I flew in from Zurich late on Friday night and on Sunday we’d planned to do a ferrata with Mei. On Saturday we went for a bike ride through Collserola avoiding the swine flu as much we could given there was an outbreak a couple of days earlier. We had lunch at my favourite little restaurant in the park and then we completed the route riding down out of the park to the main road and back to Esplugues. Ari was very slow and I kept asking if she was ill. It turned out she was and on Sunday it was just me, Mei, and her friend Juls heading off to do the Ferrata in Montserrat. Ari and I had done it once before in 2019 but not since.
It was a cold and grey winter’s day and Mei drove us cautiously in the centre lane along the highway to the car park. We parked near a restaurant at the end of a dirt road and headed off. It’s easy to get a bit lost looking for the start. Ari and I did also in 2019. This time we had the luxury of a GPS track to follow and soon we were heading through the forest directly towards the tall rock spires of Montserrat region.
We met a guided group near the start speaking some East European language. The ferrata requires that you register with the local authority before doing it and they enforce a limit of ten people per day. This group had most certainly not registered as there were at least eight of them and our group were officially four registered people.
We got our gear on and followed the group up the first few dry waterfalls until the first metal ropes. At the first major climb I suggested to the guide that we continue past to which he reluctantly agreed, thinking we might hold them up. We pulled and hauled our way up the steel ropes. There were good views out of the dry canyon of the rock spires on the other side of the valley and also views down to the plains below. The girls had no problems with the hauling and we moved quickly up through the canyon.
We climbed what we thought was the crux, a long face with a slightly overhanging section near the top, rested and looked out into the valley far below before continuing and coming across another final climb. We were in what must have been a sink hole in the past, a round half-cyclinder like formation. There were a couple of people ahead of us on this section when we arrived but they were soon finished. I climbed the chimney first. This was definitely the crux. I was fairly certain the guided group wouldn’t get to the crux and it seemed very unlikely if they did that they’d be able to do it.
I dropped the rope I’d been carrying down and set up a belay and then first Mei and then Juls climbed it. It was kind of nice to use the rope since I’d been carrying it the whole way, and it was fun to set up the belay. The section required quite a lot of arm strength and the others were happy to be on belay.
We continued past the crux and left the ferrata for a small track that ran first up and then headed back down through the rocky spires. We took a short break and ate before descending and then driving back to Barcelona. A nice trip out but a pity Ari couldn’t join.
More information about the ferrata can be found here https://www.wikiloc.com/via-ferrata-trails/via-ferrata-canal-de-les-dames-montserrat-8764723
