Wake up and walk on: a Dolomitic dream (Dolomites walk/Day 3)
Wake Up and Walk On: a Dolomitic Dream
[Day 3]
by Rudston Steward
’m fine with getting up at 4:30am—as long as it’s for a compelling enough reason. It’s a short list: in the African bush, to look for leopards; in the tropics, to hear the dawn chorus of birdsong in the rainforest; and in the mountains, to see the sunrise from a summit.
I’d set out in the half-light from the Bonnerhuette refuge, where we spend the second night of our Dolomites Safari, at precisely 4:48am. My headlamp guided me along the first steep steps, cold air stinging my nostrils; breathing felt a bit like snorting frost or inhaling tiny icicles in the dark. The path contoured around the hill before zigzagging sharply up towards a spur; beyond that the pale crown of Mount Pfannhorn rose dawn-muddled and somber, peering down at me impassively. A stone-clad sentry, unfazed by the trifling incursion I was mounting at its base.
A BIT LIKE SNORTING FROST OR INHALING TINY ICICLES IN THE DARK
As I climbed the light swelled, a gradual suffusion, so that it seemed I was walking the very day into being. It first illuminated the peaks of the Dolomiti di Sesta far behind to the west, then broadened into a glowing swathe. Emanating, apparently, from the stone on high and radiating towards the forests below. I reached the summit at 5:22am, itself still in shadow, a towering vantage point from which to observe the limpid dawn seeping steadily into the valley. When the first dazzling ray of sunlight broke, a golden shaft of luminescence, the landscape instantly danced to a different tune. As if someone had flipped a chromatic switch in the sky, tuning the world to a higher frequency.
The mountains were now laid out before and below me, a monumental cordon of fissured and filigreed rose-tinted rock, stretching as far as the eye could see. The furthest ranges glowed pale mauve, seeming insubstantial, ethereal. Standing alone on this apex of the world—needled by cold, elated, completely in awe—it occurred to me I might get up at 4:30am more often. Find more leopards. And rainforest birdsong. More sunrises from many more summits.
SOMEONE HAD FLIPPED A CHROMATIC SWITCH IN THE SKY, TUNING THE WORLD TO A HIGHER FREQUENCY
I don’t usually indulge the wishful thinking that seeks to anthropomorphize nature. But if those mountains could deign to speak—a communiqué bathed in impossibly ethereal light—they’d probably say: Wake up! Don’t waste a sunrise. Wake up and walk on.
I floated through the rest of the morning as if in a Dolomitic dream. Back to the refuge for breakfast. And later: a 13km afternoon hike, 900 meters of ascent, through what I consider to be some of the most spectacular mountain scenery in the world. That evening we arrived at Locatelli refuge, a bigger beast and more crowded than the intimate Bonnerhuette of the night before. But with a killer sunset view of the Tre Cime di Lavaredo to compensate. Sunrise to sunset: when you’re walking in the Dolomites it’s sometimes hard to tell where the dreaming ends or the waking begins.
Into the Pale Mountains (Dolomites walk/Day 2)
Into the Pale Mountains
[Day 2]
by Rudston Steward
e had driven all the way up the spine of Italy, north from Tuscany past Bologna, Bolzano and Brunico, and then along the Val Casies right to the Austrian border. It’s a dead-end valley that comes to a head at the hamlet of Santa Maddalena, where we spent the night; from there you either turn around and drive back the way you came, or ditch your car—and walk up the mountain, into the clouds.
When you spend a lot of time walking up and down mountains you learn that they have distinct characters, akin to personalities: each is a unique expression of geology and geography, a singular set of mineral circumstances evolved over time. Mountains come in different flavours: the particular way air fills your nostrils or tastes on your tongue, the specific sound of footfall over leaves or scree, the quality of light on this summit or that saddle or slope.
The major mountain ranges—the world’s great amphitheaters of stone—are wildly diverse stages upon which very different geological dramas play out. I’ve been lucky enough to hike in the Andes, Himalayas, Alps, Pyrenees, Appalachians, Drakensberg, and Apennines; each setting is distinct. At the same time a single thread unifies the experience of walking in mountains across five continents: the scale of all these ranges lays bare human insignificance. In the mountains you are not in charge—you surrender to forces far greater than yourself. Mountains confront you with the silence of ancient rock. They force you at every step to size up the brief flicker of a human lifespan against the enigmas of deep time.
OR DITCH YOUR CAR—AND WALK UP THE MOUNTAIN, INTO THE CLOUDS
After we set off from Santa Maddalena the morning’s walk was basically uphill all the way, at first through dense pine forests, later above the tree-line over grassy hillsides patchy with multi-coloured lichen. As we reached the saddle at Kalksteinjochl my phone beeped “Welcome to Italy,” which was weird given that we’d been in Italy all morning. We took a rest; a few minutes later my phone beeped “Welcome to Austria.” Which was weird, as I hadn’t moved an inch since being welcomed to Italy moments earlier.
From the saddle we contoured along a series of ridges, dipping and rising all afternoon but essentially maintaining the altitude we’d gained on the morning’s ascent. The sun was brilliant, its heat diluted by the thin, crisp air, bright as a bugle blast. The sky was Tiepolo-blue and immaculate. We walked through Alpine meadows laid out as if by design: a valley of rhododendrons, glistening fuschia; a hillside of blue and then yellow gentians, the latter used locally for grappa; a field of orchids, like small scattered flares; delicate brunellas lining the path with their chocolate scent; a cluster of campanella pelosa, aptly hairy.
We traversed a pocket of snow, a glaring white island stranded in the ocean of green meadows. The temptation to strip down to the waist, plunge into the powder and make summery snow-angels proved irresistible—a DIY spa treatment at 2500m above sea level. A bit further on we skirted a pond, its surface reflecting a jagged line of Dolomitic peaks to the south, pewter-grey on the horizon under a compact mass of ivory clouds. The pool was perfectly still, the air breathless; the reflected clouds seemed to dip below the surface of the water, probing its depths.
Later we crept along a narrow footpath of shale and pebbles, carved out of rock and dropping away so steeply we seemed to be walking on air. As if we were floating up and away, into a giddy Dolomitic realm—completely immune to nation states and gravity. Up here we were free of constraints, beyond the reach of borders and maps. Italy and Austria were irrelevant; the only proclamation that made any sense anymore was “Welcome to the Dolomites.”
COMPLETELY IMMUNE TO NATION STATES AND GRAVITY
A final surge up the flank of Mount Pfannhorn brought us round a corner to a viewpoint: the entire Dolomiti di Sesta range was revealed, lined up before us like a massive cordon of spiky sentries. Pale and formidable. Their peaks were almost milky in colour, as if the upper reaches were fusing with the sky. They got progressively darker lower down towards the ground, to their graphite-grey bases: clutching at the earth, anchored in substrata of rock.
We stood there in silence a while, taking in the view. It felt like we had stumbled into another—archaic—planet. Walked our way into some parallel mountain reality. It dawned on me that we humans have no starring role to play in this theater of geology and stone: we are not needed up here. Then we kept walking, tired and exhilarated, to our refuge below—walking into the view, disappearing into the pale mountains.
Adagio Falzarego
Adagio Falzarego
by Rudston Steward
“
orget the big mountain. Forget what’s up above. Just focus on your next foothold, the next ledge for your fingers. One small move at a time. Then another, then another. Individual moves. Like a game of chess.”
I had accepted Matteo’s invitation. I’d never climbed a mountain before, not a proper one, not with ropes. Walking—yes. I’ve done plenty of walking, across five continents. But climbing? Initially I tried to turn down the offer:
“Not my thing. Honestly, I’d rather go hiking.”
“Climbing is a kind of hiking,” Matteo replied. “A vertical walk. Think of it as a stroll, up a mountain instead of horizontally on the flat.”
Simple enough. I thought to myself: I can handle a stroll.
So here we were—Matteo, myself, and Paul the guide—at the base of the Torre Piccola del Falzarego in Alto Adige. It’s a simple climb, they said. A Dolomitic cakewalk, for beginners like me.
I looked up towards that improbable place in the sky, vertical miles away. The summit: remote, austere, skull-crushingly steep. Our climb suddenly struck me as extremely perilous, a harebrained enterprise. All mountaineering was, I now realized, a completely mad pursuit.
I was shit-scared.
“When you’re climbing, always remember one word: Adagio. Go slowly. Sempre Adagio!”
There was no turning back now. I heeded Matteo’s advice. Deep breath, looked at my options. Reached for a ledge, retracted, reached for another, lower down. Bent my knee, foot off the ground, into thin air. Stepping up. Pulled myself onto a new perch—liftoff. A flood of comfort and relief, settling back onto solid rock. Higher ground.
I thought to myself: I’m not dead yet.
Reassured, I started picking my way up the first crevasse, trying to follow Paul’s route. I crept up, gingerly, o-so-slowly. Clinging desperately to the mountain, like a pathetic gecko.
Whenever I faltered the encouraging voice floated up from below: “Adagio, sempre Adagio!”
About a third of the way up I finally started getting the hang of it. Matteo regaled me with another of his mountaineering koans: “Ti devi assolutamente divertire.” You simply must enjoy yourself.
I thought to myself: If the mountain won’t come to Matteo, Matteo must enjoy himself on the mountain, unsure if I was getting giddy with heights or dizzy with mounting happiness.
Paul was up above, out of sight, the ropes dangling and snaking to an invisible fulcrum overhead. He secured another belay, whistling intermittently, like the Pied Piper of the Dolomites. Fluting away to his mountain goats, enticing me up to the next level.
His whistling put me at ease—up, up and away. I relaxed, found my flow. As we climbed, the ascent became increasingly lyrical: Adagio Falzarego Andante.
Near the top I got stuck. Wrong-footed, literally: sheer rock above, chasm below. Deep breath. Not Adagio but Grave—a solemn tempo. I stretched out my foot timidly, back down onto a ledge. Clutching the rock with throbbing fingers, as if holding a precious and unforgiving talisman.
Regroup, rethink, find a better move.
“Always complete your step,” Matteo said. “Don’t lift your back foot until the front foot is secure.”
So I took a different line, found better purchase. Completed my steps to elevate out of the crag. From there it was plain sailing; the rest of the route was a waltz up to the summit, 2450m above sea level.
At the top there was no wind. The silence belied the multiple conversations going on in my head: with Matteo, with Paul, with the Falzarego peak, with the Dolomitic Gods of the Precipice. With my newfound mountain-climbing self. An admixture of elation, relief, astonishment, coursing through my body in analeptic surges.
And fear: we now had to rappel down the other side of the mountain. Another first for me; I’d never abseiled before. I turned to Matteo for advice. How best to approach that first abysmal step, backwards over the edge of the cliff, into the void?
“Climbing up is a stroll, and rappelling down is a dance. A beautiful vertical dance down the side of the mountain. Just stay light on your feet.”
So I danced back down to earth. Adagio at first, and then andante, the rope whizzing through my gloves, toes tapping on stone. And, finally, the last exhilarating plunge: allegro accelerando, a flighty release from gravity.