UKC

I’m landing in Calais at the start of September for two weeks holiday in a small van but have still not decided on an itinerary. As we’re in a van we can move around abit but would like to limit it to two destinations. Obviously weather forecast will play a part but things we’re after are (in order):

1. Single pitch sport climbing 6b - 7b with short walk ins, we’ll bolted and ideally not slabby

2. Decent mountain walking 
3. A couple of long via ferrata

4. Nice town with decent camping

5. Decent places to visit in the way to/from

Places I’ve considered are:

Briancon - fits the bill on all fronts but we’ve been before so would like to try somewhere different.

The Vercors - looks great but not very popular, must be a reason for this. No idea about quality of single pitch climbing

Frankenjura - is this a holiday destination or just somewhere for climbers? Not sure how easy it’d be to combine with a trip to something more mountainous (Garmish etc)

Austria - looks lovely but know nothing about it. Faff to get to sport climbing crags

It always seems to me that the Vercors massif is an awkward place to navigate around and getting from A > B often involves going around X and Z. I believe that quite a few of the best single pitch crags are still banned. Presles is mostly open again, apart from the two best single pitch bits, but maybe too hot?

We did have a couple of weeks in Austria a few of years back. Ötztal would fit the bill for you with mountains and very short approach single pitch crags. Quite crowded, though. Personally I didn't find Austria very friendly, but probably that was just me.

The Frankenjura simply looks way too hard !!!

I had a trip booked to Austria but Coivd hit and I never got.  I've no idea if it'll have all that you are looking for but it looked good to me.

Seems to be plenty of crags and via ferratta too.

I was planning on going neaqr here: https://www.ukclimbing.com/logbook/crags/oberried-9257/#overview

Dolomites!

Cortina - though the sport climbing is tough.....Al was happy that he found a crag that looked like Chee Tor......

Cortina is lovely but a long way for a fortnight, as you lose pretty much four days to driving.

Frankenjura is certainly a tourist destination for German non-climbing tourists. Pretty rolling wooded hills. Scenically inferior to the White Peak imo (but better limestone!)

About three to four hours drive if you don't get caught in the rush hour on the Munich ring road.

Ötztal has single and multipitch sport - on gneiss so not as steep on average as limestone, but it's not all slabby - some big via ferratas, decent bouldering and plenty of 3000ers to hike up.

Campsites everywhere in the Alps tend to be expensive & crowded

Asturias is great, crags are very good quality limestone and not crowded. Scenery lovely. Could visit somewhere nice in France in the way - Dordogne, Atlantic coast, Carcassone, Targasonne.

Only downsides is that it’s green Spain for a reason and some of the crags are rather bitty - say maybe 15 routes on a sector then you have to walk to the next sector. There aren’t many large walls with tons of routes like Ceuse. 

You should make a beeline for Les Gets to spend two weeks climbing and getting fit at Foron. Spare bedroom in the chalet..

Foron looks very good. Never knew it was there. 

+1 for dolomites and that area. Bit further to drive but Italy always seems to be cheaper somehow. Arco above lake Garda, little touristy but lots of good long via ferrata along the valley. mountain walking but not as high. A few campsites too. could be a bit warm depending on when you're going though. Also plenty of sport climbing

Thank you all for your suggestions, keep them coming - we’ve still not decided!

When I started climbing my frame of reference was a few sources and Vercours always featured, recently I’ve started reading Catherine Destivelle’s biography and she mentions them so they’re back in my mind and I have an idea about discovering a less well travelled gem… 

From what Alan says below this is a string favorite, might go to the top of the list. 

Too far and the Mont Blanc tunnel is closed definitely one for a longer trip  

Asturias is too far  but Carcassonne is on the for a cultural visit. 

As above a bit far but reading that makes me think I should reconsider!

Would Ötztal and Frankenjura make a logical link from Calais?

The idea of a mini Sharkathon is very attractive to me but Les Gets looks a bit desolate for Fi. Will text about meeting up for a few days

Could be done certainly. Ötztal is about 5 hours drive from the Frankenjura. The gneiss would be a bit of a style shock immediately after pocket pulling, but otoh the bolting is generally very user-friendly by comparison

La Clusaz has everything you are looking for.

Just worth a mention that the road up into Ötztal was washed out by the fooded river yesterday. So for the moment that doesn't seem an option.

Zillertal instead of Ötztal provides granite ... and combines with Frankenjura just as good. Look up Ewige Jagdgründe and the areas around.

Buis le Baronnies and Orpierre are both beautiful characterful small towns with excellent camping, especially the municipal campsite at the former. However it is coming to the end of the season and last year we found a lot of the campsites were closed by mid september. There is plenty of accessible climbing and a superb via ferrata above the campsite in Buis, not sure about the walking but cycling is amazing in both areas.

Where was this? We just left on Sunday after a mostly glorious week of sunny weather.

Interlaken or Meiringen (nice campsite IIRC).

You’d want decent weather but single pitch sport crags I have been to are Lehn Lehn and Sustenpass (Steingletscher Steingletscher, the latter in a beautiful setting. I had one day at Lehn and whilst it is mostly in the 8s the easier 7s we did were on fantastic rock.

I don’t know about VFs but given the location I imagine there will be. Obvs amazing mountain walking.

Thanks to everyone that has responded, it’s pretty obvious I need lots more holidays just to explore the relatively local parts of Europe never mind the further flung places. Plenty of new ideas for next time but for this week we are heading to Les Gets for some sport climbing and then, weather permitting, to Vercors. Next job is to find a guide for the Vercors…..

A friend who is in Längenfeld told me that he's hoping a temporary way around the washed out section can be finished before the 17 September or they'll have to go over the Timmelsjoch to get out, so it must be below Längenfeld. He sent a video of it, but I've failed to copy it. 

Thanks. We were staying in Langenfeld. Glad I booked a Sunday flight and didn't try to make the most of the bank holiday now!