UKH

Hi all,

I'm in Mallorca for 3 days next week with my wife and keen for some easy DWS. I'd be happy up to 6cish probably but my head isn't great for high top-outs! Any recommendations? I've got the old guidebook and downloaded the app but can't seem to filter by grade.

Thanks

Santanyi (DWS)

Virgin area at Cala Sa Nau might be worth a look Cala Sa Nau

Theres also some great beachside traverses at Cala Sa Nau + a low but good beachside dws crag at Cala Mitjana 

Second the Virgin area at Cala Sa Nau and Santanyi. Also nice traverse at Cala Serena. If your head gets a bit better you can try Cala Marcal.  

If it's just the two of you, thinking about safety it might be best to make sure you're somewhere busy?

Cala Barques has a few easier routes to go at in the first cave, and if you're going up to 6c then Hercules is a stunning route for the grade and not very high.

Thanks all. Is the best guide for these places the Rockfax or are there better topos?

You'd like to think so  but alas it doesn't always work like that. I was soloing alone ( tautology much?) at Portland one choppy day when a few other groups showed up.  One guy fell off a harder route and swam about a bit. After a long time (10-20 minutes I guess) I realised he wasn't coming out. Every time he approached the exit point he'd sink into a wave trough, see the next peak towering above him, shit himself and swim back out to tread water for a while.  His mates did f'ck all as he got weaker and weaker.

In the end I threw him the life jacket that I had, rigged an abseil and went down for him...

Was deeply scary trying to rig the rope so that I'd be just in reach of him at max wave amplitude but not battered.

We did a few false starts then eventually we managed to clutch each other and hold on for grim death as the wave receded.  Then we sorted something to get him up the rope.

A real lesson to us all about how dangerous the conditions were that day, but at least I'd gone into it knowing that I was on my own if it went wrong.  This bloke's mates clearly weren't...

Some people do just jump in and don't think about it. I have always rigged a flotation device and a roped or laddered exit point as well as check conditions. I think DWS should have the group making a safety call with all members assisting with safety first and then climbing second.  With this in mind, we have not had any incidents, but without it's easy to see what could happen.  

 I would go with the Rockfax one for obvious reasons. 

That's true.

I once got winded and knocked unconscious at Cala Barques when it was busy, came round quite a long way down, swam to the surface to be faced by people peering at me from the base of the crag and saying "you were down a long time". Not one person had entered the water.

I've been a bit more careful about going a muerte without people I know and trust very well around since then!