SETTINGOUT
WithJulyschoolholidaystheonlywindowavailableto us(plus
someextra‘schoolof life’leave),welandedinMunichand
travelledbytrainandbusto Madonnadi CampigliointheBrenta
Dolomites.Theareais famousformulti-pitchbigwallclimbsand
someof themostdemandingViaFerrataroutesintheworld.By
default,it alsohadspectacularhiking.
As luck would have it, late spring snow had closed all of the
high passes to hikers without crampons and ice axes, so we
altered our route and settled on some local day walks. We
discovered firsthand that, when walking in remote parts of the
Dolomites, there’s a real lack of information available on track
conditions. Even the local mountain guides, who mostly worked
in “our valley”, didn’t know much about the next valley or the
tracks between. We came across this problem on a regular basis
and often had to find hikers going in the opposite direction to get
up-to-date track information.
Our next staging point was the town of San Martino di
Castrozza at the base of the Pale di San Martino. I’d spent much
of my life working, hiking and skiing in the mountains of Nepal,
New Zealand, Japan, Canada, Papua New Guinea, and the
United States, and I’d never seen anything as dramatically
beautiful as the San Martino Dolomites. The massive limestone
spires reached over 2,000 vertical metres above the valley, and
they were so narrow, jagged and complex that it seemed
impossible for hikers and climbers to navigate their way through.Day1 -Madonnadi Campiglio(HotelLorenzetti)
Day2 -RifugioAlimonta
Day3 -RifugioAgostini
Day4 -FaidellaPaganella(SoleaSpaHotel)
Day5 -SanMartinodi Castrozza(HotelBelvedere)
Day6 -RifugioPassoValles
Day7 -PassoSanPellegrino(HotelCostabella)
Day8 -RifugioContrin
Day9 -Vigodi Fassa(ActiveOlympicHotel)
Day 10 - RifugioAlpedi Tires
Day 11 - RifugioVicenza
Day 12 - SelvaGardena(HotelNives)
Day 13 - LaVillain Badia(HotelCristallo)
Day 14 - RifugioFodaraVedla
Day 15 - StVigil(ExcelsiorHotel)OUR HIKING ITINERARY
Outdoor \ 87