The Hautes Alps are situated between Gap (to the south west), Grenoble (to the north west) and the Italian border (to the west). The rock climbing is situated around the towns of Briancon, L'Argentiere-la-bessee & Guillestre, and includes 11 major rock climbing areas. The area is sometimes referred to as the Southern Alps and enjoys better weather than the Northern Alps around Chamonix and is considerably quieter.

All the rock climbing is in a compact area making it very easy to travel from one area/crag to the other. The area is dominated by the 4,000m+ peak of Massif Des Ecrins plus several other 3,000m+ peaks, giving 1,000's of Alpine routes across all grades. There is also around 1,500 sports climbing from single pitch to multi-pitch up to 600m long - of which the majority is well bolted. Again there is a wide choice of grades to choose from. There is also an excellent bouldering area near Ailefroide. The type of rock here is very varied from limestone, conglomerate, Quartz, granite to Gneiss - offering many different styles of rock climbing.

There is a guidebook available covering the sports routes and some classic Alpine routes in the Haute Alps called "Grimper, dans le Haut-val Durance". Buy this guidebook from our shop.

For accommodation and rock climbing guides/instruction look no further than AlpBase, who are well established in the area.