Climb to the Roof of Italy

by Peter La Marsh

Three years earlier I had passed the Gran Paradiso (4061m) while hiking the Via Alpina and had heard Italians talking about the mountain as the highest peak entirely on Italian soil (Mont Blanc, 4810m, next door is shared with France). Like the Italian hikers, I was keen on bagging a ‘ four thousander’ but the Gran Paradiso was still a serious undertaking, ascending 1400m of moraine and glacier. The expedition would have to be postponed until I located a guide to lead me to the top.

It was not until July 2016 that I was back in Italy, signed up with a British guide and a group of people from six countries, and heading to Valgrisenche for a six day trek. We would need only two days for the actual climb, with the first four days used for ‘acclimatisation.’ Each day we hiked higher and higher to a total of three rifugi, also completing a ‘training’ scramble-hike up to a peak at 3336m. From that practice peak we had our first glimpse of the REAL ONE, two hiking days distant.

When our four days of ‘prep’ were complete, we descended into the Valsavarenche (Parco Nazionale Gran Paradiso) to the hamlet of Pont (comprising a bridge, campground, grocery store, a few houses and facilities), from which the Gran Paradiso climb of two days began. We were joined in Pont by a second guide so that in the morning we would climb in two groups of five. In the afternoon, we hiked up 900m on well-engineered switchbacks to the Rifugio Vittorio Emanuele perched at 2732m. Named after Italy’s first king and dating back to 1961, the main building is shaped rather like a huge, upside down bowl. There, we were in the middle of Italy’s highest national park. At 16:00 the two guides put us through a final rehearsal: walking in crampons on grass and rocks was followed by getting in and out of harnesses and, finally, linking ourselves alpine fashion by rope. In addition to the four prep days, I had already hiked for 30 days across Italy on the Yellow Variant of the Via Alpina to be as primed and prepared as possible, so felt ready to go. Soon after dinner, the lively throng in the dining room dispersed. By 20:30 the vast rifugio was hushed and with the climbing crowd we were early to our bunks.

It seemed as if we had hardly closed our eyes when, at 03:15, alarms rang and people started stirring in the darkness. Breakfast was at 04:00. For me it was two slices of bread and two sips of tea. There were no bathrooms on the mountain.

Outside, a mob milled about in the dark, everyone decked in a headlamp. The lights of a lone plane blinked in the sky above. Behind the rifugio, bobbing lights, looking like fireflies, curled upwards in the blackness. At 04:40 we joined the queue. For the first hour our group trudged uphill in darkness as the guide followed cairns through the glacial moraine. Towards dawn we arrived at the snow-glacier boundary where we stowed our headlamps, got into harnesses, attached crampons and roped together.

We stopped only once on the climb up the glacier. It was a cold hike because we were still below the peak where the sun’s rays had not yet reached. For me, it became a laboured hike, unfamiliar crampons, walking at someone else’s pace and dragged along as if part of a chain gang! On top, we were carrying our full packs. With my eyes fixed on the ice and every step taking its toll, I was not keeping track of our progress. Without warning, the slackening of the rope and, “We’re there,” came as a welcome surprise. I thought we still had hours to endure! It was time to climb. The summit pinnacles soared above us and above the glacier. Scaling the blocks of granite at the base of the pinnacles, we came abruptly to a cleft in the pinnacles and to the brink of an unnerving drop-off. At this notch in the rocks began the one-way ‘path’ along the cliff edge to the summit. Unhappily, we were on PAUSE because of the congestion, as many of the climbers who had preceded us were now impatiently and noisily waiting their turn to proceed.

Only 5 or 6 people could sit on the actual summit, which did not improve the tolerance of those clamouring in the cleft.

Suddenly, the rope jerked. An opening among the swarm of climbers had appeared. Our guide was a veteran of the Gran Paradiso and he seized the moment. We were off. Terrified, I teetered along behind him, not daring to look down into the abyss beside me. The most unpleasant part was the few metres of ledge and sheer wall where we clipped our carabiners, step-by-step, to a steel cable in order to clamber the last steps to the Madonna statue on the summit. FINALLY, we were there!! It had taken us 4hr 45min to get to the roof of Italy and for five minutes we had the peak to ourselves, disregarding the shouts below. On the cramped summit we huddled around the Madonna in brilliant weather. The views were magnificent around the compass and the Matterhorn (Cervino, to the Italians) at 4478m was riveting.

The journey down to the Rifugio Chabod (2710m), at the foot of the north-west face of the Gran Paradiso and the other base rifugio for climbing, took another five hours. We traversed a different branch of the glacier, now slushy in the mid-day sun, often leaping across crevasses until we arrived at the moraine boundary where all the paraphernalia needed to walk on ice was removed and regular hiking was resumed. Next day, we were once more down in the Valsavarenche where a van collected us and returned the group to the village of Argentière, north of Chamonix. From there, we dispersed. I still had 11 days of hiking to complete the Yellow Via Alpina route before the summer ended.

Rifugio Vittorio Emanuele
Photos Peter La Marsh

A pause on the glacier climb

Leaving the congested top of the Gran Paradiso on the one-way sheer-drop 'path'

Climbing to the pinnacles and to the Madonna statue on the summit

From the summit, the view of the hiking route on the glacier

Return to the top of this page, or to the complete Index, or to this section's Index.