The Big Wall of Dead´s Gorge is grandiose. It must catch the attention of every climber passing by. We were no exception many years ago, but it took us until 2019 to open first routes there. The wall is about 80 meters high, but only the first pitches are done. Routes in the left and center parts of the wall are accessible from big shelf 2-3 meters wide. The access to the shelf is protected with bolts and there are bolts on the shelf for the belayer. The routes are very well protected with bolts, rappel stations at the end of every route are made of two anchors connected with chain and with steel biner.
Limestone in this part of canyon is of good quality, however, you can see on the material that it is influenced by a combination of salty air, windy and rainy conditions in the winter period and very hot weather in summer. Limestone is mostly smoothe, not sharp. Your fingers will be happy with this material.
Exposition: The wall is situated to the east, so after 13.30 it is in shade. During summer 2019 it was possible to climb to 9.30 a.m., then take a rest a swim in small lakes lying at the bottom of the canyon and then go again to climb in the afternoon. There is one big stone next to the lakes, we created there a few short routes just for fun while resting.
Gorge of the Dead belongs to the local group of crags surrounding the villages of Xerokambos and Zakros. There are at least ten canyons, that are close to each other and where climbing can be developed. Xerokambos has six of them, Zakros has three. Currently climbing is at the beginning here, only a tiny part of all possibilities is exploited.
This local cluster of crags has the potential to become one of the best climbing areas in Greece and this potential is still waiting to be discovered. Our Zakros team is working here hard, however, we are only a small group of climbers. We will be very happy to invite every climber to our team to help us in our effort.
Climbing in Dead´s Gorge has its history we are not the first climbers that work there. There are some climbing routes at the entrance of the canyon in the village of Kato Zakros. We do not know exactly when these routes were created, we can only estimate that they are at least 15-20 years old. There is about ten routes on both sides of canyon, bolts look rusty. Good, safe anchors at the end of the routes are sometimes nonexistent.
We started to make our routes in the summer of 2019, we have worked in this big wall which is not far away from the side entrance to the canyon, we named this crag "Big wall". Our second crag which is not far away from these first routes made in Dead´s Gorge is also in Kato Zakros village, close to these beautifull beaches of Kato Zakros, we named this crag "Kato Zakros Cave".
