Cogne 3

Well, last week I went to Cogne again, and like the trips before our primary goal was an alpine route in Chamonix. I think Cogne is getting more than an alternative, the weather is always good, you always find ice here, and even after 20 climbing days here in Cogne there are still plenty of routes to climb.

On our arrival day Miel and I climbed the Stallatito de Cristallo, WI 4+. Good warm up.

At the start of the Stallatito de Cristallo... after 10 hours driving a nice physical activity


Next morning we moved a bit more to the right to climb Tutto Relativo, WI4. But there were people ahead, and with -17 degrees it was definitely to cold to wait an hour or so. So we traversed back to the left and climbed the Stallatito a second time, really nice. After that we got our chance to climb Tutto Relativo, the first two pitches are easy, but then things get really steep, it was cold, but the ice wasn't too bad. Afer the final pitch we walked up and around to go down again to the start of the route.

The crux pitch of Tutto Relativo...

We got some sun, had a hot tea and then crossed the valley to the other side to give Coyote another try. After the first pitch we aborted the climb because of a serious shower, within minutes everything was soaked, and immediatiley frozen. It was time to get down, and at 17.00 we had a nice Paulaner beer in Cogne.

Next day we went into Valleille again for climbing the cold couloir. We were pretty early trying to be the first en route. But as we arrived at the start more than 3 rope teams were preparing, so we decided to come back another time and walked back to Stella Artice.

Stella Artice is a pretty impressive route, with a long 60m start at WI4. But this is just the warm up for the very steep and long free-standing pillar of the 2nd pitch. In januari the pillar wasn’t yet thick enough for a save ascent, but now it was very massive – about 2x1 metres thickness. I never lead climbed a steep massive pillar like that. So it was pretty exciting. But it was really cool climbing. 

 

The left line is Stella Artice...

Steep ice is definitely fun!

 the final pitch of stella artice...

Funny thing is if you climb steeper ice routes it feels more like rock climbing – and that’s what we know and like! Miel second the steep pillar – he was really fast. After the steep pitch we had an easy snow pitch and the last pitch was hard to climb. Really hard ice, it was difficult to place the ice screws and my calf muscles were burning as hell. Anyway, we climbed that last pitch and in 4 abseils we were down again. It was a really cold day and even in the sun it was -15 or so.

 

Stella Artice gets some sun after 12.00h, Miel is rappelling down the first pitch and you can see some guys from Chamonix climbing the pillar

The last day we climbed the first 3 pitches of cold couloir, this time we the first party at the start. At 11.00h we were back in Lillaz for a coffee.