Friday 28 June 2024 - Col dei Bos (Europe Day 11)

A 45 minute ride on bus 465 took us to the Falzarego pass, just a bit further than yesterday's trip to Passo Valparola. The free bus passes we have for this week have been very useful - our car remains where we left it on arrival last Saturday. 

There were hordes of people and for a while the bus was crammed full, but unlike yesterday everyone managed to get on as the journey progressed. (No problem for us as we get on at the terminus, which is a few metres from our front door.)

We set off along path 423, with fine views across the valley to Mount Averau, a favourite spot of ours.

Down in the valley, a running race seemed to be taking place on this lovely sunny day.

We reached a path junction where runners were heading off downhill to where the hooting and cheering was coming from. For the next hour or so we met runners, some of them pictured here after they had passed us next to the remains of a WW1 hospital.

It turned out to be the Lavaredo 50km race, an ultra marathon. And what a lovely day for it. We must have met nearly 1000 of the runners and walkers over the course of an hour. They had done about 20km at this point.

Eventually a long series of zigzags and a final very steep section brought us to Col dei Bos, where we lost the runners but gained a magnificent view into the Lavaredo area from which the runners were emerging.

Time for lunch (part 1).

Sue got left behind for a while thanks to some camera shy snowbells and some chatty Americans.

After a few snowfields, Forcella Travenanzes was reached. Time for lunch (part 2), in the company of some tame snow finches.

I then continued to Forcella Lagazuoi, before ambling back to Falzarego, whilst Sue nipped up to the Lagazuoi rifugio before joining me at the bus stop.

More wonderful views from near the second lunch spot and beyond.

An uneventful bus ride got us back to base for tea on our balcony by 4pm.

We had walked about 10km with 726 metres ascent (a bit more of both for Sue), taking around 5 hours.

We went down to La Tambra hotel for office hour at 6pm, basically to say goodbye to Floris and Elison, two of the Dutch staff who represent Collett's in Corvara. Sadly Brexit makes it much more difficult to employ staff from the UK.

We were delighted to discover that Barry and a friend had made it to the top of Sassongher. He was grateful for my emphatic advice to be extremely careful. It had been a tough day.

Back at Posta Zirm Hotel, Sue and I enjoyed another lovely tasty meal.

As usual, today was suitable for some more flower photography, some of the results of which are shown below.

Mountain Avens

Round-leaved Pennycress

Alpine Snowbells

Least Primrose 

Rhaetian Poppy

Mileage: 0 (Cum: 1018)
Garmin: 10.0km, 726 metres ascent

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Thursday 27 June 2024 - The Setsas Line (Europe Day 10)

A 40 minute bus ride got us to Passo Valparola for about 9:45, for what turned out to be an excellent 7 hour outing based on Collett's 'Setsas Line' walk (M6).

Various folk, including the four sisters who are also with Collett's, set off ahead of us. Sue posed (above), and the sisters made their way down a short section of wires that made for safe handholds.

The route took us behind the Setsas mountain on an excellent path, with views to Col di Lana and its WW1 trenches.

After 3.5km we reached Bivio Sief, a small hut full of picnic tables for wet days.

The onward route to the Pralongia plateau was a lovely contouring path with a smidging of boulder fields.

We reached the cross at the high point of the plateau, from where I took the following photo in conditions contrasting with those at the same spot on Sunday.

As on Sunday, we enjoyed part two of our lunch on a bench below the teeny chapel that sits above the Pralongia rifugio. Alpine summits towered in the distance above the profile of the hut.

Rather than repeat Sunday's descent to Corvara, we headed along the crest of the plateau, with superb panoramic views, nearly all the way to Piz La Ila, before which we took path number 2 to descend to Corvara, switching to path 2A when path 2 headed north.

The descent on path 2A was in woodland.

So we made it back to base in 16.1km, with around 566 metres ascent, taking about 7 hours.

As usual, we spotted many flower varieties, some of which are shown below.

Spring Gentian

Matted Globularia

Moss Campion

Yellow Alpine Pasque Flower

Round-leaved Saxifrage

Black Vanilla Orchid

Dandelion seed heads

Bearded Bellflower

Round-headed Orchid

Mileage: 0 (Cum: 1018)
Garmin: 16.1km, 566 metres ascent

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Wednesday 26 June 2024 - The Pisciadu Cascades and the Edelweiss Terrace (Europe Day 9)

The weather forecast wasn't brilliant so we scrapped plans to climb Col Di Lana and decided on a low level walk from Corvara instead. At 9:30 we set off on the good track towards Colfosco, passing the campsite on which we have stayed in the past, shortly before the point at which the next picture was taken.

We noticed some ad hoc artwork on a gondola stanchion. 

The Pisciadu Cascades were flowing freely, so freely that the last bit of the path was inaccessible due to the torrent.

We admired what we could see and adjourned to a picnic bench for elevenses before taking path 650 back towards a place called Ron, from which we gained a view of most of the waterfall.

We had tried to ascend to Passo Gardena via path 650 in an upward direction, but the path was closed for repairs.

So we continued to the main road in the vicinity of Ron. This ended the first phase of today's walk - 6.2km with 320 metres ascent, in 2.5 hours. There were nice views across the fields on the way to Ron, with Sassongher in the background.

We sat at a bus stop, wondering what to do next. A bus came. It was free and we didn't even need to show the free passes that we have from Collett's. It took us just a short way, to Mesoles. From here we hiked 1km up the hill to a gondola in which we enjoyed a 400 metre ascent to Jimmy's Hut. That left us an easy walk (on which Sue is pictured below) down to path 8 and the Edelweiss Terrace walk back to Corvara.

Path 8A descends below the gondolas to path 8.

Corvara soon came into view far below. 

Here, I'm looking back towards the Gardena pass.

Across the valley the Sella Group slowly revealed itself,  topped by Piz Boe and its huge block of solar panels. A crocodile of walkers was making its way along the upper snowfield, and numerous others were making the tricky Alta Via 2 ascent up steep rock and snow.

Further down, folk were lounging on sun beds at Utia Forcelas.

Just below the hut there were fine views to Sassongher, but we couldn't spot anyone on the summit - late snow may have made it inaccessible to walkers.

Continuing uneventfully past the Edelweiss Hut, we paused on a bench in bright sunshine to consume the last of our tea and goodies. Nutcrackers were active in the woods.

Then it was down to Colfosco and on to Corvara in light rain!

This second phase of today's outing covered 10.1km, with 236 metres ascent, and it took us 3.5 hours to complete.

Here are a few of my pictures of flowers from today - we had many stops to admire them:

Marsh Orchid

Valerian

Globeflower

Buckler Mustard

Rosy Vanilla Orchid

Bird's-eye Primrose

Kidney Vetch

PS Google seems to have made changes relating to Blogger that makes uploading images different and who knows what other little tricks they've played on those of us who use Blogger. I'm doing my best to overcome them!

Mileage: 0 (Cum: 1018)
Garmin: 16.3km, 556 metres ascent

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