Saturday, September 10, 2011

Climbing & more at the Embalse de Quentar (Granada)

Just a 30 minutes drive away from Granada Town, the Embalse de Quentar, a artificial water reservoir, is a very welcome afternoon trip in the hot Andalusian summer days. If you feel like swimming, rock climbing, fishing or walking the Quentar water reservoir could be your option. Rarely visited by locals and tourist you find always a tranquil spot to rest, though there is no path or whatsoever going around the water. In case you want to cross over to other places on the shore you have to either swim or bring a dingy which is fun enough.



The rocky slopes are perfect for climbing and the big cave is a climbers paradise as you can jump into water once you slip. Just bring you climbing shoes and water and you ready to go. there are no hooks or whatsoever - its freeclimbing in various degrees. Best time to visit is between July and September.

If you bring a dingy you can explorer the few sidearms of the lake with small sandy beaches and fresh water flowing into the lake. if you aim for fishing there is loads of fish waiting to be hauled in. In fact i find the non-endemic prominent grayling type fish a bit of a ecologic disaster for local species.

Summerbreak in Corsica (GR20)

During the hot summer in Andalucia there are always ways to escape the tremendous heat. The month of august is the worst of them all. +40 Degrees makes it nearly impossible to walk around, even in the high mountains.

The GR20 in corsica is such a welcome escape! Its rated unter the TOP 10 of the world most diverse and beautiful long distance trails in the world and is the only one in europe in that category. The 200 something KM across the Island can be done in everything between 7-16 Days i believe. I read somewhere the there are records under 48 hours which, after having walked more then 120 KM of the same, i find it very hard to believe! Usually people take between 12-15 days for the 15 Stages or so.

During peak seasons there are lot of people on the trail and so walking without tent is not advisable. I heard  you can also book in advance in some places but that seems to take the fun out of walking without knowing where to end up. The most funniest thing i found is that every single one of the refugees has propers menues, beer, wind, chocolate, whatever you can imaging for sale. Its extremely funny if you watch people walk a stage (in average 5-7 hours), arrive at 13:00 PM to start to have beers until the evening.

Corsicas interior, the mountains and the forests are amazing and you could well say that Corse is one of the most beautiful places in Europe. If you havent been you should go. For all information on the GR20 i found helpful please refer to this sites:

http://www.le-gr20.com
http://corsica.forhikers.com