The Dolomites and Via Ferrata 2007

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Saturday, July 28

The Brenta Marathon

I had concocted a fairly ambitious route for our group today: four different ferrata routes, all in one go! In actuality, it wasn't quite as bad as it sounds - in the Brenta, different ferrata routes are all concentrated into an interconnected network over which you can easily form loops, and this was precisely what I had in mind. Besides, our group was now battle-hardened from over two weeks of mountain outings!!

I chose a route which traversed over a large section of the most famous route in the Brenta - the 'via delle Bocchette' (or 'way of the gaps'). The via delle Bocchette is a high-level north-south traverse of almost the entire Brenta Group. It is divided into many different sections, each of which are considered a different ferrata. We would climb south for a short while, then climb up to and gain the Via delle Bocchette, and then follow it north all the way to Passo Groste, where the main Brenta Group peters out into a wide pass. Not far below this pass was our rifugio for the evening - the Rifugio Graffer al Groste.

Morning in the Brenta

Getting ready

Vedretta di Brenta

The day had started out clear, but even now, at 7am, I could see the mists starting to coalesce into clouds around the higher towers. This was starting to look suspiciously like the same weather I'd encountered the last time I was in the Brenta, which ended-up giving us socked-in clouds during the most spectacular part of the climb.

We started off by climbing south along a minor ferrata route called the 'sentiero SOSAT'. This was a route that mostly consisted of hiking, and only at the very end did we encounter the meat of the route.

courtesy PChen

Typical warning sign

Jenn hikes SOSAT

Approaching climbing

The Sentiero SOSAT's main climbing section was short but actually fairly interesting, involving a downclimb into the bottom of a gully and many ladders, and then one very long, very vertical ladder out of it. The route then traversed horizontally along an exposed ledge. A bit more hiking and a bit more downclimbing and we were done the route. Ferrata one of four completed!