A few hours later, we made it to Rifugio Dibona. The views along the way were 👌
We showed up with some time to scope out our objective.
Looking the other way, we saw this… We heard it was great climbing, but a little chossy… Maybe in a few years?
After what was probably the best dinner of the trip, we took showers and went to bed. It stormed all night, and we woke up at 5am since we had a big day ahead of us. The folks set up an early breakfast table for us. We’re sitting in the entryway, next to the bathrooms 🙂
The approach was probably one hour? By then the morning light was hitting the peak.
We saw some ibex along the way!
And continued up, with increasingly awesome views.
We eventually made it to the start of our objective!!! and damn, it was pretty impressive up close.
Right when we showed up, two locals showed up. They were geology students from nearby, and they told us about the rocks. We let them go first, and they CRUSHED this thing.
Meanwhile, we took our time, and stopped to smell the wildflowers.
I learned a lot about rope management!
And Keith kept the stoke high!
Somewhere around pitch 2218023.
We were getting pretty high!
And there was so much to go…
The sun poked its head around the corner. and things started getting HOT.
The best part of the climb was a really exposed traverse along the face of the wall.
You didn’t want to mess up here, otherwise you’d get a nice swing into the wall…
Stephen cruisin’ along.
I think we were three pitches from the top at this point? Clouds kept moving in and out, so we tried to move quickly, to avoid any rainstorms…
Keith crushing some roof-y moves.
All smiles near the top!
And more smiles at the top!
The descent was a walk off. that involved moving through the cliff bands in the middle of this photo.
That was a little sketch (think really loose rock, with very high consequence falls), so it took a while (at least I was moving slowly)…
However, it took us by some old rifugios and WW1 structures.
Pretty. Neat. Stuff. We also met a group of climbers from Catalunya, and chatted on the way down.
And one last shot of my first 10+ pitch climb!!!
Up next? Tre Cime di Lavaredo!!!
Stats:
- Date: 22-August 2018
- Objective: Tofana di Rozes – Primo Spigolo via the SE Arete
- Grade: V+ (5.8+)
- Height: 10580-ft / 3225m
- Length of climb: 14 pitches (1312-ft / 400m)
- Accommodations: Rifugio Dibona