10/20/2007: Cap de la Gallina Pelada: first activity of the group (with 10 participants)
Birth and beginnings
On October 4, 2007, Ánchel decided to found this community through Meetup. At that time there were few groups on Meetup, all of them dedicated to language exchange or technology. This group was the first to carry out sports and outdoor activities through this platform.
The idea was to create a virtual community that would connect people whose hobby was doing activities in the mountains and nature and with an international profile. That is why initially all the contents were published in English. During the first year, the success was such that the organizer limited the number of members to 250 to avoid endless waiting lists.
The main objective of this community was and continues to be to establish a healthy, respectful social dynamic in which everyone feels integrated quickly.
First years
After a few months in which we were still the only group that carried out activities of the nature described above, the founder decided to open the group so that there would be more than one organizer. And so, new organizers joined with the desire to collaborate in this virtual community. With his addition, the limit of members in the group disappeared.
06/26/2008: Ascent to the Cresta de los Vientos
The members of the group were mainly foreigners or people who had lived outside our borders and that is why all the activity was published in English. It was explained to the new organizers that the main objectives of the group were the respect to all members and for the new participants to feel welcome and quickly integrated into it. To do this, the key was having the organizers to talk first with people who were participating for the first time, since those who know the host, in general, already approach him to say hello. In this way, the host of an activity acts as a bridge between new and old members.
With this philosophy, the group grew rapidly. In February 2010 we were already 500 people even though Meetup was still quite unknown in Barcelona. A couple of other groups (already disappeared) that carried out mountain activities had also appeared. About 80% of the members of the group at that time had not been born in Spain.
Natural evolution
From 2010, Meetup began to be known among the inhabitants of Barcelona and the proportion of local members grew rapidly. At the end of 2011 we were already more than 1,200 people, more than 1,900 (and 9 activity hosts) at the end of 2012. In 2012, Josep Pairó joined the group, who soon became the first Co-organizer of the group, thanks to his desire to collaborate and publish activities.
03/17/2012: Activity around Cantonigrós (first activity organized by Josep Pairó)
We were the largest group of outdoor activities in Barcelona and from 2013 more groups began to appear, but most with the desire to do business with these activities. Some of them even used (and keep using) names and denominations very similar to our group. Despite this, the group continued with a non-profit vocation and in 2017 we already exceeded 8,000 members.
In September 2018, Isra joined our group, which gave the group an additional boost. Until then, high mountain activities had been carried out in the group, but the arrival of Isra increased the number and diversity of activities of this type. With all this, in 2020 we reached 11,000 people in the community.
Pandemy
With the irruption of the Covid-19 in our lives in 2020, the activity of the group stopped practically completely. During 2020 and part of 2021, very few activities were carried out and the few that were carried out were highly conditioned by the sanitary restrictions that existed at the time they were carried out.
Back to normal
During 2021 we already recovered the usual activity of the group. In 2022, we grew to more than 13,000 people in the group and 19 event hosts who organized at least two activities a year. The desire to go out was noticeable after the hard period that we had all gone through.
01/20/2019: Taga - Coma d'Olla - Puig Estela(first activity organized by Isra)
At this point, the founder of the group decided in 2022 to start a re-foundation process. The time had come to go one step further and for this he wanted to involve all the event hosts in the process. In parallel, and due to his contributions to the group and desire to collaborate, Isra became the third Co-organizer of the group in 2023.