On a recent flying visit I made the opportunity to catch up with Serge again and put some much anticipated plans into action! We departed the Munchen zone about midday Friday, Sept 14 and headed for the Garmisch region of Germany in the Bavarian Alps, grabbed some lunch and supplies, checked out the Zugspitzen (Germany's highest peak on the border with Austria) and headed over the pass into Austria. We parked the car at the base of the Hoch-Imst ski resort (Upper Imst) and caught a lift about 4pm. Unfortunately, due to a minor landslide, we couldn't catch the upper lift and were faced with a longer hike in than anticipated. Never-the-less, I was happily sipping my beer on the deck of the hut at 2000m at 6pm.
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| Looking towards ze Zugspitzen and Tirol |
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| Looking back at ze Zugspitzen from the Austrian Side, you can see one of the cable cars on the lower left ridge |
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| Cows still out to pasture despite snow 2 days prior down to 1200m. Serge with about an hour to go. |
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| Looking up the valley, the hut on outcrop in the middle ground, only a few kms to go! |
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| Shot from the same spot but looking down the valley, Imst out of shot waaaay below |
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| Almost there... |
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I can now smell the beer! Not bad for a 'hut'! Our objective for the next morning is
in the background, the ridge running along the left of the main scree field. |
For those unacquainted with Alpine Huts, these joints are pretty much like a hotel but lodge style bunks, shared (hot!) showers etc and most importantly and bar and restaurant! The atmosphere was great and everyone was very friendly. We were able to chat to a few other climbers heading out for similar stuff the next day and got the goss on the best routes from a climber in the local rescue outfit. Turns out he was one of the chief 'route-equippers' for the valley so he gave us a good appreciation of what we could expect.
A night in the hut is 15e, 3 course meal; 15e and it was pretty good! With that in my belly with a few beers the lack of sleep caught up with me and I crashed out about 10.
After a several litres of coffee and a great buffet breakfast we had a slow start from the hut, during the night some cloud had set in and without it, it was pretty damn cold! We set out optimistic for some sunshine, finding ourselves at the base of the route about 10am.
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| Serge has his finger on the pulse and the start of our route |
After talking over beers the night before, we decided to try the 'Melzergrat', an alpine ridge route leading to the Hintere Plattien, the peak in the background. The whole route is 18 pitches plus 250m vert of simul climbing to the peak with the grade ranging from a fun scramble to about a 5 or so (15-16 ewbank?). Whilst we would have loved to top out, our plan was rap off after 14 pitches via the lovely butterfly wall rap route. The butterfly wall is the slab under the cave you can see near the top right of the massif. The whole route would have been a touch ambitious given the shortish days, our fitness and our late start!
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| a few rays of hope! |
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| and I'm off! the start of P1 |
The first 4 pitches of so were quite blocky and wandering so we tried to link a few to keep the ball rolling, at times finding hideous rope drag. By the time we tired of this and tried a little simul-climbing on we found ourselves at some proper climbing which we were content to pitch normally.
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| Yours truly following somewhere in the lower parts |
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| a thought provoking drop beneath my feet, Serge was stoked to belay me off some pebble attached by moss |
Things continued in a similar fashion until a very exposed traverse led us to a perfectly timed lunch ledge...
After lunch, the sun came out and the real climbing started, exposure was the name of the game but also some nice cracks, crumbly traverses, face climbing (thanks serge) and some very blank slab traverses.
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| for some reason this pitch was quite memorable |
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| the view from the end of it... the start was the far pillar |
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| meanwhile, the views kept unrolling! |
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| I'm there somewhere in my mountain camo outfit climbing a fun corner |
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| Serge following |
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| I'm there somewhere! |
After these harder pitches, things changed a little and we found ourselves traversing along the top of the butterfly slab, the end of our day going up. A few pitches really stood out here, including a rather balancy traverse on a awkward foot ledge with some rather blank supposed hand-holds, this was the crux of the day for me, funnily enough on second! I was pretty stoked to have
not lead that and joined Serge at a sunny belay. Just one simple looking crack and I was happy to have found our
abseil piste and we timed it pretty well too, for it was 6pm and the shadows were getting long.
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| me on the final pitch! |
As things usually are, the simple looking final pitch was steeper and trickier than it looked, being totally knackered didn't help. But it went without too much trouble.
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| the top! |
We were stoked to be at our top and got ready to bail, after taking in the developing alpenglow we started the ~160m to the deck of the butterfly slab. We had good luck and managed no stuck ropes, only a few small tangles however Serge was in the firing line when our ropes knocked a small rock off... A new ding on his helmet and it's no wonder helmets are
de rigueur in the alpine! Serge's experience showed and we were soon on the scree field below, well in the knowledge that getting off these kind of climbs can be more hazardous than the climb itself!
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| Serge bailing off the top |
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| The alpenglow really turned it on! |
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| Serge approaching touchdown, 9hrs after starting! |
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| Getting late! but enough light to not need headlamps back to the hut.. |
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| scree sucks |
Once safely down we headed back to the hut the grab our stuff and since it was 8pm we had dinner at the packed hut. After a beer and some great lasagne we started the walk back to the car... The hut had no room for us so back to Munich we went... The decent to the car took about 1:20 but it was the hardest part of the day, walking down with heavy packs on a steep track was just about enough for my legs! Serge is the man for stepping up and driving home whilst I snored away in the passenger seat! Thanks mate!!
In summary: We walked up about 900m to the climb, climbed about 600m, rapped about 150m and walked down more since the lift was closed, I was shattered!
This has gotta be up there as one of my best days in the mountains and I hope I have many more like it! It was my first time on a rather long multi-pitch and first alpine rock route and I was very thankful for having Serge to guide me and rely upon for his amazing enthusiasm! Cheers mate! Til next time...
