Valbona Bouldering

The Valbona Valley National Park (Albanian: Parku Kombëtar i Luginës së Valbonës) is a national park in the Albanian Alps in the northern part of the country. The park covers a total area of 80 km2, encompassing Valbona River and its surrounding areas with mountainous terrain, alpine landscapes, springs, rock formations, waterfalls and the valley itself with its dense forest.It is characterised by its very remote areas which have a large preserved ecosystem all of which is primarily untouched and of pristine quality. Valbona Valley has a great potential to offer in terms of outdoors activities, such as the wonderful trail Peaks of The Balkans, a huge potential for hikes, alpine climbing as well as bouldering.

Boulders are spread all throughout the valley. The currently developed problems are centred around 2 main sectors. One more out in the open on a hillside overlooking the valley, the other more sheltered and a bit more spread out in a lush forest.

There are plenty of options for different kinds of accommodation, from hotels to camping. There are many restaurants in the valley, and also basic groceries can be found. There is no big supermarkets though so we recommend doing any big shopping before entering the valley.

There are two place in Albania where you can rent crashpads:
At the gym 'Rock Tirana' in Tirana. This only makes sense if you're visiting Tirana anyways, or are coming from the airport.
Alternatively Erind Zalli rents out Crashpads in Bajram Curri, the last town before entering the valley. You can contact him through whatsapp at the following number: +355685895020.

Valbona has seen visits, although sporadicly, from climbers for quite some time now. The main focus of those visitor has usually been the bigger walls in the mountains. Nonetheless we're sure people have scrambled around and explored some of these blocs in the past. Notably a German climber, Wolfgang Schussler lived in the valley for some time and established some problems.
The development picked up in 2021 when a group of Albanian climbers from Tirana organised a 10 day trip during which almost 100 lines where cleaned, climbed and documented. This also led to this topo and an edition of the Albanian Climbing Festival being organised in Valbona.
Since then visitors have been adding a few new lines every year. If you're keen to put up a new problem, please get in touch and share the info with us! We're happy to keep updating this topo.