Wednesday June 19, Plattkofel Hütte to Rifugio Antermoia
On Wednesday, we crossed from mostly German-speaking Südtirol into mostly Italian-speaking Südtirol. We were heading to our second-highest hut of the trip, Rifugio Antermoia, where it had snowed a week earlier, and we weren't sure how easy it would be to reach.
Our day started by heading down from Plattkofel to the Duron valley.
The gushing waterfall we had seen the day before was now just a trickle.
We saw goats...
...and lotsa marmots. We did not wreak havoc on the ecosystem by feeding them peanuts.
Rifugio Micheluzzi, in the valley, is the starting point for many folks who hike up to Rifugio Antermoia. We passed the rifugio without stopping and continued through the valley...
Ah, toilet paper. People, people, people. Do not leave TP on the trail. No, no, no. Pack it out. Trust me on this: no one wants to see your toilet paper. Unless you want to see other people's toilet paper scattered about the trails, you should assume no one wants to see yours. Buy a Kula Cloth or other eco-friendly re-usable pee cloth, and never carry toilet paper with you again.
Up, up, up we hiked, past the toilet paper, up, up, up, past Passo Duron. Look, it's Plattkofel from southwestish, looking completely different from northwestish.
There's Passo Duron, which we'll hike down on Thursday:
Up, up, up we tromped, to the unmelted snow. After several days of warm sunlight, the snow was melting and soft. S had brought microspikes in his backpack, but we never needed to put them on.
Eventually, after all that upward tromping, we emerged at the rim of the cirque in which Rifugio Antermoia sits. The snow there was taller than we were, but the trail was clear, because the rifugio hosts had gone up a few weeks earlier and cleared the trails so they could open for the season on June 14th.
Look! It's Rifugio Antermoia!
The sign on the refuge says it's 2,496 meters above sea level--about 8,189 feet.
First order of business, Linzertorte and Apfelschorle. We weren't hungry enough yet for lunch, although it was lunchtime. The short hiking day was intentional: S likes rocky mountain tops, and there was other hiking to do on this mountain. Our original plan was to drop our packs and go exploring, to scope out whether we could hike out the next day by going up and over Antermoia Pass. But when we made that plan, we were expecting most of the snow to be gone by June 20, and it wasn't.
After we snacked, I removed the makeshift epaulettes I had been using for the past several days. My backpack was still relatively new, and the should straps were a little abrasive in places. S made the very useful suggestion that I stuff folded socks into the shoulders of my T-shirt, and it worked like a charm--just enough padding to soften the load.
We decided to hike to the bright glacial-silt blue lake near the refuge:
Look! Lake Antermoia! It was still covered with ice and snow and slush, but unobstructed water showed through in a few places.
After lolling in the sun with several other hikers--this was clearly a popular and pretty straightforwardly accessible spot--we headed back to the refuge, where brand spankin' new solar panels were being installed.
Here's the view from the front of the hut:
After all that lolling, we needed more food: a local cheese board with honey.
Here's a photo of S showing off a developing bruise on his forehead. When we arrived at the refuge, the squeaky clean glass doors were open. When he headed outside to admire the view, the doors were closed, but so clear they were invisible, and he plowed right into them.
Management heard the bang and came out to put a big masking-tape X and a "Warning: door!" sign on the glass. Shortly after that, the sweet golden retriever in the photo below did the same thing S had just done, banging its head into the glass with a loud thump. They need a masking-tape X at dog level too.
Afterward, I hung out at the refuge while S donned a pair of microspikes and set off toward Antermoia Pass, "just to see how it is." When he came back, he deemed it "manageable but not a lot of fun." While the snow was easy enough to walk on, it was also deep enough to occasionally sink thigh-deep into. The views, however, were pretty spectacular:
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| Looking back from the far side of the lake. The triangular peak rising in the distance is Marmolada, the highest peak in the Dolomites |
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| S's favorite photo: big mountains with people for scale |
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| Looking back from about halfway up to the pass |
Back at the hut, our room with a view:
And a view of the room. The bunk beds were stacked three high, with six beds total on each side of the room, plus additional beds in side rooms and another story up. The rifugio had been open for six days and was PACKED.
One consequence of being packed (aside from witnessing varying degrees of modesty between the room and the showers) was assigned seating at dinner. We sat with a family of four from Lithuania and a pair of hiking buddies from Belgium, and enjoyed the best conversations of our entire trip. (This was particularly welcome after our stay at Platkoffel Huette, where the diner assigned to the seat next to me was oddly territorial, manifested by a right elbow that inched ever closer to my plate. The Belgians were way better about personal space.)
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| The omnivores next to us had Speck-adorned beet risotto |
Starting at Plattkofel Huette, and continuing for the rest of our hike south, we were in the realm of Italian dining habits. This meant a first plate, a second plate, possibly a salad, and always "a little something sweet" to end the meal. Bread shifted from dark to fluffy white, along with--at least for the next couple of days--hard regional flatbread crackers seasoned with fennel, called Schüttelbrot.
Ta da! 5.7 miles, 2,200 ft elevation gain, mostly from the route below.
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