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Sportclimbing Quick Fix - Where ?

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Bonna 28 Oct 2003
Say you have a weekend, friday after work til Sunday night/Monday morning. You "need" to get a Euro sportclimbing fix and you live in London...Where do you go?
Criteria being cheap flights, easy access, and decent climbing

Nice?
Genoa(Finale)
Barcelona ?

Any other good suggestions ?
 Chris the Tall 28 Oct 2003
In reply to Bonna:

All three are good, but Nice has the closest climbing to the airport - you can even see St Jeannet from the runway.

Much depends on whether you intend to hire a car

Barca - 90 mins to Costa Durada, less to Monserrat
Nice - 30 mins to La Turbie or Peillion, 20 to St Jeannet and about 10 to Colle sur Loup
Genoa - 60 mins to Finale (which is only about 90 from Nice)

Public Transport - Genoa, bus to the station, train to Finale, bus to the crags

Other options Verona and Brescia are handy for Arco and Garda area
Simon T 28 Oct 2003
In reply to Bonna:
From Nice you can get a train to 'Annot' where there's lots of lovely climbing on big boulders, lots of bolts...however lots of the routes are manufactured off blank faces...good range tho, slabs, overhangs, faces etc.
Busses can be caught to both col sur la loupe (lovely and non imposing, campsite 5 min walk from crag) and St. Jeanette (scary bolts far apart, although if ya not a wuss who's got used to the great bolting in Annot i'm sure it's fine!)
Have fun.
 Arne 28 Oct 2003
having been to both Finale and Nice, I'd highly recommend those places.

Nice:
Train/Buss from airport to Cap D'Ail (40min ?) and walk up to La Turbie, you can see it from the station. Last time I was there was it was january, t-shirt while climbing

Finale:
Walk 10min from airport to train, 40min and you're in Finale. Some of the crags can be reach by cab for under 10euro. climbed there in mid december last time, also in t-shirt.

This is a good question, maybe we can compile some kind of list with places around Europe meeting Bonna's criteria...Must be tonnes of people looking for this kind of thing.
What about the ryanair destinations ?
Becky 28 Oct 2003
In reply to Arne:

Good idea, maybe rockfax should do a guide? or is that covered in the one with the funny name?
 Arne 29 Oct 2003
Guess one could throw in Belgium too.
Allthough not as good nor as weather-stable as the crags further south, you can get to the crags in less than 4 hours from central London. From around £59 on the Eurostar I think.
2hrs 20min London-Brussel
1hr 25min Brussels-Namur

Namur is a few km's away from "Dave" and "Marche Les Dames"
You could probably get to Freyr aswell

Then again, where as the Riviera is almost perfect in winter, Belgium might be a little too damp and cold...but you might be lucky...

OP gwood 29 Oct 2003
In reply to Bonna:
throw alicante into the pot as well, climbing in sella etc less than an hour from the airport so closer than barcelona to climbing
OP bonna 29 Oct 2003
In reply to gwood:

what about access? Easy ?
Need a car?
With no car how long would it take you from the airport to the crag?
graham wood 29 Oct 2003
In reply to bonna:
easier with car, no doubt, not sure of how u would do it without, taxi, train, nearest decent areafrom airport at alicante is pui campana, loads of classic mp routes, takes about by car so must be accessible by other means
 GrahamD 30 Oct 2003
In reply to Bonna:

I managed to get to Sardinia for a weekend a couple of years back without too much agro. One day climbing near Cala Ganone and one near the Airport at Alghero.

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