PORTUGAL - SPORT ONSIGHT BOULDERING - PEDRA DO URSO

POSITION: Just near the town of Covilha in central Portugal. The blocs are scattered all over a high plateau at 850m, so it is a lot cooler than the surrounding area. They get snow in winter and cool well in the evening, plus clear nights bring an excellent boulders chill to the rock for the following day.

300 Blocs with all grades of problems. This is a mountain granite area, where the blocks tend to be rounded and are about 4-5 metres high. Some are larger but invariably they tend to be even blanker and offer exceptionally difficult problems. A lot of the boulders have undercut bases to give some very good sitting starts.

We cover a lot of the good problems just by the car parking in our guide, which have been enjoyably sampled by Ben Moon and Jerry Moffatt. (Ben Moon on Rosa Negra 7b+).

Nearby are the mountains of the Serra Estrella that offer excellent hill walking, along with some classic mountaineering rock routes.