Monte Cavallo

This morning the chairlifts from Pedraces took Sue and me painlessly up 700 metres to Rifugio San Croce, from where path number 7 led us for nearly two hours across the face of the Fanes cliffs. The top image shows Sue, about half way up, with Marmolada in the distance behind. This section was along a narrow ledge with a horrific drop. A bit later on, some wires appeared, thus qualifying the route as a Via Ferrata (Grade 1B), though no equipment is required.

Once on the Fanes plateau, we enjoyed the rock scenery and looked ahead to Monte Cavallo's 2907 metre summit. See lower image.

After another hour we were up there. Lunch was taken in front of our panoramic map that disclosed the nature of the far ranging views. From Austrian summits to the peaks of the southern Dolomites.

Friendly German and Italian voices surrounded us. As did Pink Cinquefoil, Moss Campion, Spring Gentians, Mountain Sainfoin, Rockroses and Mountain Thrift - to name just a few.

After resisting the temptation to continue on to climb Cima Dieci, we returned to Passo di San Croce, before picking up a variant of Path 12 which led us by the shortest walkable route (our grippy trail shoes were helpful on the 'sloping' limestone) to the Forcella de Mesdesc, at around 2500 metres.

It was clear that a trail bike had managed to ascend the path from La Villa. It was also clear that somebody had managed to run down the scree. The descent to La Villa, all 1200 metres of it, was steep, especially the first scree section. Walking poles were needed. They were in the boot of the car. Not much use there! Bum was deployed.

We made it down 500 metres of scree, from the Rhaetian Poppy zone into the Harebell zone, fairly quickly, even if odd stances were employed to avoid big slides. The path looked as if it had been recently renewed from here on, with trail bikers having taken advantage of a ready made race track. But it was a pleasant enough route down #12 to La Villa and on beside the river to Pedraces.

All in all, it had been a fine mountain day, especially along path 7, in superb weather yet again. Looking up to the summit, 1600 metres above us, made us realise that apart from the 16km walk with 1000 metres of ascent, in a little under 7 hours, we'd done quite a bit of descent as well.

As a result of having decided not to climb the second, 3026 metre peak of Cima Dieci, we were back at base in plenty of time for a sauna and a beer before indulging in Alice's home cooking at Chalet Angelo, and a most sociable evening.

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