We awoke to a beautiful morning, with blue sky and crisp fresh snow… perfect conditions for a winter hike. After breakfast, we made our packed lunches and caught the bus to the Bergeralm ski station in Steinach.
Once there, we bought one-way ski passes and caught the gondola up the mountain. Next we checked our avalanche transceivers and put our spikes on to walk along the balcony path to Nosslachhutte, which John and I had visited earlier in the trip.
Rather than retracing our steps, this time the plan was to continue walking around the mountain before dropping steeply downhill, back to Almi’s in Obernberg.
It was cool and shady in the trees to begin with but, as the morning went on and the sun rose, it became warmer. The views up and down the valley were wonderful.
Unfortunately, the Nosslachhutte wasn’t open, so I couldn’t have hot chocolate 🥹, but we took advantage of the tables and benches on the balcony to have our lunch and enjoy the views and the sunshine. The main photos on my two Nosslachhutte blogs, which are taken in the same place, show the different conditions ☀️❄️.
When everyone was ready, we set off uphill through more forest, meandering our way around the mountainside. At one point we had a stile to climb, which was a challenge for the people in snowshoes!
The valley opened out and the trees were less dense after a while. Sean’s group were ahead of us and we came across them having a snack. At this point we could choose from 3 options to get back to Almi’s. Our/Dave’s group chose to continue around the mountain before taking a steep path down to the valley floor, while Sean’s group chose to take a shallower gradient immediately downhill before returning along the road.
The descent wasn’t as steep and hard on our knees as we’d expected. However, the snow was quite soft now and kept balling under our spikes and snowshoes, so that we had to keep banging our feet on the ground to dislodge it… very annoying! 😤 I took my spikes off as soon as I thought I could, but ended up having to put them back on for a steep section over snow and ice!
I think we were all glad to get down to Almi’s. John and I joined some of the others for a drink in the bar then relaxed in the spa for a bit. We have a long day ahead of us tomorrow, climbing Sattelberg, a 2105 metre peak. The forecast is good and I’m looking forward to it!
Ramblings 
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