Today’s trip had a worrying start when Minx, Joy’s lovely black labrador wasn’t allowed on the bus, and we drove off without them 😱. We later found out that Sean had also got off the bus and, thankfully, the owner of Almi’s, offered them a lift down the valley to join us.
We didn’t have long to wait for Minx and the others. Then we set off uphill in our spikes, first on road, then on a forest track through the shady forest, with occasional glimpses of beautiful mountain landscapes. It’s been another lovely day, with blue sky, sunshine and crisp, glistening white snow.
After a couple of hours and 400 metres of ascent, we arrived at Sattelalm (1633 metres). This restaurant is situated between a couple of ski slopes that don’t have lifts and are used mainly by ski tourers.
After drinking hot chocolate sitting in the sunshine, we set off again to climb another 480 metres to the peak (2115 metres). The snow was deeper now so our group changed into snowshoes. We climbed quite steeply on a narrow footpath through forest, occasionally being overtaken by ski tourers.
After a while, the trees opened out a little and we followed a barbed wire fence and occasional concrete markers along the Austrian-Italian border. I was dying to climb the fence into the virgin snow in Italy, but didn’t want to risk getting tangled up and injured, wearing awkward snowshoes!
The views were stunning in all directions once we left the shelter of the trees. However, we were now battered by the strong and freezing wind that was scouring the snow on the top of the mountain. This had created wind slab in places and Sean explained this was why there was an avalanche warning for the area. Thankfully, there wasn’t enough snow for it to be too dangerous on our route.
After a couple more hours, we reached the top of Sattelberg. I could barely stand in the wind and began to get very cold, so I didn’t end up standing with one foot in Austria and one in Italy as I’d planned. Instead, we dropped back down 10 metres to the summit cross where it was a bit more sheltered. We sang happy birthday to Pat (what a place to celebrate!) and took some photographs.
It was all downhill from the top now, quite steeply in places, so we each went at our own pace, some people (including me!) doing their best to protect aging knees. We alternated between swooshing down the ski slope in deep powdery snow and scraping over wind crusted and icy patches.
Back at Sattelalm we had plenty of time for a drink or two before we continued our descent to the bus stop in Vinaders. I was very pleased that they had hot, creamy Bombardino. I think I’d earned it!
I’m pretty sure this was the most enjoyable snowshoeing day that I’ve had… just enough of a challenge, good company, a peak, wonderful weather, stunning views, good snow, sunshine and blue sky. The only thing I didn’t like was the exfoliating wind on the summit, which left my face sore and glowing! Oh… I also didn’t like finding out that I’d been walking all day with yesterday’s knickers down the back of my leggings 😜.
Ramblings 
Leave a comment