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Reviews - Guidebook: Versante Sud Arco Rock - Heason Events

Guidebook: Versante Sud Arco Rock

6th Jun 2006

Arco Rock

Featuring Sarca Valley, Trento, Roverto, Giudicarie Valleys & Brenta Dolomites.
Written by Matio Manica, Antonella Cicogna & Davide Negretti

Reading the blurb inside the back cover you could be forgiven for thinking that the Italians invented the sport of rock climbing! It goes something like this:

"This is an indispensable guide to an indispensable destination. What would the European climbing scene be today without the crags that have developed between Lake Garda and the Sarca valley? On these welcoming rocks personalities such as Manolo, Bassi and Mariacher have written the history of the sport"

So the Italians are prone to a little exaggeration in their prose. Nothing new there then. To us Brits sport climbing in Italy is a little old hat these days. We prefer rocky islands in the Med. However there's no denying that Italy hosts some of the best climbing destinations in the world and Arco is one of them.

This guide covers the climbing in and around Arco, stretching as far afield as Breguzzo in the West, Vigo di Ton in the North, La Vela in the East and Brentonico in the South - a whacking great 80 individual areas in all. 305 nicely finished matt pages of decent quality topos and reasonable photos. In addition be warned that full page adverts are common throughout.

A scan of the map page in the guide.

By far the best thing about this book (to us Brits) is the fact that it is written entirely in English. Printed in April 2006 it is as up to date as you could possibly hope for and I for one am very much looking forward to heading out to check out what all the fuss is about.

Retails at 24.9Euros which isn't bad at all for an English guide to a foreign crag.