Narrowing the gap
ascent of the Zugspitze via the Höllental

by Lorna Fewtrell

Fruit and I were booked onto the WELTbewegend Foundation Alpine Skills course at the end of June and we had a strong suspicion that, as we are both pushing 60, we would be the oldest on the course (we were). So we decided to play to our strengths – while we might be somewhat lacking in the ‘youth’ department, being retired we had the luxury of time and the chance to do some pre-course acclimatization. With that in mind, we were travelling in our campervan, making our way towards Austria and the course rendezvous, when we realised that we would be passing close to Germany’s highest peak (2962m). It is described in “Europe’s High Points” (Carl McKeating & Rachel Crolla – Cicerone) as “the jewel in the crown of the Bavarian Alps, Zugspitze is a veritable trove of thigh-slapping delights”. Given that there was also a cable car for the descent, how could we resist?

Thus, on 20 June we found ourselves setting off from Hammersbach (160m) at 05.30. The route is delightfully varied. The first part follows the stream uphill and through a spectacular (and wet) canyon. This is a tourist attraction in its own right, but the advantage of an early start was that a) we had it to ourselves and b) entry was free! We emerged from the canyon into the sunshine and a glorious valley, and got our first (very distant) glimpse of our objective for the day. The trudge up the valley to the glacier was largely picturesque through meadows, across rock faces (protected by via ferrata) and scree. Occasionally our path would cross that of the stream and we took the opportunity to cool down.

At the Höllentalferner, we roped up. The route was well-trodden, with a clear trail in the snow and quite a few people in front. The glacier isn’t steep and there were few crevasses, the main difficulty is the Randkluft at the end of the glacier which seems to be quite notorious. It was innocuous enough the day we were there; the problem was with all the other people in front of us. It is, in fairness, quite awkward to leave the snow and get onto the rock and the via ferrata that leads to the summit, so there was a queue. Unfortunately, there seemed to be a general lack of competence and we were both hit by walking poles from someone on the via ferrata (good job we were wearing helmets). There was also some very dodgy technique on the via ferrata, with multiple people clipped to each cable! We were glad to do some overtaking on easier ground and get ahead.

After the initial sunshine we were now shrouded in mist, so the views remain something of a mystery, but at least route finding wasn’t tricky with a via ferrata to follow. There was the obligatory summit cross photo, where we queue-jumped in front of the folks who had used a mechanical means of ascent. Our descent was via the cable car to Eibsee, the cog railway and then an ordinary train back to Hammersbach. We had walked 9km with a height gain of 2200m in just under 7 hrs - a grand day out and jolly good training for the Foundation Skills.

Emerging into the sunshine – Photo by Lorner Fewtrell

A clear path to follow – Photo by Fruit

Fruit, looking less than impressed, in the Randkluft queue – photo by Lorna Fewtrell

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