Rock Climbing in Andalucia and Southern Spain

The southern Spanish region of Andalucia offers many excellent rock climbing venues including the world famous gorge at El Chorro.

The vast majority of the rock climbing within Andalucia is on limestone rock, with the odd crag being either slate or sandstone rock. Virtually all of the routes are bolted though some do require traditional gear such as nuts and cams. With the exception of El Chorro, the routes are mainly single pitch, with the odd 2 or 3 pitch routes available.

Situated only 50 Km inland from Malaga, the rock climbing area of El Chorro consists of a huge gorge, which offers some fantastic rock climbing with its own unique atmosphere. Here alone there are over 650 routes, at all grades and up to 10-pitches long. Click here for more information on rock climbing at El Chorro.

To the north and east of Malaga there are several excellent crags other than El Chorro. These include such as Desplomilandia, Torcal de Antequera and Archidona , Turon , and San Bartolo on the coast. Each of these crags offer 100's of bolted sport routes on limestone rock (except San Bartolo which is sandstone), and across a good range of grades. Click here to find more information about rock climbing around Malaga.

In recent years, rock climbing around Granada has grown substantially and now offers 16 significant crags with well over 2,000 routes across all grades. Some of the largest crags are Los Cahorros, just South of Granada, with over a dozen buttresses forming a bowl at the end of a valley, Los Vados, quite close to the beach, with amazing high walls, as well as Alfacar, right outside of Granada. These areas offer around 300 routes each, with both single and multi-pitch routes to choose from. Plus there are a few more amazing sport climbing crags to explore, click here to find out more information about rock climbing around Granada.

Around Cadiz there are a number of crags, with the largest being San Bartolo, Benaocaz, and Grazalema. San Bartolo is the most extensive crag with around 250 routes, whilst Grazalema is the most impressive with multi-pitch routes up to 230m long. Click here to find out more information about rock climbing around Cadiz.

Close to Jaen there a number of crags with a total of over 350 routes, which are mainly single pitch sports routes on limestone rock.

The rock climbing around Cordoba and Sevilla is not as concentrated as the rest of the region. Though there are still some good crags to be found, particularly at Espiel, which offers over 230 routes with a good selection of grades.

The best time of year to visit Andalucia to go rock climbing is from the autumn through to the spring. With the Sierra Nevada Mountains rising to 3,500m above Granada it is also possible to mix some skiing and rock climbing on the same trip!

There are various guidebooks that cover the rock climbing and sport climbing in Andalucia and El Chorro. These are as follows:

The "Granada Sport Climbing Guidebook" covers 16 sport climbing areas and over 2,600 routes around Granada.

The “Andalucia Sport Climbing Guidebook” describes over 3,600 routes in the Andalucia region across a wide range of grades. This includes crags around Malaga, Marbella, Granada, Cadiz, and Jean.

The "El Chorro Rock Climbing Guidebook" is the comprehensive guidebook for El Chorro, Desplomilandia, and Valle De Abdalají, covering more than 1,500 routes across a wide range of grades.  Published in 2024 it is the most recent guidebook available for the area, and hence has the most up to date information regarding access to the crags in the gorge. 

There are also several dedicated sport climbing guidebooks for Malaga and Cadiz. These are called “Malaga Sport Climbing Guidebook”, “Rock Climbing in Southern Malaga Guidebook” and “Cadiz Rock Climbing Guidebook”.

Buy all of these rock climbing guidebooks for Andalucia from our shop.