Easter trip to Tessin, the climbing

We wanted to make the most of the Easter break and it looked like the weather was going to be better south of the Alps, so we headed down to Tessin to do some climbing. We stayed in Locarno and just took the bus to nearby climbing or hiking areas.

This was our first time climbing in Tessin and we both really enjoyed doing the gneiss slabs!

The climbing, difficulties and route names from either "Plaisir Sud" or the SAC Kletterfuehrer for Tessin. Unless otherwise indicated, we both lead-climbed each route.

Thursday afternoon, Ponte Brolla

• Jimmy 4b
• Pino 4c (greg lead on the first pitch) then 4c/5a/3b (multi-pitch)
• Bionda 5b (just greg failing here: getting over the first step was too much)
• Chiara 5a
• Rosso 4a/4a/4b/4a/4b

 


Friday, Ponte Brolla

• Salamandra 3b
• Azzuro 4b
• Chritin 4b+
• Schogsii 4c (both lead) then 4c/4a (multi-pitch)
• Sunneblueme 5a (Andrea only)
• Gero 4b
• Trio 4b (both lead, then greg did it wearing his hiking boots for the practice)
• Coccodrillo 4a

Sunday, Arcegno
Sector Rotaus:

• Rote Schlüfi (4a)
• Mamma li Turki (top rope) (5b)
• Bambela (4a)

After finishing those things were starting to get crowded, so we walked past a few other sectors (full!) to get to the one furthest from the street. As hoped, there were a lot fewer people there.

Sector Ruino:

• Ruino (4c)
• nicotina mon amour (4c)
• zululubambalu (4c)
• calypso melody (5a)
• kottolengo kante (5a)
• samba pâté (4c)
• artore (5c+) both top rope 
• la zota (5a)
• vampiro dal nero mantello (5c+) Andrea top rope, greg lead
• la petrolleuse (5b)
• Survi (5c) Andrea top rope
• il Volo di Marco (5c+) greg lead

Monday, Ponte Brolla
We got moving pretty early so that we could do the whole wall up to the Rovine del Castelliere multi-pitch without being in a crowd. There are multiple ways to do this; we opted for a pretty easy one:

• Joggi (4a)
• Coniglio (4a/3a as one pitch)
• Farfalla (4b/4c)
• Congilio (3b/3c/3b)

Not particularly challenging, but very fun climbing and a great lunch spot at the top. Since we got an early start, we only saw two other climbers. From the top it was a nice walk back down to Ponte Brolle and the bus back to Locarno.

Climbing the Oberbuchsiten Platten

The weather report wasn't great for the Alps, so we'd figured we'd go do a bit of climbing in the Jura. The slabs outside of Oberbuchsiten have been on our list for a while as a good place to go practice our multi-pitch technique. We assumed that we'd have the place more or less to ourselves given the fact that we got there early and that it is still March. Hah! wrong!

slabs near Oberbuchsiten, with area of multi-pitch routes at the left

We arrive at the wall and the parking lot is already more than half full. The klettergarten area has a group of adults and kids and, horror of horrors, the half of the wall on the other side of the waterfall, the one with the multi-pitch routes, is also full of kids. ack! Luckily there is one route free (the rightmost one). We take that one.

We're into it enough now that the climbing is pretty easy (max 4c, not too steep, excellent footing, hands really required only for balance), so we can focus more on the multi-pitch aspects and dealing with the rope. It's fun climbing, despite the cold (it's not a warm day and the sun isn't out yet). We make it up the five pitches in around an hour. We're five minutes too late to be the first ones down the abseil route. Rather than wait for the large group of kids to finish, we opt to walk down.

Back at the bottom all the routes are open, so we opt to go up again. This time we take the leftmost route, which is just as fun as the other was. It's not challenging, but boy is it fun. This time we're also alone at the top, so we can do the abseil route without waiting. It takes us a couple of transitions to get this smooth too, but by the time we get to the bottom we've got it mostly down.

Andrea following Greg's lead

After lunch we think about going up again, but it's a bit crowded again, so we opt to just head home.

On snowshoes from Gstaad via Lauenen to Lenk

just a reminder, text to come

Day 1:

Day 2:

St. Imier to Courtelary via the Chasseral

After a long run of weekends with absolutely crap weather, we finally got one where things were at least acceptable. The forecast called for an overcast morning clearing up in the afternoon. So off we went to do some snowshoeing in the Jura. We've started a trip here before (and ended one as well), but this is our first winter trip.

We start our way out of town and then head up, up, up for a while before needing to put on the snowshoes. Then it's up some more, cross a ski-slope (well a road that people are skiing down), lunch under a tree (still no sun) and then up, up some more until we hit the ridge. For the last bit we can smell the french fries cooking at the hotel up top, so there's nothing for it but to stop for some fries and beverages. After the nice break, we head along the ridge to the Chasseral before starting the long descent to Courtelary. At around 5pm the sun finally makes itself visible. Yay! a bit of sun!

It was great to get out and move our legs, even if the weather didn't play along.

finally, sun and blue sky

SAC Avalanche Course 2015

This year's avalanche course took place near the Furkapass.

Conditions were not optimal: the avalanche situation was orange for most of the Alps (the rest was red) and the weather on Saturday was not so good (lots of snow and otherwise overcast). The forecast for Sunday was ok though.

After the long trip to Realp, we stopped for a coffee while we waited for the guide and the instructors to meet us. After they showed up and a bit of intro, we headed off into the snow. The conditions were really not particularly good: you couldn't really see much of anything because of the snow. At the Hotel Galenstock we took a break that ended up being fairly long: the next stretch is up the slope, we're supposed to maintain 10m distance because of the avalanche danger, so this ends up taking a while (would have been great to see this procession in the sun: 50 people zig-zagging their way up the slope, stretched out over 500m). Once up top we follow the shelf down to the Hotel Tiefenbach, where we settle in and then do some prep for the next day.

through the snow

On Sunday morning the sky is blue, the weather is good, it's awesome! As we get ready to set out. Greg notices that one of his snowshoes has broken (they lasted 6+ years... not too bad), fortunately Manuela has some zip ties that we can use to hold it together, so Greg gets to continue. The day is spent tramping around and doing various exercises. The weather's great, the snow is nice, we have fun and learn some stuff. Finally we make our way back down to Realp to start the long ride back.

on the way to the Schafberg