New Year's Rock Trip in Catalunya
This year during Christmas we paid just a couple days visit to Lithuania. Barely enough to collect the presents from beneath the Christmas trees. A day in Kaunas, a day in Vilnius and off we fly again! This time to Barcelona for a week long rock trip. A rental car and almost no planning in advance worked out remarkably well.
We reached Oliana quite late at the night of the Boxing day which meant that no camping was working. We had a list of three campings and all of them seemed to be closed. That doesn’t ruin everything however if you have a car! We thought quite optimistically. In the morning we changed our minds - it was quite cold actually. Some coffee and loads of motivation fixed that and early afternoon we were already clipping the draws.
Day #1. Luckily, we had very good weather in Oliana. Climbing with t-shirts on a beautiful sunny day in a sports crag in Spain - what can be better. That adds some enthusiasm for sure. …
The second night we spent at a camping in which we were probably the only guests at that time. I guess the temperatures were not too inviting to sleep in a tent. But oh well, better than a car for sure. Day #2 - Ager - a crag recommended by Vida. A nice and small sector perfect for a day or two. We climbed many easy routes here to collect the mileage.
Day #3 - Santa Linya, Futbolin sector. Getting colder already but very good conditions for climbing. So we both climbed our hardest routes of the trip here.
Day #4 - a rest day in Lleida. Hiding from cold and looking for free wi-fi in cafes, night at some Airbnb place and on the road again.
Days #5-6. Of course, we cannot leave without going to Siurana. I wanted to try something harder so we decided to spend a couple of days at the same place. We chose Siuranela Central for that. And even though trying did not result in sending it was worth those tries. No skin after a couple of days made me want to go to Barcelona and have fun earlier than planned but Martynas kept his motivation high until the very end.
Day #7. We spent the last day in Can Toni Gros where I had so many flashbacks from 6 years ago. Climbed some routes that I have done then, some that I have tried but couldn’t do. And even though I will not remember any of the moves, I actually did which was very interesting!
It was quite sad to leave after a week of such a simple life on the road. We still had a day in Barcelona which we spent sightseeing mostly if a new bouldering gym counts as a sight. And yes, we went to a museum and ate vegan burgers and cakes and walked and talked a lot!
So here the trip should have ended but… we had a connecting flight on Monday through Copenhagen. The first flight was delayed so we missed the second one. Which resulted in a fancy hotel, an even more fancy dinner and me being late to work the next morning. I made it though!