Blog Posts in Category: Austria

Similaun

Alastair BegleyAlpinism, Austria Short Link

With a short weather window in the very unsettled summer we decided to climb Similaun which sits high above Vent in the Sölden valley. I have actually climbed the Similaun before, as when I was in Sölden 20 years ago on a family holiday I climbed it with my parents and our family friends. Due to the unsettled weather we were not able to wait for a nice day for the walk in, which meant that we got very wet on the dull walk in from Vent to the Martin Busch Hütte. Thankfully the walk wasn’t too long, and we were soon in the warmth of the hut and able to enjoy some warm drinks and beer. Following Covid it was strange being back in a hut, sharing a table with strangers and not having any mask requirement. Unfortunately all the small rooms were booked, so we were in the lager room in the roof which didn’t even have a window! The next morning we woke up to clear skies and beautiful views, we had decided to climb Similaun via the Marzellklammspitze as this meant that we walked up a. Read the full article…

Piz Buin and Dreiländerspitze

Alastair BegleyAlpinism, Austria Short Link

Previously alpine mountaineering was firmly limited to the main holiday of the year, but having moved to Munich it is now possible to do it over a weekend, this was a concept that I spent a large amount of the weekend being amazed by! We stayed at the Wiesbadener Hütte for two nights, with an aim of climbing Piz Buin on the first day, and Dreiländerspitze on the second day if the weather was perfect. After weeks of wondering if the snow was ever going to go away, and then it being far too hot, we were lucky to have a perfect weekend with relatively cool temperatures and excellent weather. It was a brilliant weekend with great company, excellent mountains, sometimes challenging card games in a wonderful mountain hut environment with a friendly guardian. Walk In After finishing work slightly early, but evidently not early enough, we drove down to the Bielerhöhe in the Silvretta Alpen. This was an excellent place to start a walk in as the car park was at 2040m, which significantly reduced the ascent. Unfortunately there was a considerable amount of traffic on the drive down,. Read the full article…

Kohlbergspitze

Alastair BegleyAustria, Walking Short Link

With a good forecast for the day Rob and I headed back to Austria to enjoy our access to the bigger mountains. While we wanted to enjoy the bigger mountains, we had to be careful not to head too high due to the amount of snow. We elected to do the Kohlbergspitze which is between Bichlbach and the Plansee. This was the weekend where I have switched from my winter boots to trainers, and I really hope I don’t need to go back, it was so much more enjoyable being out in soft, light trainers! The route we decided to do was a round tour, which went up a scramble which we hoped would be ok with the snow. As it was south facing and it looked OK from the valley, we decided to go for it. The ascent out of the valley was brutal, between leaving the main valley path and getting to the summit there was 1150m of ascent in 4km! We made good time up the path in the woods and soon separated from the main track. As we walked along and ascended above the treeline the. Read the full article…

Vorderunnütz

Alastair BegleyAustria, Walking Short Link

Poor weather dominated most of the bank holiday weekend in Bavaria, however thankfully there was a brief abatement to the rain in the mountains from Sunday evening to Monday late morning. After enjoying sunset at Ammersee last night, Rob and I made the most of the easing of restrictions and headed over the Austrian border to the Achensee. Our peak was the Vorderunnütz, which turned out to be a lovely walk with excellent views of the local Austrian peaks. Given the rain which was forecast from 11, we met relatively early at 7:30 expecting to get fairly wet on the descent, but hoping to get to the summit before the rain. Despite a number of photo stops, we made excellent time on the ascent over 1100m in just over 2 hours, which certainly got the blood flowing! Despite the lack of sunlight, the views were excellent as the air was clear, and it was great to be out in another new area. We could see the weather closing in as we started the descent, but due to a quick descent we were almost back before the rain really set in.. Read the full article…

Seehorn Nordwestgrat

Alastair BegleyAustria, Rock Climbing Short Link

Despite it looking very unlikely earlier in the week, on Saturday George and I headed down to Sankt Ulrich am Pillersee in Austria to climb the north west ridge of the Seehorn (Nordwestgrat/Astenriedlgrat). I started my day with a very early train journey from Munich to Kufstein. It was a beautiful morning with a brilliant sunrise, just a shame the only chance I had to photograph it was at a train station! After meeting George in Kufstein a short drive took us to the start of the route, which looked a long way above us! During the first 3.2km we ascended over 1000m, thankfully most of the ascent was in the woods so we were out of the morning sun. When we emerged from the woods we were treated to brilliant views over the Austrian mountains, there is certainly a lot to do here! The traverse around to the start of the route was fairly awkward and poorly marked, but with only a few wrong turns we were soon at the start of the climb. Unfortunately at this point the cloud rolled in and we lost our views, which as. Read the full article…

Reintalersee Klettersteig

Alastair BegleyAustria, Via Ferrata Short Link

Having moved to Munich last weekend this was my first opportunity to make the most of living an hour from the Alps. Adam and I headed into Austria to the Reintalersee. As it was a forecast to be a really hot day, and to avoid the traffic we set off very early. Given how hot it was in the afternoon, and how many people were on the klettersteig by the time we finished this was definitely a good idea. The route had a short and reasonably steep walk in, followed by a fairly steep start. Unfortunately the route involved lots of ’cable pulling’ rather than rock climbing, but it was still enjoyable with excellent views. As it was our first route in a while we decided not to go for the hard “E” variant and just to stick to the normal route. This meant we were able to enjoy a lovely traverse in an outstanding position with fantastic views, which as made even better as it was in the shade! Soon we harder route rejoined our route and we just had one final section to do, which again was fairly. Read the full article…

Reinhard Schiestl Klettersteig

Alastair BegleyAustria, Via Ferrata Short Link

With a morning weather window we decided to climb our local klettersteig as we could easily walk to it from our campsite. The route was called the Reinhard Schiestl Klettersteig, and it was graded “D” which meant that it was much harder than the previous route. The route started off as it meant to continue, with steep and strenuous climbing from the off. The hardest bits actually seemed technically easier than some of the easier bits, but just very exposed. Despite some drizzle on the ascent we made excellent time to the top of the route, and managed to descent back down to the campsite before it started to properly rain.

Wildspitze Traverse

Alastair BegleyAlpinism, Austria Short Link

The Wildspitze was the main objective from our trip to the Sölden in Austria. I had intended to climb some other peaks first to acclimatise, however the weather had other ideas! We set off from a village high above Sölden called Vent. The day started with two chairlifts which gained us a considerable amount of height. We had elected to walk to the hut via another peak, the Wildes Mannle, this was a fairly short outing as lift station to hut only took us two hours. However it did get us a bit more mileage in our legs, and gave us a good view of the glacier that we would be crossing the next morning. After a lovely evening at the hut with fantastic evening light, good company and good beer we had an early night in the luxury of a 2 bed room. The next morning we woke up to dense fog which meant that we thought we were going to have to change our route to the normal route instead of the Rofenkarferner route. Thankfully after breakfast the cloud broke, so we were able to stick with our. Read the full article…