UKC

Anyone been recently? places to go with ease of access and fees etc? Permissions needed from who, any help welcome thanks. Know its a bit of a pain there lately.

In reply to Neal F:

http://www.ukclimbing.com/news/item.php?id=68591

In reply to grumpybearpantsclimbinggoat:

Thanks, I saw that, just wondered if anyone been on the ground recently, we booked before this article came out, bummer.

In reply to Neal F:

Hi Neal

The only information I have in addition to that news report is that Sector Solarium at Puig de Garrafa is closed off with a new fence.

Most of the other restrictions appear to only be 'under discussion' still. Someone has reported that they had been asked to pay for Fraguel although this hasn't been confirmed yet. It also appears that Cala Barques is closed but, again, I haven't heard of anyone being turned away.

There are no other confirmed reports of people being turned away and the permit system isn't in place, it is just a proposal.

So you should be fine at the moment for your trip. The only thing to keep in mind though is that the local climbers have requested that people don't visit, but considering that you have already booked, they can hardly expect this of you.

Alan

In reply to Neal F:

Hi Neal,

We were there for a week over New Year. We visited Puig de Garrafa (access to all sectors apart from Solarium is fine), S'estrat, Sa Gubia, Les Perxes, Cala Magraner and Port de Soller...and had no problems.

In reply to Neal F:
I was out with a group just before christmas and visited a number of crags and the only place with access issues was fraguel. we were charged 6 euros for the privilege of driving up the many many hairpins to the crag.

In reply to Neal F:

Sorry to post something you may have already read but:

I would like to mention that I recently returned from a two week climbing trip to the island and didn't come across anything which might indicate access problems or taxes/charges at the crags we visited. These were Gubia, El Fumat, La Creveta, Les Perxes, Puig de Garrafa, Calvia, Valdemossa, Cala Magraner and Tijuana. OK, we didn't do DWS (winter!) and we didn't visit La Reserva or Fraguel/Sa Comuna but we had an absolutely fantastic time with daily doses of world class climbing (the rock, not the climbers!) in stunning locations.

I love Mallorca and hope to be back on many occasions in the future but the rumours about charges are worrying and I would certainly have to consider other destinations if the government take the shortsighted step of imposing blanket charges island wide. It is lazy and sure to be counter productive for the government, landowners and climbers/cyclists alike.

For now though, Mallorca remains the best place I have been climbing and I would urge people to not abandon all hope so soon as we had a 100% trouble free and very memorable time this December. The vast majority of sport crags are trouble free and I cannot see how many could possibly be policed at all given their wild locations. It is easy to avoid those with apparent restrictions.

I would also recommend taking advantage of the amazing network of mountain refuges which are real hidden gems and another example of the Spanish governments failure to promote something with great potential but few tourists manage to find out about.


I have built up a fair amount of knowledge of the island and accommodation from visiting it over the years so do feel free to PM me with a question if you wanted! I don't want to sound like I work for the tourist board or anything but I just think it's a shame the people are being scared off from going to a place with so much great accessible rock...