I'd heard about climbing in Sicily through word of mouth and although there is limited information online we decided it was worth a trip. A huge bonus was that there was no need to hire a car as we paid for transfers to the el bahira campsite (san vito la capo). We stayed in a mobile home where the 5km of bolted cliffs were simply a 4 minute walk away overlooking the campsite, perfect. The loud music they call animation until 12am not so perfect, although this is only during June- September. The staff at the campsite were not so friendly not that it particularly bothered us as we still got 20% discount for being climbers. Online they welcome climbers but they didnt have a guidebook in stock which made our first few days interesting jumping on routes. The shop was reasonably priced for food and we would also walk for 40 minutes into San vito for food from a bigger supermarket. The food at the restaurant on site was comparable in quality and price to those in San vito- very much geared up for tourists.
That's the logistics out of the way now about the climbing... The routes on the cliffs around San vito are world class with a range of styles from tufas to slabs. The grades (quite stiffly graded) were well spread out so we were well accomodated climbing as a three with different abilities from 4s to high 7s.
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Menage a trois 7a+
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| Menage a trois 7a+ |
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| Menage a trois 7a+ |
Day one climbing we eased in with some 5s and 6s, finding particularly the last moves of climbs razor sharp. I slipped off a climb at the first bolt burning my forearms and cutting my finger. Luckily climb on bar stopped this becoming an issue for the rest of the trip. After this i still managed a stiff 6c+ onsite which considering it was day 1 I was pleased with. We also encountered a wasps nests on a climb that day... Three stings later it was time to get on the beach. Over the next few days I continued to warm up on a couple of 5s and 6s then got on the grade 7 routes. Flashing a 7a ('Knockenmaderll') on day two and making a first lead of 7b 'Seltsam ammutende vollspacken'.
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| Stiff start of 'Il menotauro', 7b |
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| 'Il menotauro', 7b |
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| Onto the easier terrain of 'Il menotauro', 7b |
This trip I had aimed to go for quality of routes(grade 7s) rather than quantity (lots of routes well within my grade). This strategy worked as I challenged myself each day, although I still found trying to make the transition from onsite climbing to focussing on redpointing routes particularly hard. On several 7bs and 7cs I felt that given more time I could definitely send the routes after a couple of attempts as on the majority of routes I was able to make all the moves. One route I felt particularly motivated by was 'Seltsam ammutende vollspacken' having taken 2 stops on day two I felt it would go clean on the next attempt, and 12 days later I was delighted to have cleaned the route on my second attempt after flashing 'Boandkromer' a 7a just before.
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| Flashing 'Boandkromer' 7a |
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| The steep roof of 'Seltsam ammutende vollspacken' 7b |
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| Shaking out on 'Seltsam ammutende vollspacken' 7b |
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| Last moves of the 30m 'Seltsam ammutende vollspacken', 7b |
One of my favourite routes was an unusual 7a climb with a horizontal roof, missing a crucial hold through the roof and slipping off I cleaned it on the second attempt.
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| 'Yoshimi battles the pink robots' 7a |
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| 'Yoshimi battles the pink robots' 7a |
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| The rare choice for me of a more vertical route...'O brothers' 6c |
The hardest onsite was a 7a+ named 'Frateelo Caldo', very well chalked and polished through the crux it required a very dynamic move and almost a second crux at the end as the rock once again became razor sharp. There is still a huge potential for climbing in he San vito area which could rival the likes of kalymnos. There seems to be climbs for all abilities. Following further development I would return to climb in Sicily again.
