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Solitude, sorrow and solace – a journey in the Dolomites

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The Dolomightiest of Dolomites

I came to the mountains without much of a plan. I was on my own, so could do exactly as I wanted. All I knew was that I yearned for beauty, hiking, and solace. The alps usually deliver, and the Dolomites (roughly the Italian part of the mountain range) are particularly well known for their beauty, so I was fairly certain I’d get the first two.

Solace might be a different story, as for me it’s a part of the world I associate with the end of my marriage, so I was prepared for a few bad memories to resurface. What I hadn’t realized was just how commonplace bad memories are in the region. It was the scene of intense fighting during the Great War, when Austro-Hungarians and Italians wrestled over dominion of the Südtyrol region in valleys and on mountains all over the Dolomites. The former lost to the latter, and Südtyrol passed into Italian hands, but not before battle upon battle had been fought here, with intense suffering as a result.

Even now the scars are there, and the language you use will greatly affect the reaction you get, depending on the mother tongue of your conversation partner. As a local woman in her seventies confided to me (in German): the older generation doesn’t want to learn Italian, because of what happened.

She said it as if it (the first world war) had happened only last year, not over a century ago, but then the very land here still bears the marks to remind people. A case in point: the victorious Italians set about changing all the place names, but the old names still linger, in minds and on maps. And so it is that I set out from Dreizinnenblick/Vista Panoramico Tre Cime to hike up a long, picturesque valley to what is arguably the most recognizable of all features in the alps: Drei Zinnen, or Tre Cime, a constellation of three enormous rocks, that are the poster children of the Dolomites. To me they don’t look like crenellations (German) or chimneys (Italian) so much as three crooked old grave stones, leaning drunkenly on one another.

In a way they are, too, because many a man has perished in their shadows, either trying to climb one of the various routes up the rocks themselves, or in the aforementioned pitched fights. I felt as if I were about to join the ranks of the victims; my heart rate oscillated somewhere between ER and morgue when I finally made it up to the rifugio that sits across from the three giants. I was quite surprised therefore when I saw a lot of people strolling about up there – all the more so because I had set out early, and had hardly seen a single human all the way up the valley. It turns out that on the other side of the Big Three a paved road takes you all the up to the foot of the rocks, and so day trippers come up by coach or car and have a wee bit of a walk around. To me – fainting and damn near going into cardiac arrest – it felt like they were cheating: that’s not how you commune with the mountains!

Refugio vs Tre Cime

Thankfully, not many of those visitors elected to stay the night, which was a stroke of luck for me, as even as it was I only just managed to get one of the very last bunk beds in the rifugio/Hütte (although late in the season, reservations (and cash!) are of the essence, it seems.). After six hours’ hiking, 21km and 2,000 vertical meters, I ate everything in sight, and then promptly fell asleep around eight, still wearing my clothes.

The next day I set out earlier still, traversing the sella (saddle, i.e. mountain pass) that sits behind Rifugio Lavaredo in order to descend back down to Dobbiaco via Val Campi di Dentro. Up there was where I first encountered the remnants of real fortifications. I had seen a couple of man-made caves the day before, but here I stumbled upon a fortress hewn out of the bare rock – trenches, underground storage space, machine gun nests, walls, and perhaps most poignantly of all, a lonely little cairn. It was nought but a small pile of rocks with a cross made from a couple of sticks bound by rusty barbed wire, sitting across from the Tre Cime as a forelorn monument over some long gone nameless poor bastard who died here. It seemed so futile, somehow, to lay down your life in order to prevent someone you don’t know from crossing an imaginary line drawn on a map, only to be forgotten by all, a lonely rock pile being the only memorial to your anonymous existence. Was he Italian or Austro-Hungarian? No way of knowing.

The Cairn of the Unknown Soldier

I mentioned where I was to a friend, and it turned out that her great grandfather had been a Kaiserjäger, a member of an elite company who fought in these very parts. Even if you survived, how could such an experience not scar a man for life? And who can tell what this meant for future generations? I find it fascinating and depressing in equal measure. And so I was in a pensive mood as I passed across the pass, past several similar gunners’ nests, where once your efforts for climbing this far would have been rewarded by having your neighbours lying in wait to shoot you in the face. Today however, the only blood on the ground was Alpen-Bärenträube (lit. Alpine Bear grapes), a low growing and intensely red plant that brought a bit of colour to the rockiest stretches.

Then, as I descended further down into the valley, the trees grew higher, the undergrowth more verdant, and I followed a dainty brook all the way to the valley floor. In the middle of the forest I came upon the spooky old ruin of a former spa hotel, where once the upper echelons of society came to ”take the waters”. This they did from the five springs in the vicinity that (in spite of being very close together) were once – according to helpful signs – thought to cure a variety of vastly different ailments. I choose to fill my CamelBak with natural mineral water from two of them, the combination of which may well cure me of liver diseases, ulcers, chronic (!) gastritis, skin ailments and a variety of gynecological disorders, if the signs were to be believed. Pas mal! Thus fortified, I made it back to “my” hotel, where I again ate like a champ, then passed out like a chump.

Day 3 the weather had taken a turn for the worse. Where previously there had been clear blue skies, there were now ominous-looking clouds, but as the forecast said there would be very little rain, if any, and I had my magic potion from the day before to ward off most ailments, I still set off, this time going from Cimebanche/Im Gemärk up another valley to an area optimistically called Prato Piazza (Flat Space). From there it was onwards and upwards, skirting a massive peak coloured red by iron oxide, called Croda Rossa (Red Cross), or “the bleeding heart of the Dolomites”. I noted with surprise and great satisfaction that my own heart was neither bleeding nor fluttering like a kolibri any more. The trail was long and hard though, the massif looking like a giant dragon lying on top of the mountain, so it was with some trepidation I continued. The dragon didn’t wake, but the path did lead past areas of massive rockfall, where such immense quantities of stones had fallen from the heights as to create whole fields of red boulders (I later learned that the rockfalls can be sufficiently powerful to register as earth quakes!). Moving across one of those and hearing rocks starting to bounce down from high above you in the clouds is an experience that will make you feel very small and vulnerable, for sure.

When the path suddenly needs rerouting…

The same goes for passages where you turn a corner to find that the path takes you on the outside of sheer cliffs, where a chain bolted into the rock is the only thing to hold on to, and one misstep means certain death. The payoff is of course the immense vistas and god-like viewpoints you experience far away above the valleys, but I’m weirdly glad I was alone – for the simple reason that I’m not sure I could bear to watch someone I care for scrambling across those abysses. I remember my father forever calling us back from precipices when we were in the alps when I was a kid – I understand him now.

Find Wally!

Eventually I make it back down again, all the way to “the most beautiful lake in the alps”, Lago di Braies, which is truly gorgeous, but by this point the rain was hanging in the air, I’d been out for seven hours, I was exhausted, and my annoyance at the sightseeing day trippers was such that I just got on the first bus and went back “home”.

Prettiest lake in the alps?

(Incidentally, the people of “my” hotel must think me mad, because I check out every morning and come back (nearly) every evening; it’s because my guidebook (Walking the Dolomites) keeps insisting that my itineraries are 2-3 day affairs, which means I’m carrying everything I need for a week on my back wherever I go. In spite of this I manage to cover enough ground to be back down again every evening except the first one, hence my strange behaviour. Had I known I could have left 85% of my kit in the hotel, which would have saved me quite a few calories…)

The next day it is pouring down. The thing is, when it’s raining in the mountains you are literally in the clouds, so there is little chance it will let up. I grind my teeth and put on all my rain kit, and make my way to the start of a trail up to something called Val de Fanes (the Valley of the Fanes people – local fairy folk). Unfortunately, my local map doesn’t cover this area, and the guidebook is quite sketchy, so I’m in terra incognita. There are two sights on the way up into the land of the faeries that I know I want to see, however: Cascate di Fanes, the highest waterfall in the Dolomites, and Ponte Ulto (Ladin for High Bridge), crossing a chasm of similar magnitude to that of the waterfall – 70 meters. I hiked up to the edge of the canyon to see the waterfall crashing down on the other side. I then made it down to the bottom only to realize that the path back up again on the other side was a via ferrata, which really requires proper climbing gear. I made an attempt of it, but as it was pouring with rain and everything was slick and slippery I reluctantly decided I had no choice but to turn around.

Water, water, everywhere…

So back down the canyon I went, and then all the way back up again on the other side, back to the same waterfall, reached by another via ferrata (this one slightly less murderous, but still intimidating in the rain). So I saw the waterfall every which way you could, and the bridge as well (less impressive), but after the lengthy detour I had already used up about half the day, and since I didn’t know how far it was to the Valley of the Fairies, I eventually gave up. I had hiked for hours in the rain through the sodden pine forest, ever upwards, and in spite of my rain gear I was soaked through (condensation being just as efficient as actual precipitation in that regard), my muscles were stiff and cold, and I didn’t want to continue into the unknown. I was done.

By the time I made it back to the valley it’s late afternoon, and the hotel owner informs me that they haven’t turned on the heating yet, so there is no way to dry my clothes. It’s the mountain gods’ way of telling me this is it. The next morning I get on a train and leave the mountains behind. I make it to Milan and spend the next 36 hours soaking up the atmosphere and madness of the Milano Fashion Week instead – as contrasts go it couldn’t be any further from the solitude, sorrows and solace of the mountains.

Alpine Adrenaline II

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The Bavarian Alps. The most German setting imaginable. Marvellous mountains, nestling green valleys with villages taken straight out of Grimm fairy tales. Birthplace of the grimmest of ideologies. 

I’ve come here for a week of peaceful hiking with my friends Florian and Iris. It doesn’t quite turn out that way. 

We come by train from Munich (where a local beer hall made our layover as enjoyable as can be), through pleasant rolling hills, and arrive in Oberstdorf (lit. “The highest village”) in sunny, warm weather. That’s a nice surprise in itself, since the forecast is promising thunderstorms and rain for most of the week. 

Florian suggests a “light” hike for the first day, climbing the nearest alp, Rubihorn. Coming in at 1,950m high, it’s no more than a 500-metre climb from the first lift station, but the sun is out in force, and by the time I reach the summit I’m wobbly-legged and woozy from the effort. That’s nothing compared to F and I, however. They arrive wheezing and gasping for air. But once heart rates have come down to something resembling normal we have a splendid 360 degree view for our efforts. We are at the edge of the alps, so to one side are the lowlands, and on the other there are hundreds of peaks as far as the eye can see.

What draws the eye more than anything, however, is the incredibly blue waters of the lake hidden right underneath us, shimmering in the heat like a Fata Morgana. Declining the kind offer of summit schnapps from a friendly local, we begin to make our way down a slippery slope towards it. When we finally reach its shores I’m so hot that the lure of the cristalline water takes over, and I join the friendly local and his buddies going in for the coldest dip of my life. 

Afterwards I will read up on it and learn that the lake is source-fed from below and therefore maintains a steady – low – temperature all year around (never glazing over in winter), but getting out of the water Iris sums up the experience rather succinctly: “I see it was this cold”, she says, grinning, showing a most unflattering distance between thumb and index finger. Suffice to say when the offer was made anew, I gratefully accepted the (plummet) schnapps this time around. 

Playa del Rubihorn

The next day we make for Fellhorngrad and a ridge walk that would have been ideal as a first day introduction to the area. Straddling the border between Germany and Austria, it’s a pleasant enough hike, but too crowded and pedestrianised for my taste. The best that can be said for it is that it offers splendid views into the Austrian valley where we will be exploring next day. 

The vale is effectively an Austrian enclave in Germany, because there is only one real road into the valley and it arrives there from Bavaria, which must have made everyday life for the inhabitants rather cumbersome back in the day of border controls. More importantly (to us) it’s also home to one of the more impressive gorges in Europe, the Breitachklamm. And so our third day sees us going to Austria.

Getting off the bus well above the Klamm (“pinch”) itself, we follow the Breitach downriver in glorious sunshine along a very pretty road that would have been a joy to run. I say as much to my hiking friends, forgetting the adage that you should be careful what you wish for. You see, after an hour or so of hiking Florian discovers that he has left his outrageously expensive camera hanging on a bench where we took a break. It’s a good kilometre back up the road, so I offer to run and get it before someone else does. 

Unfortunately someone else already has, and so I continue running back to the last lodge we passed, yet another kilometre upriver. When I finally arrive I’m drenched in sweat, but the camera is there, handed in by the finder (hikers are nice people!), and so all that remains is for me to race back to my friends. By the time I get back after this unexpected detour I’m once more so over-heated that I just tear my clothes off and let the river cool me down, with unexpectedly homoerotic / rubberducky results, as captured by my gleeful friends. 

When I post a pic of me on FB/when I’m tagged in one.


The Klamm itself is gorge-eous. The valley narrows, steep walls looming above us, waterfalls forcing their way ever deeper into the rock beneath us, as we clamber along walkways hewn into the cliff-face or precariously hanging on to the outside of the bare rock. Like a cut into the flesh of Mother Earth, the gorge is so deep that some of it hasn’t seen the sun for two million years. The debris left behind by winter floods bear witness to the brute force of the water: entire trees are lodged between the walls in places, and markers show the water levels sometimes reached, metres above our heads. It’s awe-inspiring.

Since Florian is leaving in the afternoon to visit a friend, Iris and I decide to try something both of us have been itching to do for a long time: tandem paragliding. We’ve signed up to do their longest flight, using the thermals to stay up in the air for up to forty minutes. Unfortunately, the flight school is incredibly badly organised, with numerous reschedulings and one pilot not showing up until an hour and a half too late, by which time it’s so late in the afternoon that the thermals are gone. This in turn means our flight is less than half the length promised, but for all that it’s an incredible experience!

We run off the top of the Nebelhorn and take flight as easy as anything, then go down the valley close to the forest-clad sides, gliding effortlessly and smoothly through the air. It’s such a high I’m just grinning and laughing the whole time. Iris, meanwhile, is screaming at the top of her lungs – something she has forewarned both me and her pilot is a sign of joy. She soon has cause to scream for other reasons, though, because then they start showing off their skills, making us swing around our axes, spinning around in half loops in the best roller-coaster tradition. It’s fantastically good fun, if quite disorienting. 

Iris earning her new nickname, with me in the background.


Before we land I’m given the reigns and told to steer towards the village church, which I do as best I can, before finally we come down soft as can be on a field, grinning from ear to ear from the adrenaline high, and me at least more convinced than ever that this is something so want to learn for myself! The rest of the evening is spent in a Biergarten, mulling over the minutest of details, riding the air waves over and over again.

Next day Florian is back, but the worse for wear from last night’s birthday do, so Iris and I ride the Bergbahn to the top of the Nebelhorn on our own. We set out along the ridge together before parting ways, with me attempting the Entchenkopf alone. 

It’s sits across from the Rubihorn, but is 300 metres higher, and significantly more difficult going, with several passages being senkrecht climbing. I had been wanting to try the via ferrata, the climbing paths that you traverse with guides and equipment, but nae more. This is worse by far. With no back-up or climbing gear, the ground slippery from last night’s rain, and drops of anything between ten and fifty metres onto sheer rock, any mistake would be my last. It’s no coincidence Todesangst is a German word, I think. 

What do we say to Death? Not today.

 

When I finally reach the summit, my legs are shaking from fear-induced adrenaline, and I don’t dare stand up for quite some time. But fear is good. Fear – if harnessed – makes you more alive, more focused. As I sit there, taking in the never-ending views, the air as clean as can be, I feel like a million bucks. 

And then the moment is over, and I slide down the other side of the mountain towards the Hütte where Iris awaits my return, and the best Kaiserschmarren pancakes known to man.

That was Iris’s last day, so next day Florian and I set out on our own to do the Sonnenköpfe, three lower peaks that form the continuation of the Entchenkopf. They looked more like rolling hills from the summit the day before, but as we hike them they turn out to be quite formidable, too, and it’s only the knowledge that there will be even more of the same Kaiserschmarren that spurs us on til the end. 

Next we want to try the stony Gottesacker plateau (lit. “God’s plowing field”), but when we get there the lift is under repair, and faced with the prospect of an additional 1,000 vertical metres in full sun – the weather forecast having turned out to be quite wrong yet again – we opt for an alternative route through a Naturschutzgebiet up to another lodge, seated on the Austrian-German border, and down the other side. It turns out to be Florian’s favourite walk of the entire week, but I can’t help feeling a bit wistful about having missed the plateau, especially since it looks just like a sleeping dragon from below…

Climb every mountain!

 

The very last day the weather forecast is finally correct, and the rain is pouring down. F can’t be bothered to leave the Gasthaus, but I go for a quick run and then a solo hike in the southernmost valley in all of Germany. It’s wet and misty and moist and slippery, but I don’t mind. The low-hanging mist lends the nature here a mystical aura of veiled beauty, and besides it’s reminiscent of the hikes of my youth, when – as I remember it – the alps were always clad in clouds. 

And so my travels with Sonnenkopf and Nebelhorn (lit. “Sunny head” and “Fog horn”) are at an end. The lovely Martin and Andrea, who run the Gasthaus Birkenhof where we have been staying, hug and kiss us goodbye and drive us to the railway station, and then all that remains is one more visit to a beer hall in Munich (with succulent Schweinshaxe and Augustiner beer), before finally flying home. 

The alps, however, are already calling me back.