Mixed climbing in the Bernese Alps

 

We have been to Switzerland for a few days. We climbed the route “Mülloch” (M5, 7 pitches) on the north face of the Stockhorn in the Bernese Alps. Two days later we climbed the “Gälliwand” (5a, 9 pitches) on the north face of the Gällihorn. Both summits are located in the Bernese Alps and are easily accessible by cable cars, although for the Gällihorn we decided to stay in de Winteregg hut to have enough time for climbing. Both routes are nice to climb in winter with crampons and ice axes. Bring a rack of camalots and we doubled number 0.5, 0.75 and 1. Next day we went to Kandersteg for climbing the three pitches of "Lurking Fear"(WI 3).

Topos:

• Mülloch https://www.camptocamp.org/routes/1100371/fr/stockhorn-bern-voie-mulloch
• http://slack-line.ch/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Topo_Stockhorn-1.pdf 
• https://www.rebolting.ch/de/topos/routen/gaellihorn-2018.php
• https://www.camptocamp.org/routes/248710/fr/cascades-de-glace-adelboden-bonderfalle-lurking-fear 
  

"Mülloch"

 Preparation in the sun, before descending to the left to the start of the routes in the north face

 

 first pitch, not steep, but at times compact rock, Jeroen did a really cool lead...

 

 higher up on the first pitch, it all goes up to the far right, belay just before the rocky spur...

 

We have no picture of the two M5-pitches. Both pitches are steep, have some bolts and are good protectable with cams.

 

 

 exit of pitch 5

pitch 6 is a very compact lime stone rock band traversing to the right, we made belay there, than it's another pitch to the summit ridge.

pitch 7 close to the summit

beautiful views to Eiger, Blümlisalp and Balmhorn...

 

 

 Gällihorn

 

 

Winteregg hut, we walked up from Kandersteg in 2 hours

 

 

 

 

 

Pitch 1, ramp and then compact around the corner

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 Pitch 2, traverse to the left

Start of pitch 3

 

 

 

Pitch 3 just below the bloc coince...

 

 

 

Pitch 4, snow gully with some rocky sections

 

 Start of pitch 5

 

 

 

 Looking down into pitch 5, very compact, snowy and steep finish to the belay

 

 

 

Pitch 6, cool chimney and crack climbing

 

 

 

 

Looking down into pitch 6

 

 

 

 

 

Intermediate pitch to reach the start of the traverse to the right (10m above)

 

 

 

 Traverse to the right

 

 

 Summit!

 

 

 

 

 

 

LURKING FEAR 

 

 

3 pitches, 50min approach, very nice climbing...

 

 first pitch

 

 

start of second pitch

 

 

on top, happy!

 

 

 

Cogne -early ice again

 Like in 2021, I had to go to Switzerland for work early december. After fnishing there 3 days of working, Jeroen came by train, I picked him up in Bern and we drove to Cogne - unsure if we would find climbable conditions. We did! Some ice in the Loie icefall above Lillaz and in the afternoon some dry tooling at the Cretaz crag.

It was cold in the morning, -14 degrees Celsius or something...

Enough ice ...

Obligatory cappucini in the bar de Cogne

Enough rock...

Orco

 I had to work in Switzerland for a few days and Bernd and I were very eager to climb something despite the bad weather forecast. we only had a few days and finally it had more coffee and wine than that we actually climbed something. We hoped to go somewhere up in the higher mountains but we ended with some base climbs in Orco.

Cogne - Cold Couloir Integrale

 

Nice week of ice climbing in Cogne with Bernd. It was generally cold (around -13 degrees when we started). Not so much climbers anymore, as the week before we assume. Although, one day we wanted to climb Repentance, but one rope team arrived 20 minutes before us. So we decided to go to Monday Money first, but when we rapped down again 4 other rope teams were climbing on the same route, pretty weired.

Other cool routes we climbed were Candelabro de Coyote, Chandelle Levure and Tuborg. Especially Tuborg will keep in our mind, I climbed that route 5 or 6 times before but it had never been that steep and thin. Furthermore, the ice had a lot of tension and the pillar had not been worked well by other parties. I really had to work hard to climb this pitch.

Last day we climbed the Cold Couloir all the way to the top. Long day, with deep snow in the upper part. We had planned to be on the summit around 15.00h but it was finally 17.00h. The descent got a kind of deception. Around 19.00h we reached the area of the waterfalls close to Lillaz. We could see the village and the parking lot but we could nog exactly locate how to get down. Several steep slopes down climbing leading into dead ends, climbing back up again finally let us decide to call for assistance. We are very grateful for the help from the 2 guides and also the staff in the valley.

 

 

Steep pitch of Tuborg, difficult climbing this year

 

Tuborg upper part

Chandelle Levure, lower part

Chandelle Levure, upper part

Lower part of Candelabro del Coyote

On Candelabro del Coyote, we got really wet.

Last pitch of Monday Money

First pitch of the Cold Couloir, first part thin

Second pitch, really nice

5th pitch

6/7pitch

upper part, last part of ice

deep snow for several hundreds of meters

 

 Summit and views to Cogne and Epinel