Here’s a review of the Roca Verde region from the renowned American alpinist Josh Wharton, who stayed at Casa Quiros with his family last year..
“I’ve been fortunate to travel a lot as a climber, and through all that travel I’ve learned that climbing areas, at least in part, live up to their reputations. Ceuse does have immaculate rock, and a big hike. Catalunya does have thousands of crags in every style, and generally soft grades. And Rifle does have enough hard routes to keep you occupied for a lifetime, and enough kneebars to justify shaving your thighs. Conversely, when breaking off the well trodden paths, you expect something to be a little lacking. The rock might be great, but it rains all the time. There are only ten routes actually worth doing. Or rest days consist of staring at your navel.
And that’s exactly why the Asturias region, and Teverga in particular, was so shockingly good. Since I’d never met anyone that had climbed in the area I expected something would be missing. The routes would be dirty, the approaches epically long, it would rain the entire trip, something was bound to be up. Instead it was one of, if not the best, family sport climbing trips I’ve ever been on. First off, the scenery was green and beautiful, with rolling green mountainsides that reminded me of Switzerland.
There were lovely bike paths on many of the approaches, which often allowed my daughter to ride her bike to the crag. And the climbing was amazing, varied, and never crowded. At the Entecampos I was delighted by 40 meter vision quest wall climbs, where one pitch felt like an entire days worth of climbing. At Bovedas, I was served a slice of humble pie on near horizontal tufas and pockets. And when it did rain there was the incredible, and completely protected Muro Techno stacked with even more routes. On rest days we drove an hour to the coast, and were treated to a beautiful rugged coastline with empty secluded beaches. My daughter splashed in the waves, and afterwards we feasted on four course seafood lunches for ten euro, and toured charming little cities.
But of course there are all sorts of reason you shouldn’t go too. Because of the lack of traffic there aren’t gobs of chalk and tick marks, so on sighting is a little tough. It certainly does rain a bit more than in southern Spain. The wifi is spotty, and the area is too sleepy to have developed its own hashtag. And the water at the beach was a bit chilly in June. Yeah, if fact, the place is total rubbish. Don’t go at all. But if you do bother, please leave your draws on Manumission, I’d like to have another go on that one!”
