People often comment on us being lucky with the weather (occasionally intimating a pact with you-know-who). Luck doesn’t really come into it – It’s more a question of a) stacking the cards in our favour (by going to sunny places), b) being prepared to shuffle them (by chasing the sun) and c) informing both a) and b) with a lot of browsing of forecasts! Despite all the above, sometimes there’s just too much cruddy weather to out-run, and we just have to suck it up like everyone else. That’s what just happened 😦

The first day of rain was actually a bit of a relief after seven days climbing – nature’s way of telling you to take a rest day and all that. By day two, not only was it still raining, but the forecast for the next couple of days had cr@pped out too. Time to escape the van before stir-craziness sets in, and we pick Giggerl (hence the post title) as being south facing, 10mins from the road and having some easy routes. Not looking promising parked up beneath the crag…

… but a lull in the rain has us suckered into making a dash for it…

A thermal, a t-shirt, a hoodie and duvet, plus a CAC beannie for good measure, and still barely warm enough…

Helen bravely fires up the rock on Samba, 5a, and all’s well until around half height when the heavens open – not rain, but hail! Not much choice but to press on for the chain as swiftly as possible and then get our soggy selves back to the truck pronto!

A bit of a brightening had us pondering whether to stick or twist, and we braved another disappointment by walking up to Montanejos Climbing Garden (not too much of a gamble with a one minute approach!) Fortune favours the brave (or at least the fortunate!) and a patch of blue sky emerged. We managed El Aspirante Vange, 6a, Ole, 5c…

… and a real rainy-day bonus: 100 Days en Leonidio Extension, 7a!

More rain the next day so we deployed the full arsenal of weather apps to convince ourselves that the 90mins drive to Nafplio would yield a sunny afternoon cragging. Heading north along the coast we could see Nafplio clearly across the Argolic Gulf, and sure enough the Neraki and Promenade Sectors were shining like beacons of climbable rock.

… which made it even more annoying to watch the rain fall in the parking area for an hour after our arrival, combined with 40mph winds! Happily the rain stopped and the south facing Promenade was completely sheltered from the northerly wind. We managed a few routes, the best of which were the 4* No Fear, 6a, and Lust auf Mare, 6c. As a bonus we bumped into Mike and Pam and had a good natter and picked their brains on the local climbing scene.

Strictly speaking, walking along the Promenade is banned due to the risk of rock fall (though this is widely ignored) and so climbing is also frowned upon. A “helpful” Greek woman stopped by to explain all this (while acknowledging that she wasn’t allowed to be there herself!) and started making oblique references to the local constabulary – at which point we decided to call it a day rather than outstay our welcome.

A glance back south towards Leonidio suggested we hadn’t missed much there!

Day four of the forecasted wet spell dawned surprisingly bright, and got brighter! Still windy and cool so the huge red south-facing solar collector of Kokkinovrachos was an obvious refuge.

Plenty of fresh snow on the surrounding hills.

… but pleasantly warm on the crag, and we set too, making up for the previous three damp squibs.

Helen did a couple of routes on Douvari including Kefala.

I did the excellent Higgs Bosin, 6c, on RocSpot, with a view to checking out the adjacent Cern, 7a, which 2019 Dom had failed on and recommended a return match – turns out he’s a sandbagging bu@@er!

Further left on Orama, Helen did a couple of the routes from the ledge accessed via a short via ferrata: Marneris, 5c, and Tsitos, 6a

… which also makes for a perfect sunny picnic spot with a pretty decent outlook.

I wrapped up an unexpectedly good day by onsighting NNGH, 7a, in the gathering dusk. Okay, perhaps we ARE lucky with the weather!