Anyone got a power drill I can borrow?

With a poor forecast for today we decided to make a plan not to climb the night before and stick to it (rather than getting up and then umming and ahhing). So after a long lie-in this morning we eventually got up to find...you guessed it...blue skies! How can I be so disappointed that the weather is better than they predicted?! I've clearly been living here too long, especially when I hear that the UK is getting a few inches of snow this weekend!!

But a plan's a plan and we were determined to stick to it, so breakfast on the sofa it was to be (with the big patio doors wide open for the first time this year!), followed by coffee and hot cross buns on the balcony, courtesy of Tash's mum.



Coffee and hot cross buns on our 'ickle balcony. Mmmm [Tash made me include this by the way!]



But being typically British, we were getting more and more twitchy at being inside when it was so warm and sunny outside, so eventually we broke around 1pm and decided to head out for a walk and at the same time check out some potential local crags. I'd been up to Pratdip (a.k.a Llaberia) on the hunt for crags before xmas and found some which were bird banned from Jan - June, so I'll be returning to them in Autumn. But recently I'd heard about some more developed crags around the village of Santa Marina, near Pratdip, so that's where we went today for some exploration.

We set off up a marked track towards some crags in the distance, which soon took us into Indiana Jones territory, scrambling up a dry gorge and crawling through tunnels and holes. More interesting than I was expecting when we set off!

After about an hour walking up the gorge and hill we left the track and broke out into the scrub to get up to the base of the rock that we'd seen from below.

"Is it really this way?"

Yep!

Crawling through boulders following the 'track'!





Out of the gorge and up the hill to the crags - by this time it had clouded over as predicted (only about half a day late!)



And we found rather a lot of rock...actually, we found a lifetime's worth of rock! Not much sign of development though (i.e. bolts or chalk)

Finally we found some bolts! And a few decent looking lines, in amongst the acres of untouched rock.

The rock just goes on and on and on.....

....and on!

After a few hours exploring around the base of the crag and checking out different potential sectors (including plenty of bush whacking through nasty spikey plants) we made it back to a track which took us down to the road and the car, just as the predicted drizzle finally started.

Proof that it does rain here sometimes!

So the conclusions (for my future reference) are that:

a) We probably didn't find the new Santa Marina crags which are supposed to be being developed.

b) We found RIDICULOUS amounts of undeveloped rock! Although there were a few small areas with some bolted routes, they were spread out across a really large area with big gaps between. It's probably worth another visit to climb the few routes that we did see (especially those situated between the 'Font de la Flauta' and the 'vatica' and then also around the 'Salt de la Grallera' cove)

c) Some kind of kevlar trousers are needed to protect your legs from the bushes when going between sectors!

d) I really need to get myself a drill and start developing!