
distance travelled 1770 kilometres or 1100 miles in old money.
05 jan wednesday - St Llorenc de Montgai 2nd day in spain
woke to the sound of a really noisey truck parking next to us and leaving the engine running for ages, thanks for that. this has been the worst nights sleep for ages loads of road noise and really knacked from the 400+ miles of driving the day before leaves us with only 55 miles to go to our destination.
1 hour later and were there looking up at towering orange and grey walls, pretty phyched to climb. feeling super achey and tired from the traveling proceed to get spanked and shown that we need to rest before trying anything hard. my arms seem to have got massivley pumped from driving for 3 days and my back is silly achey rubbish, easy day tomorrow and then on to something hard
have a walk around in the afternoon and visit the twin caves on the hillside they look emense 45-50% over hangs for 15 metres at least looks so good, i have my eye on
Patiasso al pallaso which at 7c+ looks do able. seems to be a line of what looks to be big ish holds for around 12 metres of 50 degree roof. lets see what happens. really cool photo of it in the lleida book page 63.
highlight of the day finding prickley pears and watching lucy try to pick one :) theyre not called that for no reason
06 jan thursday - St Llorenc de Montgai 3rd day in spain
had a wicked day today woke up to an amazing display of colours in the sky coming in from the end of the valley, took some photos and watched the thin whispy clouds wind there way up the river between the glowing orange rocks.
had a little cycle through the village of st lorrenze de montgai was a good wakeup.
decided a multi pitch climb was the order for the day and proceded to start up Gabriele a 140 m 6 pitch VI+ ? strange uiaa grades, this provided a pretty epic day with very run out bolting and getting lost and doing a pitch on another significantly hard route with the worst bolting ever, clip a good bolt go up 3-4 metres clip a rusty peg, look for the next bolt cant see it, continue up anyway I'll find it at some stage, get up 5 metres look for it ooh yeah there it is another 4 metres up and 2 to the side. scaryist runout ever. figure out thanks to someone on the road shouting at us that this isnt the correct route, gee thanks i figured it wasnt a 5/6a as was bloody terrifing. absailed down and found the correct route 2 nice close bolts to start followed by a 7 meter un protected traverse to the next bolt brilliant well done to lucy for her sterling effort in following this one. fairly straight forward from this to the top with one particularly memorable belay from a small ledge 120 metres up with the most amazing view, all in all a very memorable day, back to the van 5 hours after starting feeling knackered and starving thinking next time we would look where the route goes a bit better :)
decided to check into a camp site and have a proper shower and chillout for the evening, had our dinner sitting out the front of the van looking at the stars in total silence its so nice.
07 jan friday - St Llorenc de Montgai 4th day in spain
woke up today feeling super warm went for a wander and a nice long shower taking advantage of the camp site felt good. the morning is blissfully warm at around 14 degrees. we rush to make sure we can check out in time to find out that check out time is between 5-6 pm brilliant. leaving the van and grabbing the bikes we head a few miles down the road to the inspiring caves of the sector Disbila after a 15 minute uphill slog to get to them we set about warming up for the main event of "Patiasso al pallaso". Tieing in i feel super nervous having never climbed anything this steep or this long its around 50-60 degrees over hanging for around 15 meters. i start off clip the first bolt and head out into the roof first clip goes good then the second then im off. gett back on and try a bit more still feeling well scared i get a few more bolts up till im pumped. i lower back down and look up at the rest of the climb. 2nd go goes well i get past the move that stopped me before and get another clip further then start to feel really scared start faffing then lower off to rest for next go.
2 spanish climbers turn up intersted in the same route so i relax and sit in the sun for half an hour watching their attempt. it turns out that the crux is the very last few meters and then clipping the loweroff. we sit high up on the hill side savouring the view for a while longer, then i tie in for one last go and get upto the 4th clip and then a foot hold breaks and im off falling into nothing. feeling ache and tired i decide to call it a day il be back in a few months when were back up this way, the best part . . .the quickdraws are all in situ to no need to strip the route. hurray for steep cave climbing
back down we hurry back to the camp site and with enough time to scrape in another shower we abuse the generosity of 5pm checkouts.
after 3 days of climbing in a row we decide on a rest day for tomorrow and to head down the coast further to costa blanca. first stop "Gandia" with its tufa encrusted walls. full of climbs of goodness
i write this from a truck stop 60 miles below barcelona our home for the night. having just feasted on pizzas im off over and out, keep safe.
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