Hello fellow mountaineers,
Today i want to share the story of me and some friends of mine climbing Austrias highest peak, the "Großglockner" at 3798 above sealevel, some time ago. It was actually one of my first "real" mountain experiences, and my friends were even less experienced, so we did the right thing, we hired a mountain guide. (Since my climbing and mountaineering skills have grown, i have been to the summit again with my climbing partner via a more difficult route (Stüdlgrat) recently) It was an amazing feeling to stand on the highest point of my homecountry, specially since the mountains around lack a few hundred meters in height, so the view is not obscurred by any other summits.
Our tour started a two thousend meters lower at the so called "Lucknerhaus" were we began our hike......
The map gives you an overview about the steep climb following
The track starts around lush green hills populated by marmots. Their whistling "supported" us all the way up.
We even found a swing at a hut close to the start. No one shall say we did not preserve the child in us. :)
After the first 3-4 hours we came across "Stüdl-Hütte", one of three major huts surrounding Großglockner and the meeting point with Stefan, our Mountain guide
Passing Stüdlhütte we were able to catch a glimpse of our designated goal for the next day every now and then.
Weather was changing rapidly, there was only one constant, the screaming wind. (Can you spot the climbers traversing to the peak?)
Things begin to get laborious around 2500m above sea-level if your not used to heights.
Most of the time we were walking on the glacier, but sometimes we had to climb too
When arrived at "Adlersruhe" (meaning eagles rest), a plateau, and the Erzherzog-Johann hut at 3454m we were battered. We enjoyed the sunset and went to bed early. This was one of my worst nights ever, i went up from 316m above sealevel, where i live, to 3454m and my body did absolutely NOT like it. My head felt like it was going to explode and my pulse raced around 100bpm while resting. (compared to my "normal" 45bpm at home) Paracetamol relieved me partially of my brutal headache, but when we got up around 04:00 am i still felt horrible.
Sunrise made up for the long, cold, sleepless night.
The summit still was beaten with strong winds, but at least it was not raining/snowing.
When we started our climb, the sun came up and we began to warm up.
We were lucky at the "Glockner Leitl", a notorious steep part of the way, that is very dangerous to climb in years with little snowfall. (This year there was a horrible accident involving three climbers, conncted by rope, exactly on this spot)
As soon as we left behind the snow, we actually had to climb. (Sorry for the bad image quality)
Every now and then, the wind blew away the cloud and we were stunned by the view for a few moments.
As you can imagine, there is heavy traffic around the peak and the flow comes to an halt at the infamous "Glocknerscharte", where you have to balance over from "Kleinglockner" to "Großglockner". We met a lot of pourly equipped and pourly educated climbers turning around, because the thought this is just a nice two day hike.
Me passing the Glocknerscharte.
The view down at the Glocknerscharte
This is our group, shortly after passing Glocknerscharte and going for the last few steep climbing meters, captured by another mountaineer we met down at the hut afterwards
Finally we arrived at the summit.!..
...and enjoyed the view for some quiet (and cold/windy) minutes...
...before starting our long decent.
(If you've ever climed a mountain, you know that going up is not even half of the deed)
Long and laborous hours after starting our climb, we made it back to the Stüdl hut and continued to decent from there through the grass covered mountains following the water
Altough Großglockner is by far not the toughest mountain i have climbed until today, every time i glimpse at these pictures a smile appears on my face and i think about going back (i already did :). If you like(d) my mountain stories, feel free to upvote/follow. Thank you for reading!
-> THE MOUNTAINS ARE CALLING, AND I MUST GO!
