Bad day on the walk - sometimes it doesn't work and today was one of them.
Two problems: somehow we had not realised that it was a big walk, we had both somehow concluded that it was a stroll down the hill and, secondly; the weather was bad.
The weather was the most immediate problem. Thunder and lightening all night and rain early in the morning meant we didn't leave the hutte until 9.00 and then there there was another big storm mid-morning which held us up. The weather meant we were off the pace, it was hot and sweaty all day and we were constantly anticipating the next storm.
I knew how long the walk was, about 23 kilometres, and knew that it wasn't just straight down, but somehow was underprepared. I had prepared myself for a long easy walk down - the reality was something a lot tougher. After endless zig-zags down across an open moor the path climbed into thick trees and no longer seemed to make any sense. It went up instead of down, lost itself in an ever deeper morass of undergrowth and just went on and on. To make things worse none of the places I expected to see came up on the signs, and despite the hard evidence of the GPS, I didn't really know where I was.
We walked for nearly three hours on the edge of civilisation but without seeing anyone when, at last, we were spat out from the undergrowth unceremoniously into a mountainside restaurant. Grabbing the opportunity to restore a sense of normality we ordered omelette and chips.
Not sure if it's the weather, or the harder than anticipated path,or a combination of the two but team working is not as good as it might be at the moment. Struggling through the trees on steep, sometimes precarious paths, promoted cold war style communications - not much and not very meaningful.
The best bit of the day was the 800 metre final crash down the mountain to Finkenburg - at last we knew how far we had to go. The descent restored partial communications and we decided that, given the bad weather forecast and the tough walking for next three/four days we should get ourselves in a position for some bus assistance. After a brief chat with a helpful woman at tourist information in Finkenburg we agreed that a better starting point for tomorrow was Mayerhofen, and ended staying there.
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone
Two problems: somehow we had not realised that it was a big walk, we had both somehow concluded that it was a stroll down the hill and, secondly; the weather was bad.
 |
| Looking back to Rastkogelhütte |
The weather was the most immediate problem. Thunder and lightening all night and rain early in the morning meant we didn't leave the hutte until 9.00 and then there there was another big storm mid-morning which held us up. The weather meant we were off the pace, it was hot and sweaty all day and we were constantly anticipating the next storm.
I knew how long the walk was, about 23 kilometres, and knew that it wasn't just straight down, but somehow was underprepared. I had prepared myself for a long easy walk down - the reality was something a lot tougher. After endless zig-zags down across an open moor the path climbed into thick trees and no longer seemed to make any sense. It went up instead of down, lost itself in an ever deeper morass of undergrowth and just went on and on. To make things worse none of the places I expected to see came up on the signs, and despite the hard evidence of the GPS, I didn't really know where I was.
We walked for nearly three hours on the edge of civilisation but without seeing anyone when, at last, we were spat out from the undergrowth unceremoniously into a mountainside restaurant. Grabbing the opportunity to restore a sense of normality we ordered omelette and chips.
 |
| Tricky river crossing |
Not sure if it's the weather, or the harder than anticipated path,or a combination of the two but team working is not as good as it might be at the moment. Struggling through the trees on steep, sometimes precarious paths, promoted cold war style communications - not much and not very meaningful.
The best bit of the day was the 800 metre final crash down the mountain to Finkenburg - at last we knew how far we had to go. The descent restored partial communications and we decided that, given the bad weather forecast and the tough walking for next three/four days we should get ourselves in a position for some bus assistance. After a brief chat with a helpful woman at tourist information in Finkenburg we agreed that a better starting point for tomorrow was Mayerhofen, and ended staying there.
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone
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