Grade black – day 5

Beautiful start to the day – weather fantastic and scenery outstanding. We already at 2200m altitude and with three mountain “jochs” to cross we set out with a spring in our steps. How wrong can you be! First crossing fine, some ropes and warily crossing steep snow.  

Boys settled in to a mountain maths session between the rocks.  

Then on to cross Rosskarscharte with steep drops, scree, snow and ropes. Unfortunately part of the rope disappeared under the snow so a precarious work-around was required. When Guy later referred to it as “sketchy” I felt less of a wimp. Abseiling was never my thing! 

   We Lunched in the shelter of a large rock, used the solid fuel cooker for home–made soup (fantastic). 

 The final crossing turned out to be the most hair-raising experience for me; a long and very steep descent over crumbling rock and scree. Some ropes but mostly disintegrating or washed-away path. Needed a change of underpants after that one!  Needless to say – no pictures of that route!

 Finally reached Wurtemberger Haus, relatively early so we able to sort ourselves out at leisure. Not busy and provisioned only by helicopter. Great supper on the sun deck overlooking the world. Later played cards until a thunderstorm arrived big time. Stunning to watch, kept boys fascinated for ages. I headed for bed and read the description for tomorrow 😕 not a recipe for a good nights sleep.

Boot-legging: day 4

Like most things, it started easy and ended tough. We needed to descend to Imst to get new boots for Guy. So starting from our very nice hut that we had worked so hard to reach, we embarked on 30 mins of uphill along a cliff side path 

 Reached a working ski-lift which descended for ages to a lower station, then another lift to upper Imst and a half hour hike to town.  

  Found a knowledgable sports shop (nice change) so Guy now chuffed in his new Meindls. The hard part was then finding a bus to a nearby town from where we would start our ascent. It then took us 5 hours of non-stop uphill to climb 1300 metres to Steinsee Hütte. En-route passed a massive stone quarry. Maybe that’s the wrong description because there are literally trillions of tons of stone scree on the lower slopes. We were all finished by the time we got to the hut. Quite busy with a load of big school kids from a nearby town. 

 Our dinner on the balcony was surprisingly good considering that this in an inaccessible but. Even jeep track to lower reaches had been washed away. Soup starter, lasagne and pudding. All happy. Guy collapsed in bed early. Liam read his book outside and later we chatted. Nice end to the day. And.. I got a proper shower AND washed my clothes. We all smelt like polecats on arrival 😋 The boys not quite up this clothes washing yet, so polecats again tomorrow!

Sore legs & blisters – Day 3

Change of plan. We need to hike out to  civilisation to get new boots for Guy. Heading to Muttekopfhütte instead, which involves another descent to a busy road crossing (ugh) at Hahntenjoch.  Loads of bikers passing. Apparently some 14000 BMW bikers descended on Garmisch this weekend. 

Then once again we disappeared into the hills with another high Joch to cross (2400m). This time cables and footholds and (much worse) loose scree.  

 

Got to Muttekopfhütte by 15:30 to everyone’s delight.  Beer and apfelstrudel revived us.   

 
Although this hut was built around 1890 it has been modernised to being almost an hotel.  Electricity was welcome because the solar charger not working with my phone or GPS. 

Boys headed off to explore nearby cliff before dinner.  That too was the best meal so far.   Schnitzel, just to make Ross envious!!    

 
  
Card games followed. Now we all have sore leg muscles.  Tomorrow we drop down off the mountain to Imst to shop for boots, then abandon civilisation again for the next week. 

Killer day 2

  • If I had known how difficult today would be I might have planned it differently. After a Jungle Oats start to the day we made steep 400 vertical climb to Loreascharte. Outstanding view of a vast valley below. Only problem being that we had to  climb steeply down a loose stone path that damn near killed my legs and which went on forever.   
  • That was the theme of the day- about 20kms which included 1200m of vertical ascent PLUS 1200m of descent. Even Guy’s boots disintegrated and eventually (believe it or not) he was hiking in my Crocs! We crossed rivers, rock screes and snow in +30c temperatures.  At around 16:00 we still had to clear this valley and climb over the mountain with few hundred meters vertical descent on other side.  
  • Snow crossings a bit hairy due to risk of caverns underneath   
  • We finally got to the hut after 10 hours. It was a busy place with loads of kids around. Clearly there must be another easy route here.    Unlike last night when we played cards (game called sh..head?), tonight we were all finished and all hit bed after dinner.   
  • Suffice to say that I am enormously proud of my grandsons who kept at it till the end without a murmur of complaint! 

Lorea Hütte

Very happy to make it.  Greeted at hut by seasoned old hiker who made sure we understood all the rules before we got through the door.  To his credit, he made us a huge pot of fruit tea which went down amazingly!   

  
Made our own supper tonight.  Freeze-dried won the day.   
I assume these are Edelweiss 

 Going to be an early night I think….. Still snow around the peaks 
  

The ascent

Great train ride thru forest, these trains have no problem climbing hills it seems.  The thinkers played chess. 

 
Climbed off at Lermoos, a pretty and typical Austrian village.  Missed the Postbus into the hills so taxi it was.   The big slog started when we got to Fernsteinsee.  Relentless steep uphill,  first real break at an open “alm”  

 
More killer uphill. We have now ascended around 700 vertical metres.   Another hour to go.  Tree line has ended, view magnificent.  

 

What a mission!

Day started ok, but I mistakenly assumed that the hostel might keep our excess bags.  No chance, so we lumbered everything to the Station to find that locker hire cannot exceed 72 hours.  Next plan was to hire a car (handy place to store bags at least) – nothing available today.  To make life interesting a thunderstorm engulfed us so wet gear came out quicker than planned.   

 Plan C was to book a hotel for when we return, which turned out to be the friendliest albeit the most expensive option.  The Lech river through the town has a beautiful blueish colour.  

 Finally got to the station, found the pretzel shop while waiting for a really great DB train to take us into the mountains.