Cavallers features in the POD Lleida guide and has been on our “to be explored” list since 2014. However, set high in the Pyrenees at 1,800m and without a solar-powered south-facing sector (crags face SE or NW) we’d never found the weather window… Until now! A forecast of 10hrs of sunshine and 17C seemed perfect so we made the 30mins drive up into the Aigüestortes i Estany de Sant Maurici National Park (to give it its full name).

Gorgeous pre-Alpine scenery and the inevitable winding, narrow road (must be bonkers in season)…

… lead to parking beneath the dam (at which point you’re hoping that the engineers did their sums right!)

It had clearly been quite chilly overnight…

… and there was a thin coating of ice across about half of the surface of the reservoir…

Happily, the sun had been at work on Sector Pared Inerte, on the far side of the dam.

The rock is granite with a preponderantly slabby style, and we arrived fully expecting to have to moderate any ambitions. Numerous route names referencing Yosemite and Tuolumne conjured up images of never-ending smears and huge runouts, so it was quite a relief to find that Que bueno que Viniste, 6a, actually had holds on it. Tricky for the grade, but not in a “getting spat off a 5.6” way that sometimes happens in California!

Further right, Caldasbanchel, 6a, brought us back down to earth – much more like slab suffering we’d feared, and Helen sensibly did Insipidus, IV, instead. The crag starts to lose the sun around 1pm at which point it gets cold (there are still snow patches at the foot). There’s a 6c+ and a 7b up this striking steep orange wall, which would merit a return visit.

Even with a leisurely lunch break, you’ve still got a while to wait until Placa Xalmet and Sector Drinking on the other side of the dam come into the sun at around 4pm (the shady area at the foot of the long ramp in the centre of the shot below).

… and seen end-on when the sun has finally arrived.

A nice little snow field at the base at least gave me an extra few inches to get the second bolt clipped on O’taku Mimbante, 6c. Tenuous and slippery!

There’s a tonne of climbing to come back for, with over 500 routes in the definitive guide and numerous MPAs of 250m and more – just need another weather window and a brush-up on my slab technique!