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| Siurana |
It all started out rather ignominiously however. A warm sun, a few polished, slabby, technical nightmares and I was falling off 6b+ with tips about ready to submit for a modern art exhibit. Siurana was hard then... So how about a change of scene and a different kind of pain at Margalef? Well, either Margalef has the softest grades in Costa Daurada or my carefully structured pocket practice program (i.e. Never having climbed on pockets before) was uniquely suited to this conglomerate pocket pulling paradise and I was able to flash or on sight every route I tried bar one.
With some grades (if not perhaps hard routes) under my belt, I decided the winning formula was a to steer clear of slick sandbagged Siurana so swung by El Falco, near Arboli. Wow! "Technical" and "pumpy" symbols adorn the Rockfax guide to this 45m face like some bad splurge on 2 for 1 offers. Climbing on this wall was the finest day of my trip, culminating in clipping the chains on Chanidanger after a long fight and an epic amount of shaking out. I'd like to thank Dave MacLeod for telling me to work my weaknesses (I trusted microscopic footholds like I never have before) and Chris Sharma for his near religious use of the powerscream (the pump twisted, finger uncurling howl that escaped my lips while on the crux a metre from the chains would have scattered a pride of lions at 100 paces).
Harhar, thought I, with my new found fleet, fairy feet I shall conquer the land of Siurana. The only thing to land was me, with a thud, accompanied by the sound of air whistling out of an overinflated ego. I can highly recommend investing in as much technique as you can beg, copy or invent before reaching Siruana but none of this changes the fact that the grades there are as solid as a gold plated lead brick. I didn't flash any hard routes at Siurana but even when I was falling off (or more likely shouting "take" through a red haze of fingertip agony), I still often felt surprised by what I was able to stand on in quite a conscious manner I have rarely experienced before.
If you remember my last post, word for word, then the title to this one will make perfect sense (and also, you must be quite bored, so get up from your computer right now. _RIGHT NOW_ and go outside and do something new, anything!). Otherwise, here is a tick list to confirm that Dave MacLeod will shortly be relegated to second best climber in Scotland:
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Grade
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Style
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7a+
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1 flashed, 1 on sighted
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7a
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2 on sighted
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6C+
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2 on sighted
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6C
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3 flashed, 3 on sighted
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5+ to 6B+
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15, mixture of on sights and flashes
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Now, the million dollar question: Can I convert anything I have learned to trad? I suspect that weather considered, that question is wholly academic.
Recommendations
I might as well give a few personal recommendations about what you should do if you would like to climb in Costa Daurada. Skip this if you are not going because it is BORING!
- Fly to Barcelona or Reus, hire a car, save money by avoiding the freeways with designations starting AP (toll roads). Go in Spring or Autumn.
- There are two Siurana guides, Toni Arbones' old guide has been superseded by a very colourful new guide that is really superb and available in the tourist info in Conudella de Montsant and probably elsewhere too.
- Limestone gets polished pretty quickly, to avoid polish, head to newer crags and avoid the "total classic" lines (the line just next door is probably as good and less worn).
- There are lots of foreign climbers who speak English but in most of the villages the locals speak little English spoken so some Spanish is useful.
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