This year my mountaineering club again headed to the italian dolomites for a week of climbing. We went to the same area as last year so many plans were made long before departure. The goal was again for us sportos to gain some experience doing long alpine routes. We always stayed well within our difficulty comfort zone, never really climbing anything harder than 5.8-5.9. While the rest of Europe suffered from a heat wave, we experienced nearly perfect weather - most routes start at around 2000 meters, so the temperatures were just right. Most of us had not done much alpine climbing this year so on the first day we warmed up on some straightforward 200-meter routes on perfect rock. Feeling good after the first day, Uros and I decided to up the ante and do Alvera (350m V+).

The high point of our trip last year was a slightly easier route that takes one arete to the left of Alvera in the photo. Here's Uros on the first pitch, just as the sun rose above the mountains in the east.

Our fellow climbers thought we were crazy for getting up at 4am for this climb, but we wanted to be able to move at our own pace which required us to be the first on the route that day - since it's a classic, we expected a lot of traffic. We were rewarded with a fabulous sunrise.

The route was awesome, a bit harder than the one we did last year. The crux pitch featured a strangely sized vertical dihedral/chimney (seen a few pitches above Uros in the photo) whose only protection was an old piton at the beginning. The rest was unprotectable unless you happen to carry large camalots. Spicy. After a good amount of sweating and cursing I was treated to a fabulous belay ledge.

The following day we headed to the Lastoi di Formin group, which we eyed last year from just about every vantage point. In this picture, taken last year from Cinque Torri, it's the group in the foreground - plans to climb the spires in the background failed due to lack of motivated climbing partner on the last day.



The route was a bit shorter, but more sustained (250m, V+). Not having a single 'rest' pitch, awesome exposure, and getting slightly off route in the middle all added up to have quite a psychological effect on both of us. Here's Uros coming up to an awesome belay, back on route.



The crux on this route was fabulous - an overhang that required some sport climbing knowledge - a lock-off on a positive ledge, undercling, high-step, jug. Sweet.
After a rest day, we headed to Tofana di Rozes. It's the most imposing wall in the area, seen from just about anywhere. In the photo above, its summit is covered by a cloud. Our route didn't climb the entire 1000m face, but instead one of the shorter, monolithic pillars on the right-hand side.

Although you can't really tell in the photo, there are two separate towers here. There's an amazing-looking line on the taller tower on the left that follows a crack/dihedral system straight up the middle - definitely on my to-do list for the future? Our first attempt at this route (Primo Spigolo de Tofana di Rozes, 450m V+) ended at 9am - Uros led up the first pitch and complained on the way up that he wasn't feeling it. Half way up the pitch, two pairs of italian soldiers arrived, and instead of waiting for me to follow up to the first anchor, they immediately started climbing practically on top of us. They looked very professional so I thought they would be fast and talked to Uros about letting them pass, but this quickly proved not to be the case. I started climbing when the first one was 3/4 up the pitch and caught up to him, even after struggling to remove a cam for five minutes because he placed his piece right above it. The commotion caused Uros to call off the climb, we rappelled and returned to camp.


The next day we got an alpine start, were the first people on the route and had it basically to ourselves until a guide leading a client and a really fast german couple caught up to us. The first three dihedral pitches were amazing, vertical and sustained.



After two easier pitches we got onto the arete, and were treated to awesome exposure and a sweet traverse (although I *really* hate traverses, this was super fun).




When we reached the huge ledge about 2/3 up the route, we decided to take a break, enjoy the sun, and let the faster climbers pass. We didn't really feel hurried and thunderstorms were not imminent. Cinque Torri look quite childish from here (lower right). Lastoi di Formin is in the upper part of the photo.

On the exit pitch, we met up with Tomaz and Johny who climbed a route (VII+, 450m) to the right of ours on the same tower. We descended down an old via ferrata to a cabin at 2600 meters. The tourists gawked at us and our gear - we downed a liter of water and a pint of beer, lounged around in the sun swearing that we'll never be middle aged and overweight, and headed down to the car.

This was to be my last climb in the dolomites this year. I really wanted to climb the spires above Cortina (they are in just about every photo I took last year) but they will have to wait until another time. Amazing times, I'll be coming back to those parts for the rest of my life.