Team Building Experiences

Hiking in Secret Montserrat

We met in the centre of Barcelona in the morning and drove to the spectacular mountain of Montserrat. Sergi took the group on a hidden trail through the belly of Montserrat that saw us reach a UFO spotting area, unfortunately the aliens must have been having a cup of tea because we didn’t see any.

Sergi explained how the unique rock was formed and with every turn we were blessed with jaw dropping beauty. Navigating through dry riverbeds and up forrest trails we popped out onto the tops where we found ourselves above the clouds, surrounded by rock climbers scaling the summits.

Then we pressed on to our final destination and lunch spot, a refuge built into the side of the mountain where climbers and hikers alike meet and are able to stay for some days in this spiritual place.

Our journey down was no less adventurous as we found ourselves immersed in the wonderful smells of Rosemary coming from some of the largest Rosemary bushes I have ever seen before winding down a track that lead to an old chapel that is now another refuge for mountain dwellers.

The track led back to the car park where we looked up and back at the mountain we had just experience and were all in agreement that this was one special day.

Rock Climbing for Everyone

We have a philosophy here at Crag Rats and that is that rock climbing is for everyone. Thats why we offer courses and excursions for every level of climber from the very beginner to the hardened athlete. Some of the best daytrips we have run have been when we have a group with such mixed ability and this was one of those days.

We left Barcelona in the morning and headed to a picturesque beach on the Costa Brava. This beach is home to a small crag with interesting sport climbing routes of varying difficulty. The beach itself was crowded with sun seekers and climbing became very much a spectator sport as we became their entertainment.

It’s hot work climbing in the sun so we have a couple of breaks to do some snorkeling before we headed off the beach and around the coast to a hidden cove for some Deep Water Soloing!

For those who don’t know, Deep Water Soloing is climbing without ropes over the sea. Not for the faint hearted!

To their credit everyone in the group tried it but we all ended up in the drink at some point! we finished the day with scrambling up to the highest point of the cove and jumping into the sea! After a bit of persuasion…

Our final destination was the little village nearby for a well deserved cerveca on a terrace, another wonderful day!

Valiant Via Ferrata

Most of our guests have never heard of Via Ferrata and have idea what to expect from the experience. This was no exception. Fortunately we have a very experinced guide in Rafa who lives and breathes mountains, he oozes calm and confidence which the guests feed off something that comes in very handy when you’re about to tackle an obstacle course bolted to the side of a mountain!

Via Ferratas come in all shapes and sizes but this one starts as it means to go on with an overhang that gets the heart pumping from the off, it then goes on to offer exposed and tricky traverses around bulging rock formations before we have to cross a gorge by shimmying along a metal wire 50 meters above the ground!

What follows is a long and interesting traverse where Rafa explained how the rock was formed and how we were nestled in between two different types of rock sandwiched together by huge pressures millions of years ago.

This stretch ended in the valley where we stopped for lunch before engaging in the hardest part of the ferrata that would even test regular rock climbers, a real overhang followed by an exposed finish amongst the eagles scouting their prey. This is no exaggeration there are actually birds of prey hunting here!

Just when we thought it was all over the final ascent gave us one last flutter of the heart before we reached the top of the mountain and the Catalan flag waving triumphantly for our arrival!