A shuttle bus was appointed at 11 sharp to pick us up from Val Fiscalina after our descent from Rifugio Zsigmondy and lead us to Lake Braies. Because we were the first to descend, we were just in time for a strudel and a coffee.
Lake Braies is the commercial-hello-tourists lake. Take your flip-flops, get into your car, get the little chihuahua on the leash, take gran’ma and her walking stick, the little one in their stroller and you can have a nice walk around the Lake while enjoying a wurst and the scenery. Extremely crowded but also extremely green and beautiful! A feast for the eyes. Completely different than Lake Sorapis but a spot to have on your to-go-to list.
The second part of the day was supposed to start exactly at the Lake – just take this path here and go up. This route, however, was not tested prior by our rangers. This was due to a misunderstanding in one of our accommodations so we needed to do it by ourselves and get to a certain end point at a certain hour.
The hike was around 19 km with an ascent of 900 m, mainly through the woods, and (oh…) a descent of more than 1500 m. We were about to find out that it will be difficult and never ending. Difficult because of the never ending part.
We did the ascent alone, just the two of us, no other companions or tourists. The heat was unbearable and my feet were starting to refuse the trail. I realised I cannot function in full heat. The worst thing was that I was also refusing to drink water. When I cannot do it anymore, my mouth takes the mic. And I begin to swear in cursive.
We reached the peak, at Kühwiesenkopf – 2140 m, and we found our team resting and pumping sugar in their veins. We decided to keep together for the rest of the descent. And this was the best decision we took during the whole trail. The way down was extremely tiring at first, you had to be cautious at the pointy rocks everywhere, then passing an I-cannot-see-its-finish-line hill with gazillions of horses and cows and manure and no place to hide from the sun, then starting to go downhill, through the woods, barely walking, toes and nails shrinking in the boots, grabbing the tree roots for a bit of hoooold-it-karen-not-that-fast!
From time to time we were bumping into a tree and stopping just to hear one of us cursing or looking desperately down to perhaps see the light at the end of the road. There was no light and we had to descend even more. Eleven rights and lefts and we reach the forest road and it will be leaner. Eight rights and lefts now! C’mon, another five rights and lefts! F*ckign hell, make it stop! I never want to see tree roots and forests and rocks in my life. Someone wanted to take a pee but, funny enough, no place to hide or leave the narrow path or be able to actually assume the peeing position.
Almost eleven hours after, the day ended and we reached our destination! A van was waiting to take us in the small city of Olang, in the province of Bolzano. We got to our B&B, a small villa where we shared the room with one of our companions. By this time, I was already accustomed to all of our fellow hikers so sleeping with almost strangers was not an issue anymore (Well, this might sound a bit weird).
That late evening we had a reservation to a pizzeria and, sweet baby jesus, I had the best pizza ever! My pizza was called Steve and I loved him wholeheartedly.
In the fourth day, the same van was appointed to take us to Rifugio Pederü and from there, going through the Alta Via again, we were to reach Lake Piciodel, and head to Camping Sass Dlacia – the accommodation for the night to come. Each with their own tent, thank God! The hike was around 15 km with a fairly 700 m ascent and just as many for the descent.
A great late lunch cooked in South Tirol was waiting for us at Refugio Fanes. Should I pin the strudel again or it goes without saying that I had another one? Lake Piciodel is a small, green, ready to bathe in lake. The water was freezing cold but this did not stop our friends to jump in and cool off.
The Sass Dlacia camping is one of the best spots to end or begin new hikes – the camping has absolutely everything you need to spend some weeks without a care. Perfect shower facilities, dozens of washing machines, spots where you can put your tent or park your RV, a super market, a restaurant, terraces and a bar that was promoted as the loud area. Well, considering all hikers were dead asleep at ten, tops, I am not quite sure who spends their time in that loud area, heavily drinking all night. This is not college life, gents! What the camping does not have is more sockets where one could charge their devices. Please picure me at 5:30 in the morning, brushing my teeth so thoroughly that would make any dentist proud, just to allow my phone to get some more juice while placed in a socket by the sinks.
I love mornings. I am completely in love with all my mornings – and now imagine the ones where you wake up, unzip the fabric, and you are surrounded by mountains, the sun is making its way out through the peaks, your face looks shredded by the so-called pillow you slept on, a fellow gets out of their tent and speeds up to take a leak while dressed like Deadpool at a Pride parade. Never judge a man by its covers. Especially in the mountain campings. While getting back with some juice in my mobile, I hear voices calling me over – the Belgian couple whose teen girl was named just like ours was awake and the perfect smell of instant coffee lead me to them. Did you sleep? Oh, f*ck yes, I think I had a solid 7 hours of sleep. And this is when I got killed by their looks. They got the flu, the coughing, the cold and no sleep. And I only wanted a sip of that instant coffee of theirs. Well, now that you mention, it might not have been 7 hours…let’s say 4-ish and those were poor, all kinds of noises around. I tried to lie and make them give back the heart they pulled from my chest.
Day five was ready to begin. This was about to be by far my favourite day in the mountains! We would reach Nuvolau peak and sleep at 2575 m, with 8 other people, in the smallest room you could imagine and I was about to experience the most beautiful sunrise I have ever seen.
But this is a story for another day. Keep close.