Saint Photis

Kalymnos, GR

Saint Photis is the name of a quaint whitewashed chapel on the southwest coast of Kalymnos. A crag of the same name towers above and around it. Sector Saint Photis was originally created by the Remy Brothers in 2002. About a decade later, many hard new lines were added by Simon Montmory, and a few years thereafter, Simon together with Aris voluntarily rebolted most of the older routes (which had fixe bolts made of aisi 303 stainless steel, not suitable for marine environments). A good yellow wall and an intensely overhanging cave in a peaceful setting. Some parts of the crag have shade all day long. __Busy__ 1/3 __Climbing__ On vertical walls and relatively high-quality rock. At the upper section, in the big cave with the stalactites, are some premium hard routes at absurdly overhanging angles. In 2012, Alexander Megos flashed or climbed most of them on his second go. __Conditions__ Good for most conditions, except hot/humid summer days. Routes in Icare Cave are protected from the rain. __Shade (Exposure: W, NW)__ Until 13:30–16:30. _View of Chapel_ Until 13:30 _Chapel Wall_ Until 14:30 _Icare_ Until 13:30 (wall), until 15:00 (cave) _Spiders_ Until 16:00–16:30 __Kids__ No. The only suitable area for supervised play is at the chapel courtyard. The path has some steep drops, also. __View of Chapel__ is a technical vertical grey wall. Routes are not new, but because they are not climbed often they can still benefit from traffic. In 2015, Jürgen Rohrmann cleaned some of the lines and in the process removed the bolts from routes mareike and mareike ext. __Chapel Wall__ is just to the right of the white chapel, and it features vertical brown rock on the left, and a grey pillar on the right. The quality is good, but the brown rock can sometimes feel soapy or slippery. All routes at Chapel Wall were bolted by the Remy Brothers in 2002–2003. __Icare__ A zone of excellent Kalymnos-quality rock with a large cave and vertical walls. Routes in the cave are tailor-made for those comfortable in the 7c–8c range, while the limestone walls are good for technical climbing from 6a–7c. __Spiders__ is a very peaceful crag with a unique view to the south face of Telendos and shade into late afternoon. The white and brown rock is vertical or slightly overhanging with smooth, occasionally slippery holds. To get to Spiders, from the white chapel continue along the main path (do not go left up to the cave). Follow a cairn and red waymarks to a little path on the left-hand side up to the cliff.
CRAG STATISTICS
60
Routes
5066
meters climbed
220
Zlags
7a
average grade

J F M A M J J A S O N D

Very safe
Rain safe
Parking
Slabs
Vertical
Overhanging
Exposition
5 m.
30 min.

GALLERY