Averau Via Ferrata

Monday 11 July Cinque Torri climbing and Averau Via Ferrata

We get up at 5 o’clock to leave early so that we can climb Averau before breakfast. The Via Ferrata is quite steep for a grade two. Nobody is about as we pass the Averau Hut, walk round the back and start scrambling up towards the peak. We follow cairns through steep scree and rock and a small snowfield to the top, arriving at 6:30 AM. The rising sun is there to greet us, and we can see the Cinque Torri illuminated down below us.

A little yellow biplane flies along the valley below us we wave. He comes round and flies directly over us at about 50 feet above us. There is just us, sitting on the summit rock, gleaming in the sun and the plane above. He dips his wings to us and we wave again from our eerie.

We return quickly, jogging back to the hut in time for breakfast and then pack up the sacks before going climbing to the towers. We soon see that the weather is closing in and we decide to go down to the valley before we get caught in the storm like yesterday and the chairlift is stopped.

When we get down we are starving; the restaurant at the bottom is full, there are no buses for hours and it is starting to rain Reluctantly we start walking up the road almost immediately someone stops and offers us a lift. He is an American who has in turn been given a lift so he’s just passing the favour on.