LADDERED HEIGHTS (Trail, Jan 2003)

Alf Alderson exposes himself on the big walls of the Italian Dolomites

The ‘vie ferrate’ of the Italian Dolomites are an absolute must for budding mountaineers who can’t be bothered with learning all the technical jiggery-pokery of ropes, belays and bits of clanking metal. If you’re looking for a full on, high exposure mountain experience this summer then put this region at the top of your list.

However, when you get there and crane your neck upwards to view the stupendous vertical limestone peaks and towers of the Dolomites it won’t take more than a couple of seconds to convince yourself that their massive walls are off limits to all but Spiderman, sports climbers and chamois. But look again closely and you may spot tiny figures effortlessly ascending these gargantuan rock walls.

These small, multi-coloured dots are scrambling up a ‘via ferrata’, which translates as ‘iron way’, and on which ordinary mortals can enjoy as much excitement in the mountain as they’ll ever have whilst fully clothed. These sensational mountain scrambles provide you with access to wild, exposed and very high cliff faces along exhilarating high-level routes that even a complete newcomer to the mountains can enjoy - as my girlfriend was about to discover. But more of that later.

Many of the first vie ferrate were constructed between 1915-17 when Italian and Austrian troops tussled for control of the region, and some of these can still be visited today (see box). Thousands of men lived, excavated, tunnelled and died in this beautiful region, some even living in the tunnels and caves of an ‘Ice City’ beneath the Marmolada Glacier which flows down the slopes of 3,344-metre Marmolada Peak, the highest mountain in the region (vie ferrate here take you through the scene of much of the military action).

Further development of the vie ferrate came from the 1930s onwards as more acrobatic members of the Club Alpino Italiano and other local climbing clubs attached wire ropes and iron pegs, rungs and ladders to scores of rock faces throughout the Dolomites. The routes they created vary from easy traverses to phenomenally exposed vertical crags, and give you a relatively safe and easy taste of the adrenalin-charged world of big face climbing without the need for the technical ability and muscles of the experts (who can often also be seen on ironware-free crags in the vicinity).

The enormous blocks of limestone that make up the peaks of the Dolomites are awe-inspiring whether you view them from their summits or their bases. Gargantuan crags seem to almost burst from the Earth’s surface, rising up into alpine-blue skies in huge sugarloafs, impossibly-serrated needles and vast molar-shaped blocks that, in the light of dawn and dusk especially, are surely some of the most gorgeous mountains on the planet.

Sasshonger, a 2,625-metre peak above our base in the rapidly but tastefully expanding resort of Corvara is a classic example, standing guard above the northern end of the town as a massive and seemingly inaccessible tower. “Not so” said Maurizio Roveri, a personable mountain guide with whom we’d wandered through the forests, alpine pastures and Great War trenches beneath the Passi de Campolongo the day before.

“Children can climb it. OK, a little steep at the top, but you should be fine”. Maurizio’s final sentence was for the benefit of my girlfriend Fiona, dragged along on her first ever visit to ‘real’ mountains but, being Irish, ready to have a go at anything. When a waiter and the hotel receptionist also casually remarked on the ease of ascending Sasshonger despite it’s forbidding appearance, Anglo-Irish pride left us with little choice but to head for the hill, so on a hot and sunny September morning we set off for the 1,100-metre climb to the top.

The mountain rises steeply up from ski slopes, emerald green in late summer, and the higher you climb the more dramatic becomes the path carved into the glaring white limestone crags, but for all the drama there was no real danger other than from sweating to death, and as Maurizio had predicted even the steep final rib of rock was little more than a fun scramble, made all the more easy by the presence of a steel hawser you can grab onto for additional security (thus categorising this last section as a Grade ‘A’ via ferrata, ‘A’ being the easiest, ‘G’ the hardest).

The views from the summit are ample payback for the loss of buckets of sweat. Way down below, Corvara goes about it’s daily business; across the Val di Corvara is the barren, desert-like hanging valley of the Val de Mesdi, hemmed in by enormous rock towers; and to the south-east are the blue-white slopes of the Marmolada Glacier. While I took in the view through a film of sweat Fiona stood on the summit, arms in the air, celebrating an impressive start to her mountaineering career.

A couple of days later we found ourselves clambering into climbing harnesses and clipping onto the rope of mountain guide Giorgio Manica to scramble up the Via Ferrata Brigata Tridentina (named after soldiers from Trentino region who helped set up the route). This would be a rather more serious undertaking than Sasshonger, with around 550 metres of aided climbing graded ‘D’, but with a former member of the Italian climbing team in charge we were in safe hands.

Giorgio, a quiet man with an elegance and grace of movement we couldn’t hope to emulate told me that the ironware is inspected regularly by mountain guides – “sometimes I will come up myself and replace it in spring or autumn” - and later, as we climbed, I noticed that he regularly checked the solidity of rungs and hawser anchors. As we shuffled for space amongst other via ferrata-ists at the bottom of the crag Giorgio also pointed out that this was quiet compared to August. I know we shouldn’t use racial stereotyping in this day and age, but it was noticeable how the German climbers were happy to barge past everyone, the Italians spent as much time gabbing as climbing, and the few Brits on the mountain almost fell off in their eagerness to avoid getting in anyone’s way. The European Union, hey..?

Giorgio advised “It’s best to visit in July or now, September, when there are not so many people on the mountain – anyway, tomorrow we climb a much quieter route”.

Within a few metres of starting this ascent up the huge north flank of the Sella Massif you get a taste of the whole via ferrata experience, first clipping your carabiner into a steel cable bolted at short regular intervals to the rock face, then above this ascending a series of iron rungs set into the rock, beside which another steel cable provides protection.

This was Fiona’s first taste of mountain scrambling and climbing. After the first steep pitches I asked how she was getting on. “Away with yer, boy – I’m having a grand time” was the reply, which kind of goes to prove that on the easier and middling grade routes anyone who doesn’t suffer from vertigo and has a sense of adventure owes it to themselves to have a crack at a via ferrata.

The Trentina route has a couple of sections towards the top where you’re very much exposed to the long, long drop down to the valley several hundred metres below, and it’s no place to discover you’re scared of heights. Technically, though, it’s little harder than climbing up a ladder to clean your bathroom windows. But by the time you’ve scrambled above the waterfall tumbling down from the Lago Pisciadu, up to the very steep and extremely exposed final ascent and across a rocking and rolling suspension bridge traversing a deep, dark canyon you’ll feel the strain on arms and legs of this adrenalin-charged ascent.

And having said how easy it all is, it’s worth considering the adventures that two English guys we’d met the day before were getting themselves into at the same time as we cruised up the Trentina. Sam and Fergy, outdoor instructors from Yorkshire, were in their own words “…having a bit of an epic” on the Bec de Mesdi above the Marmolada Glacier. The guide book description as ‘interesting’ should perhaps act as a warning that this Grade ‘F’ climb may offer a challenge or two, but throw in rain, sleet and snow at an altitude of almost 3,000 metres and it’s no wonder they were both knackered by the time they finished. The harder vie ferrate shouldn’t be undertaken too lightly…

Next morning we awoke to mist in the valley while the sun-tinged upper slopes of the Dolomites rose proud of this into a clear blue sky. Fiona had hurt her knee on the descent of the Trentino route the day before, so myself and Giorgio were left to tackle 2,908-metre Piz da Lec alone. The start of this relatively short 240-metre via ferrata is easily accessed via ski lifts and we managed it in an hour (although the guidebook recommends 2 ½ hours – and if I hadn’t been sprint climbing to keep up with Giorgio I would undoubtedly have been nearer this time). Despite being graded ‘D’, the same as our route of the previous day, this was much more challenging with some technically difficult moves where rock climbing skills were required, and a vertigo-inducing face towards the summit, negotiated via iron ladders which are so close to vertical I swear they were overhanging.

It was unfortunate that that as we’d gone up so the clouds had come down and hidden from view the spectacular views across Val de Mesdi and the Sella Massif, one of the main reasons for making this climb. No matter, I’d had the excitement of my third via ferrata and was now hooked enough to be planning to come back next summer and tackle a few on my own. I’m as much use with rope and knots as a one-legged man at an arse kicking contest, but that’s another of the beauties of the via ferrata – you don’t need to be a rope master.

But I think the one-legged man might be best advised to stick to arse kicking…

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Getting There

From the south of England it’s as easy to get to the Dolomites as Scotland, and the weather is a lot better. And there are no midges. Inghams Lakes & Mountains offer a wide choice of package deals in the Italian Dolomites, and we stayed with them at the 3 star Hotel Marmolada in Corvara, where seven nights half board costs from £511 per person including return flights from Gatwick to Verona and transfers to/from resort. Inghams Reservation Line: 020 8780 4433, www.inghams.co.uk

Equipment

Essential equipment includes a climbing harness, about 3.5 metres of 11mm rope, two special via ferrata self-locking carabiners with rope blocks, a kinetic impact shock absorber and a climbing helmet.

Local climbing shops sell the full rig (apart from helmet) for around 70 Euros. It’s simple to use, but if in doubt consider employing a guide for the day and you’ll quickly pick up the technique to enable you to go solo (Associazione Guide Alpine Val Badia, 39033 Corvara (BZ), Str. Col Alt 36 tel 0039 471 836 898 e mail This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it )

Information

‘Via Ferrata – Scrambles in the Dolomites’ translated by Cecil Warner (Cicerone

£12.99) is an essential English language guide featuring almost 90 routes.

Corvara Tourist Information Office, Str. Col Alt 36 tel 0039 471 836 176, e mail

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For more information on the Alta Badia region and the routes described above, log

onto www.altabadia.org

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The Great War in the Dolomites.

Cynics will love the Dolomites for their proof of mankind’s ability to get into a fight over anything – even barren, snow-capped mountains. From 1915 to 1917 the alpine corps of the Italian and Austrian armies developed systems of tunnels, defences and footpaths throughout the Dolomites in a bid to gain strategic control of the region.

Twenty thousand or more soldiers are thought to have died in the battles, often in rather bizarre ways. In 1916, on the Col di Lana to the south-east of Corvara, for example, Italian troops spent months tunnelling into a mountain top occupied by Austrian troops before eventually blowing up the entire top of the mountain, Austrians and all; in 1917 Austrian troop tunnelled under snow on the Sasso di Sesto east of Cortina d’Ampezzo to attack their enemy; and hundreds if not thousands of soldiers on both sides were killed by avalanches and rock falls, some acts of God, others deliberately instigated by enemy mortar shelling.