We chose to climb the Große Ochsenwand (or Schlicker) Klettersteig today, as it was a beautiful but very hot day and we thought that getting up high would help reduce the impact of the heat, how wrong we were. It was also a route without much time for being slow, as the guidebook time was 7 hours, and there was only 7.5 hours from first lift to last lift!
The day started with a frustrating loss of 200m of height as we descended towards our objective. The descent was very straight forwards, however finding the ascent was not. The guidebook said there was a well travelled path, but we certainly could not find one initially across the scree field, we eventually found some faded red paint spots and then found a more substantial path.
We were very hot by the time we got to the base of the route, and for the vast majority of the route, but this did not take away from the enjoyment of a wonderful route up the huge face, with brilliant views down the valley and of the large rock faces around us. The route was long with 700m of vertical ascent, so by the time we were at the top we were certainly ready for some lunch.
After our brief lunch we set off on the descent, which involved a reasonable amount of down climbing on a klettersteig, before we traversed to rejoin a walking path. As we rejoined the walking path we were a bit concerned as it said that it was 2 hours to the alm, which was 3km from the lift station, and we had 2hrs 10mins until the last lift. Thankfully this sign was very pessimistic, and we were at the alm, enjoying a cold drink in just over an hour.
A quick walk down an easy track took us to the lift station in under guidebook time, to finish a brilliant but very hot day out in the mountains.
Max elevation: 2678 m
Min elevation: 1402 m
Total climbing: 869 m
Total descent: -1563 m
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