Bouldering in Varazze

After staying in Chiavari, we decided to go a bit bouldering in Varazze. The number of boulder problems is amazing. All of the problems are described in this guidebook. For each crag at least one picture is provided.

Unfortunately, the weather was not that good. It did not rain, but the humidity was very high due to the clouds coming from the sea. Therefore, the rocks were very slippery in the Potala area. Might be that we have decided on the wrong season. This might be the reason for being alone on the craigs. The guidebooks describes parking spaces, which revealed to be more of being single parking lots.

Being in Varazze and in Fontainebleau within the same year, I personally prefer Fontainebleau. Let me point out the differences:

  • Terrain: Varazze is in a very hilly terrain, whereas Fontainbleau is pretty plain.
  • Gound: Varazze is more in forest with a soil ground. Fontainbleau has more sand
  • Parcours: Fontainbleau has thie nice kind of parcours that I personally like very much.
  • Kids: For our 10 months old son, Fontainebleau was a bit less dangerous. In particular the chestnut trees in Varazze and the spiky shells of their fruits are not that good for crawling around.

P1080172 (1024x768)Varazze Potala Sector

Italian Riviera – Chiavari

We recently stayed in the Olive Press Lodge in Chiavari. It was a very cozy place and allowed us to relax. We arrived during the harvesting of olives, which seems to be a very hard and labour-intensive business. The owners of the lodge sold freshly pressed home-made olive-oil to us. Very delicious.

From the lodge it takes only 10 to 15 minutes to the city center of Chiavari, which is a small, but enjoyable town.

We also visited Cinque Terre. Unfortunately, it was not possible to walk from city to city with strollers. We thought it must be possible to walk from Riomaggiore to Manarola. But the path is closed since 2013. I suppose it will not be opened again.

Pictures can be found here.