Monday 8th August Admont to Modlingerhutte

The original plan was to walk from Admont all the way through to Hesshutte, an ambitious 10 hour walk. We had already worked out that a sensible bail out option was Johnsbach, slipping a day on the schedule, but given today's weather going even that far proved too miserable a prospect. It started raining heavily 30 minutes after we began and never let up, really heavy rain, couldn't see a thing and we got wetter and wetter. Having taken brief shelter at the Oberst-Kinkler Hutte at around 1pm (no food on a Monday), we found the warmth of the Modlingerhutte just too welcoming and decided to call it a day when we got there at 3.15pm.

As we were in cloud most of the day it is hard to describe the scenery. We started out up a road and then through trees from Admont with a steady but relentless uphill gradient. Crossing a road we continued up on a badly way marked path and at around 11am arrived at a small new sportshutte at a winter ski place where we had soup and bought a much needed local map. Good to know you actually are on the right path, especially when you can't see anything.

Then back out into the driving rain, steeper uphill now on a long twisting woodland climb up to the Oberst Kinkler Hutte where we scrounged a cup of coffee. The young woman serving looked surprised when we said we were going on to the Modlingerhutte Hutte and wished us luck. We later found out why.

After our non lunch we proceeded up to a col and then down a steep and slippery forest road for quite a way, catching tantalising brief glimpses of the Admonter Reichenstein ridge and face above us to the north. It was very wet underfoot and our feet were soaked, mine as per usual and Christine's despite her Gortex boots.

At the bottom we arrived at a raging torrent and a broken weir with no obvious way across, the water running so high. What to do. I walked up and down the bank a bit to try and find a safe way over but no luck. Christine was threatening to jump over and that looked dangerous. Eventually I eased myself out on my bottom on a broken trunk that had been part of the original weir, to end up dangling off the end above the torrent but still a metre from the other side. I removed my pack and threw it over and then, praying, pushed myself off. Made it. Then Christine gave me her pack and followed my lead, with me able to catch her on the drop. A hairy but satisfying moment. I tried to record the crossing place on my camera but had for once kept it inside my jacket pocket (not waterproof) rather than, as I usually do, in my shorts under my leggings. It is now defunct.

Our path continued but narrowed and steepened uphill again, sometimes in the open and sometimes through steep banks of conifers where it was so dark it seemed like night time. The rain was still beating down hard as ever and we could see virtually nothing. At last we arrived, after a steep pull up, at the Modlingerhutte. It felt like the Israelites arriving at the promised land, flowing with beer, noodles, jagermeister, sausage and above all warm and dry. We decided to stay here the night and Christine proceeded to consume a vast plate of holzfallernockerl.


PS from Christine: thank you Juan for praying for my knee : it's worked and I have gone through the last three days with no real problem.



No comments:

Post a Comment