[moose]

Hola, just booked a November holiday to Chulila and after any beta that previous visitors can provide. 

Route recommendations from 7a to 8a gratefully received (I likely won't be getting the guide until we're out there, so I need some fodder for my day-dreams in the interim, Steve Crowe has already kindly provided a mini-guide).  It goes without saying to anyone who knows me, that anything at the higher end of that range would have to be (a) soft, (b) easy to work out, (c) suited to someone weak and lanky!

Also, my current rope is likely around 65m long - is an 80m string mandatory for a faff-free holiday? (and, if so, any bargains out there?).

Any other advice - restaurants, bars, shops for groceries etc also much appreciated.  We'll have a self-catering apartment in the village but will fancy the occasional drinks in town (especially if there's any decent football - though sadly there's no Real vs Barca Classicos scheduled for our stay - always a good chance to see the locals let their hair down).

[Wood FT]

It goes without saying to anyone who knows me, that anything at the higher end of that range would have to be (a) soft, (b) easy to work out, (c) suited to someone weak and lanky!

you need to stop putting yourself down Moose, you've had a cracking year

[JohnM]

Send you a list of recommended routes on fb.

[moose]

you need to stop putting yourself down Moose, you've had a cracking year

cheers, though it just means I'll be entirely broken down by November! Oh well, you only live once... bring on Sendtember and Roctober!

[jwi]

The sector El Oasis is good for 7s

The refugio was nice.

That's all I remember from our weekend there.

[Ali]

We had a 60m & 70m and although we found plenty to do we were eyeing up some longer routes wishing we could get on them. I can't remember how often the 70 was essential on the routes we did vs a 65. The problem with the guide is that it only gives the max height of routes in a sector so you're left trying to judge how much shorter the route you're looking at is than the longest one!
Some routes I enjoyed (typically sustained rather than bouldery) were conflicto territorial 7a+ & dale duro negro 7b at sector sex shop, camina of revienta 7a+ on enfeebled and blue agave 7a at lamentaciones. Sector oasis & chorreras were also good.
Found the grading a bit inconsistent so don't be put off if the first routes you pick feel hard. It's a great place - everyone who's been seems to enjoy it.

[Ali]

Enfeebled should read Enfrente (hate auto correct) although I did feel quite enfeebled by the time I reached the belay!

[Tommy]

70m rope is fine (we only once got pretty close to the end).

Recommendations - basically nearly everything is soft, but also extremely good. You won't be disappointed! Oasis was the best sector, but a bit cold when very windy.

Groceries - small and fairly limited in the local town. Enough to get by, but you can't cook fancy.

Bars - I'm too boring to go to those.

All in all a really excellent place to visit and an area that I'm sure most people would go back to (I certainly will).

[moose]

Cheers, might not bother with a new rope then - with a bit of forethought, the 65ish and 75ish my partner and I have between us should suffice. 

Really looking forward to it - a new area to me - I'll be like a kid in a sweet shop.  Chances are I'll just end up trying to climb oodles of 7a-7b+'s, rather than spending more than a couple of goes on anything. Though, if there is an absolute must do - a visually stunning line with good climbing - in the 7c-8aish range I might be tempted - we're there for a fortnight so chances are we'll be revisiting the better sectors. 

By the way - any kneed to take a knee pad? Or isn't steep and cave enough for that kind of cheating.

[jwi]

On La pared de enfrente there are a few routes where kneepads, or at least heavy trousers, will come in handy.

[JohnM]

I sent you these route recommendation on FB but don't know if it worked.

Los Posaderos (7c) - Pared del enfrente.  This route is very good with powerful climbing at the start and technical higher climbing.

Hipotermia (7c) - Al Garrobo.  A boulder problem leads to a good rest on a tufa and then a further tough move to gain the pumpy upper wall.

Cap i cua (7c) - Chorreras.  Amazing tufa!

Pin pan poms (7c) - Chorreras.  Also good tufa climbing.

Nibelungalos (7c) - Al Garrobo.  Amazing!  Must do!

Moon Safari (7c+) - El Balconcita.  Powerful tufa at the start then awesome wall climbing with a sting in the tail.

Tequila Sunrise (7c+) - Amazing with a cool tufa.

El Capataz Ircapataz (8a) - Soft 8a but amazing varied climbing.  Technical Malhamesque (easier than Malham) upper wall.  Would feel way easier than a lot of the routes you have done this year.

I am sure you will clean up there as you are in good form on British lime.  Like someone said most of the routes are quite soft so don't be afraid to get on the harder stuff and it is always worth going for the onsight.  I found if you could get through the start on the stuff on Balconcita then I could generally recover my way to the top.  Having said that some of the 7b+s left of Oasis felt desperate and were hard to onsight!

[Ally Smith]

What John said, plus...

El Ramallar (7c+) - take the obvious, and obviously run-out righthand variant

Los Franceses (7b+) - cool "E2" corner feature topped by some tufa

have a jolly doing the two via ferrata on a rest day

In addition to the local sell everything shop (does a mean black sausage which i can recommend) there's a supermarket in the next town over if you want to get some more varied groceries.

Also, the bars & restaurants have weird opening hours - don't believe what's written on the doors. A couple of times we ended up eating leftovers when we'd planned to eat out.

[moose]

John and Ally - wow! Cheers for all that, fellas.  My Steve Crowe bootleg topo is being duly annotated! All much appreciated

I am sure you will clean up there as you are in good form on British lime. 

 
Aww shucks....! Stop it or I'll get big-headed.  As an aside, the most disconcerting aspect of this run of form (or undeserved aberration prior to an inevitable reversion to the mean, as I think of it) has been bumping into people after long absences, and finding that they are utterly au fait with my latest activities.  Thankfully I'm just about self-aware enough to realize how objectively meaningless my being slightly less mediocre for a short period is, or, I might get paranoid ("they're all talking about you behind your back"!). Small world innit though?!

I found if you could get through the start on the stuff on Balconcita then I could generally recover my way to the top. 

Now, I like the sound of that - "recover to the top" is my preferred (actually, only) climbing style!

Also, the bars & restaurants have weird opening hours - don't believe what's written on the doors. A couple of times we ended up eating leftovers when we'd planned to eat out. 

Sounds very familiar from staying in villages near Siurana and Chorro.  The traditional emergency dinner of bread, chorizo, and cheese; intended for the next day's packed-lunch but feebly transformed towards something more resembling a proper meal by putting in a frying pan until bits char or melt to satisfaction!  Thankfully I always seem to accumulate enough of those big bars of dark chocolate with almonds in to avoid starvation.

Also, to get all the climbing holiday cliches out: there is nothing so cold as a night in an out-of-season apartment in Spain with inadequate bedding!  And, the absence of a proper kettle = literally hours of holiday time spent trying to make a morning cuppa and fill a thermos!

Whenever I mention such delights to my parents, they are always surprised and tell me it doesn't tally with their own experiences of the last 10 years, holidaying at least once a year, often twice, in Spain.  You might almost think that everyone of those holidays having been in Benidorm hasn't given them the best insight into out-of-season stays at inland, fairly rural small towns / villages! 

[Fiend]

Hi.

Any tips for the F6b-7b punter?

Is there a new guide available?

Any routes that aren't long vertical faces (just for the variety)?

[seankenny]

Fiend, we did the following which were great:

El Ramallito, 6c, Blue Agave 7a, Muro de la Lamentaciones 7a, Infernio des harzarles (sp?) 6c, all at Lamentaciones - yes very much long vertical faces but excellent, the crag gets plenty of sun so a good venue if it's a bit grim elsewhere.

Lots of good 7a/7a+ at Chorralles, which is the tufa-draped crag next to Oasis. It's a bit steeper, the one I did - Camino del leche - had a bouldery start and with some sustained sections above, this seems par for the course on that wall.

Penata was a good cliff if a bit old skool, vertical climbing with hard grades. The outlying cliffs were okay to warm up on and fun in a Costa Blanca-ish way.

New guide is "just coming out". Draw your own conclusions.

We found an 80m rope very useful.

There's a good supermarket in Villar del Arzobispo which is about 20m drive from Chulilla, it's called Consum and appears on google maps so it's easy to find.

[Paul B]

Hi.

Any tips for the F6b-7b punter?

Is there a new guide available?

Any routes that aren't long vertical faces (just for the variety)?

El Oasis. PM me through FB (or via email) and I can give you some beta. 80m and more draws than you might expect. We took something like 28 draws and it wouldn't be enough to have two lines sensibly equipped.

The face climbing is really good and so are the tufa's at the top end of your chosen grade range. Nat had a great holiday.

We booked a place in Losa del Obispo (sp?) on AirBnB for ~25E per night (it sleeps 4 and that's total, it was a bit chilly).

[Fiend]

Cheers youths. I guess that means no guide: oop vs. not really coming out soon enough  Any other resources apart from http://chulillaclimbing.com/crags/ ??

Sean that's the sort of stuff I'm after. Any short steep things around too??

PB, thanks for the accomodation tip, will try to avoid chilly stuff tho

[shark]

I gather the tops on Climbmaps are up to date but it is a nightmare to use.

I have a spare guide you can have which I inadvertently picked up unless claimed in the meantime (Dan? Nick? Duncan?) otherwise you can borrow my copy.

Chilly cliffs are the best ones and endurance is the best beat to dance to there 

[Duncan campbell]

Chilly cliffs are the best ones and endurance is the best beat to dance to there 

So with that in mind would early april not be a ridiculous time to go to Chulilla?? I personally find a sport trip at about this time of year is the best way to get fit for UK trad and Chulilla looks like the perfect venue...

anyone been in early april? or is it going to be way too hot?

[seankenny]

Sean that's the sort of stuff I'm after. Any short steep things around too??

Having just bought some brand new 80m ropes especially, we weren't really looking for that kind of route... but there might be one or two around, it's a big cliff.

PB, thanks for the accomodation tip, will try to avoid chilly stuff tho

I think we stayed at the same place. It was not cosy and all a bit basic - the oven was so weak I had to give up my plan of roasting some auberigines 

[duncan]

Any routes that aren't long vertical faces (just for the variety)?

Shark did the big 7a crack La Diagonal in one ~60m pitch (situ bail 'biner at 40m to facilitate cleaning) which he described as good and "very trad." It's on my list to do next time.

[Paul B]

I think we stayed at the same place. It was not cosy and all a bit basic - the oven was so weak I had to give up my plan of roasting some auberigines 

For the amount it cost it was what it was. I do wish we'd spent a little more and stayed elsewhere. Spain really is (or can be) cheap.

I've also heard that crack is good.

[shark]

I've also heard that crack is good.

[moose]

Any routes that aren't long vertical faces (just for the variety)?

Shark did the big 7a crack La Diagonal in one ~60m pitch (situ bail 'biner at 40m to facilitate cleaning) which he described as good and "very trad." It's on my list to do next time.

I did the same - nice route.  Another non-face climb along the crag a bit is Los Franceses, 7b+ - a huge stepped groove - burly trad-esque undercutting, with a with a tufa head wall to finish.   

The Los Chorerras sector in the shady gorge is also full of routes at all grades that are definitely not face climbs.  Some topos refer to the area as "Mega Tufa Land" - though the tufas are more the huge type that have to be bridged between and squirmed up, rather than the normal pinchy drainpipes.

[joel182]

On the burly undercuts theme, Camino o Revienta(?), 7a+ on the same crag as Los Franceses is cool.

I'm climbing in your grade range and really enjoyed Chulilla, pretty much every line I got on was great. Really recommend Long Dong John 6b+ in Chorreras - absolutely outrageous climbing for the grade.

I found a lot of the ~7as in Chorreras were nicely broken up by big ledges to take massive rests on, which was nice with my lack of endurance!

You might like Dumbo Love ~7a at Pared de Enfrente, though it is incredibly manufactured.

I would avoid Pablosky in Oasis (heinous crimps straight off the ground), and one of the routes around Viaje a Cuba, which had a disgusting slippy start off a pile of blocks.

I made some topos, which are just stitched together screengrabs of climbmaps, they are hosted here: https://drive.google.com/folder/d/0B8v0Qe1iDnVhcXduemgtWHhFR1U/edit

[kelvin]

Fiend - I'm here at the moment. The bar at the top car park is Dan by climbers, there's a copy of the guide there, they'll print out topos too. We rocked up with nothing and have been fine. An 80m is handy, I don't have one and my 70m would have been too short on some things. 150euros for a 90m 9.4mm fixe rope in the local climbing shop.
It's alright here.

[kelvin]

*ran not Dan!!! Fucks sake

[Fiend]

Cool I'll as for Dan when I'm there.

[Fiend]

Cheers guys. Had a great trip out there. Here's some more info for future reference (copy'n'pasted from blog so apologies for any duplication)

Pro-tips (in addition to the common knowledge online):

• To get to El Oasis and other nearby sectors, drive around to the dam. It adds 5 mins driving and saves 10+ mins tiring walking. However the upper walk is worth doing just once for the scenic bridges.
• Don't head down the horrible gully at the town parking to "short cut" to the river below Lamentaciones. Head into town and turn right at the shop to gain the zig-zags.
• Take heed of sunny vs shady sectors:  El Oasis is perma-shady in winter, Muro des Lamentaciones gets evening shade, La Pared De Enfrente gets it sooner. Your toes will thank you for any shade.
• Most mid-grade routes aren't steep enough to stay dry if it rains, BUT Sector Cuevas opposite Lamentaciones has decent mid 6s upwards beneath huge roofs.
• Take a bail biner if you have any doubts about doing / working a route. 30m is a long way to stick-clip up.
• Take a decent tarp, most crag bases are dusty.
• A 70m rope will do most mid-grade routes (including all but one listed), harder routes and a few exceptions will require 80m.
• El Altico is a nice base, comfy beds and sociable vibe. Could be grim if busy but dorms are pretty small, although kitchen is too. Half board gets you a nice evening feed with red wine but breakfasts are minimal.
• The guide is still trapped between OOP and the unpromising "coming soon", but the topos at: http://chulillaclimbing.com/crags/ are good enough, and El Altico has a full routes folder to browse.

Routes list / recommendations:

Sector Cuevas & Sector Penata:

La Caida Del Melon F6c - okay, bouldery start (soft).
Sindrome De Corbadia F6c+ - good and burly, neat line, bulge sates underused biceps.
Maquillaje Mental F6b+ - very nice, bloc start and endless pleasant steep slab. Shiney 35m lower off after best climbing.
(Amor Loco P1 F6b - described as a "satchel of wank", polished burly start (not F6a))
Crisis P1 F6b - good, interesting, start is a bit slopey and tricky
Smigol P1 F6c - great, cool veiny rock and continually interesting right to the chain.

Muro des Lamentaciones:

El Muro des Lamentaciones F7a - amazing, steep start then endless enthralling voyage up steep flakey slabs (soft).
Contacto En El Space F6c - great, very direct route, same steep start then continuously interesting but never desperate (not F6c+)
Yorkshire Pudding F6b - decent, varied, sting in the tail.
(Blue Agave F7a - good, mostly steady apart from one slopey pod section and awkward clip, avoid in warm)
El Ramallito F6c - good, steady then steepens up nicely for a great finish.
Nos Sobran Potxolos F7a - good, nice line, short with a fiercely crimpy crux.
Zikrutina Mientras Puedas F7a - decent, bouldery to start then nice short wall above (not F7a+).
(La Costa Nostra F6b+ - nice line, popular, described as good, techy and rounded)

El Oasis & Las Chorerras :

Top Of The Rock F7a - very cool, nice line, 3 boulder cruxes with good rests, steady if you focus (steady).
Richi F6c - decent but a bit unbalanced, grim start then more fun climbing (not F6b+, F6c for start).
(Nazgul F6c - very much the same)
(Olog-Hai F6c+ - good, cranky start into varied climbing and easier finish up nice wall)
Chamarilero F6c+ - very pleasant, steady start then escalates to techy finish past micro-tufa.
Orgia Sado En El Internado F7a? - good, several hard and very fingery cruxes up smooth walls, fierce (probably not F6c+, harder than F7as here)
Magnetorresistor F6b+ - good, worthy warm-up once past the "uk-style" slopey flakes low down, finish is very nice.
Plan Z F7a - very cool, lovely tufa wall, steady with thoughtful weaving moves and a great finish (soft).
Gargola P1 F6b - short but well worthwhile, thoughtful groove moves and not tiring.
Cantina Marina F7a - excellent, bouldery goey start leads to good moves leads to endless F6b into pure Kalymnos finish at 40m (soft, maybe F6c+).

[kelvin]

New guidebook out last week from Pedro - much like the last one. Works in conjunction with the website.
There's also another one out next week... like buses eh? Only my opinion but this one is much nicer, lots of general info and decent topos for the  climbing, parking, etc.