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[TR] Antalya area, Turkey - 12/20/2010


Rafe1234

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Trip: Antalya area, Turkey -

 

Date: 12/20/2010

 

Trip Report:

In August this last year my girlfriend Misty moved to Turkey to take a teaching job. Obviously I would go and visit, and turns out there happens to be some nice climbing there as well!

 

We left Istanbul for our tour of Southwest Turkey on Mistys first day of winter break, Dec 19th. Our first destination was Olimpos and neither her nor I knew anything about the climbing there. The Antalya region guidebook is pretty vague as well.

 

Olimpos is pretty much a spring/summer tourist trap built around ancient ruins also boasting miles of rocky gorgeous beaches and coastline. In winter though, it's completely deserted.

 

We decided to climb first at a cliff named Cennet, meaning heaven in english. After passing an ancient fortress on the trail to Cennet, you pop out of the trees with a full view of the gently overhanging limestone wall.

 

With long routes on beautifully featured rock, turqoise ocean behind you and a 3 mile sunny sandy beach 10 minutes back down the trail, I can see why they call it heaven.

 

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Cennet

 

DSCF20271.JPGDSCF2120.JPGDSCF2089.JPGDSCF2054.JPGp><p> We continued our tour around southwest Turkey and I was amazed at how much rock there is here, cliffs and mountains of untouched limestone...that probably never will be touched. There is also an amazing amount of ancient Roman ruins. I

 

 

 

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Our last climbing destination was in Geyikbayiri (sounds like geek-bayer). We'd tried to get accomodations here but everything was full so we rented a car and just went for a day. Turns out this is quite the Euro sport climbing destination! The crags are roadside, the weather is great year round, and the rock is really cool. As one might imagine with all of the available lodging full, it was rather busy. Everywhere I looked I saw young, wafer thin Euros sporting dreadlock mullets and sending .13+. The popular crags though, are everything you would want from a high end limestone cave-style crag. Fins, pockets, stalactites, mini-caves, etc. The area is quite new but is already very polished, on the popular routes anyways.

 

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Turkey has a lot of really good climbing, but It's a long ways away from the U.S. to be any sort of American climbing destination, I think. Which might explain why we met only one other American climber there. Although, I wouldn't dissuade someone who wanted to check it out.

 

 

 

Gear Notes:

At least a 35m rope, and a bunch of draws.

 

Approach Notes:

$850 plane ticket, at least. You'll either have to ride a bus everywhere or rent a car. If you get a car, bring your rally car gloves and a cool head, and get ready to pay $12 a gallon for gas. They don't have street signs either by the way.

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If anybody ever heads over there again, get in touch...i lived there a loooong time and did a ton of climbing over there. BTW, the "... cliffs and mountains of untouched limestone...that probably never will be touched" in the areas you were in have been heavily investigated... :)

 

Did you go to the alpine bouldering area above Geyikbayiri? Have they finally started developing the back side?

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