The Best Crag You've Never Seen.
Every British climber will tell you: We love a cheap destination. British climbing has a strong tradition of dirtbagging the bejesus out of any and all decent climbing locations, and even some fairly sub-par ones as well if there's cheap booze on offer.
As such, you expect that the good destinations have been thoroughly canvassed, myriad crags and quaint villages swallowed up whole into the chomping maw of UKC and processed out the other side as nicely packaged destination guides. In France we have Ceuse, Verdon, Briancon and more. In Norway we have Lofoten, Flatanger. Fontainebleau is just a quick blast across the Channel. In Spain, the list is endless. Well documented, well travelled, well appreciated.
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| Typical Brits: Emily and Ned celebrating after topping out 'Amptrax' f6a+ in the popular Spanish climbing area El Chorro. |
But what of Germany?
Now, I know the answer that springs instantly to mind.
'They have the Frankenjura! What more do you want?!?'
True, true. And Brits do visit the Jura. Whilst planning a trip for October, a quick enquiry on UKC garnered a wealth of information and route recommendations, making for an easily assembled ticklist.
All fine. But what of the rest of the country? At 357,168 km² Germany isn't exactly small... There must be something else out there. The English speaking climbing community draws a blank. The best you get when googling 'Swabian Alps Climbing' is a pretty obscure website advertising various attractions for the surrounding area, which apparently include climbing. It does offer some tantalising hints, however, mentioning that the routes in the area range from easy to the 'Lower Tenth level'.
Translating this, it comes out around 8a+. Time to go exploring...
Turns out that like most things, the Germans have got this nailed. There are big colourful guidebooks (All in German, but hey!), detailed route descriptions including the number of bolts/threads on each route, and even signposted crags?!? Madness. A little part of me was twitching at how weirdly different this was from the UK.
So, to business. The first area we explored was called Lenninger. Most of the rocky outcrops are up on the valley walls surrounded by ample forest, so it takes a little while to get orientated and work out whats what. The rock ranges from Peak District-esque crimpy limestone to glorious golden waves of Spanish style overhangs. We visited two such crags in a single day, each about ten minutes apart by car on opposite sides of the same valley.
The rock quality was bomber and the bolts were similar. Hell, the second crag even had an access ladder and a wooden belay ledge for the cave routes. I onsighted an 8+/9- that was easily as good as any 7b+ you'll find on the Spanish crags. I even pulled onto an unclimbed project, which linked a F7C boulder roof into a 10- upper wall. It would make an amazing 8b+ or so.
The most amazing thing about these crags? They were absolutely dead. We didn't see another climber all day.
Safe to say, our first visit had us pretty hooked. As soon as we were done in Lenningen we were already planning a trip to another part of the Alps, and this place apparently had 100m multipitches.
The psyche was high.
On day one, we headed to Stuhlfels to check out some of the bigger easy multipitches. Now, it turns out that some of the crags around the Donautal area are actually on UKC - evidence of some sneaky brits getting down on the German sport! Still, only a tiny amount of routes were listed. First of all we cruised up one of the classic multipitches of the crag, 'Südostpfeiler'. Well bolted, straightforward climbing made for a quick pace, and we soon found ourselves cresting the pinnacle on the final pitch.
After topping out, we quickly abbed down to check out the West wall. This had a totally different profile from the South wall, resulting in an utterance of definite excitement from yours truly.
'Oh Gods, the steepness and tiny holds arghhhh'.
I pulled onto a brilliant 10-/f8a+ called 'Walking on the Moon'. This route had everything! It started off with flowy straightforward moves, then quickly moved into technical wall climbing on tiny pockets including a deadpoint to a sinker mono. No sooner had you worked yourself into this technical style than the route decided to hit a major curveball and throw a huge dyno at you. Like, we're talking four points disconnected. If you managed to hang on for all of that, the crux was waiting for you at the top with tiny crimps and a loooonnnngg rockover.
In other words, it was mindblowingly awesome. Cora got on a 6-/f5c 'Fruehsportweg' and found that it too was a very classy route, with flowing moves and good quality bolts. From the crag top we'd spotted a whole number of other rock faces on the other side of the valley and decided that we'd check them out the next day. We were in for a treat.
As we wandered through the woodland pathways, little outcrops started to appear all around us. These looked good in themselves, but we knew there was bigger, and better. We just didn't know quite how much better! We headed through the woods to the end crag first to hit up another easy multipitch. 'Alte Hausener Wand' was a brilliantly exposed piece of climbing at V+, and even the IV pitch was excellent.
Afterwards we went for an explore of the area. Walking back along the line of the cliffs we found an absolute plethora of limestone buttresses formed from perfect rock, trad cracks sitting alongside steep overhanging sport routes and exposed face climbing. I'll let the pictures do the talking...
Pretty frickin' awesome.
A few fun facts about the Swabian Alps for those now buzzing for a visit:
All fine. But what of the rest of the country? At 357,168 km² Germany isn't exactly small... There must be something else out there. The English speaking climbing community draws a blank. The best you get when googling 'Swabian Alps Climbing' is a pretty obscure website advertising various attractions for the surrounding area, which apparently include climbing. It does offer some tantalising hints, however, mentioning that the routes in the area range from easy to the 'Lower Tenth level'.
Translating this, it comes out around 8a+. Time to go exploring...
Turns out that like most things, the Germans have got this nailed. There are big colourful guidebooks (All in German, but hey!), detailed route descriptions including the number of bolts/threads on each route, and even signposted crags?!? Madness. A little part of me was twitching at how weirdly different this was from the UK.
So, to business. The first area we explored was called Lenninger. Most of the rocky outcrops are up on the valley walls surrounded by ample forest, so it takes a little while to get orientated and work out whats what. The rock ranges from Peak District-esque crimpy limestone to glorious golden waves of Spanish style overhangs. We visited two such crags in a single day, each about ten minutes apart by car on opposite sides of the same valley.
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| Typical Swabian Alps scenes. Tiny villages and towering crags. |
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| Looking up at the unclimbed line 'Project Matrix'. |
The most amazing thing about these crags? They were absolutely dead. We didn't see another climber all day.
Safe to say, our first visit had us pretty hooked. As soon as we were done in Lenningen we were already planning a trip to another part of the Alps, and this place apparently had 100m multipitches.
The psyche was high.
On day one, we headed to Stuhlfels to check out some of the bigger easy multipitches. Now, it turns out that some of the crags around the Donautal area are actually on UKC - evidence of some sneaky brits getting down on the German sport! Still, only a tiny amount of routes were listed. First of all we cruised up one of the classic multipitches of the crag, 'Südostpfeiler'. Well bolted, straightforward climbing made for a quick pace, and we soon found ourselves cresting the pinnacle on the final pitch.
 |
| Cora and I topping out on Stuhlfels. |
'Oh Gods, the steepness and tiny holds arghhhh'.
I pulled onto a brilliant 10-/f8a+ called 'Walking on the Moon'. This route had everything! It started off with flowy straightforward moves, then quickly moved into technical wall climbing on tiny pockets including a deadpoint to a sinker mono. No sooner had you worked yourself into this technical style than the route decided to hit a major curveball and throw a huge dyno at you. Like, we're talking four points disconnected. If you managed to hang on for all of that, the crux was waiting for you at the top with tiny crimps and a loooonnnngg rockover.
In other words, it was mindblowingly awesome. Cora got on a 6-/f5c 'Fruehsportweg' and found that it too was a very classy route, with flowing moves and good quality bolts. From the crag top we'd spotted a whole number of other rock faces on the other side of the valley and decided that we'd check them out the next day. We were in for a treat.
 |
| Cora walking through the woods en route to the crag. |
As we wandered through the woodland pathways, little outcrops started to appear all around us. These looked good in themselves, but we knew there was bigger, and better. We just didn't know quite how much better! We headed through the woods to the end crag first to hit up another easy multipitch. 'Alte Hausener Wand' was a brilliantly exposed piece of climbing at V+, and even the IV pitch was excellent.
 |
| At the base of 'Alte Hausener Wand' V+. |
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| Cora checking out a line on one of the many sweeping overhangs in Donautal. |
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| Dwarfed by the 40m+ buttresses. |
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| This crazy cave had routes leading up from both walls! |
Pretty frickin' awesome.
A few fun facts about the Swabian Alps for those now buzzing for a visit:
- RyanAir flights to Stuttgart can be had for £30 with a couple of months notice.
- The Alps are fully accessible by train, especially the area around Donautal.
- High quality campsites with great facilities are located in the valleys.
- There is an absolute plethora of easy sport routes and multipitches, alongside a wide spread of much harder climbing and even potential for bolting and new routes.
So what are you waiting for?
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