Matterhorn North Face

Matterhorn is quite a spectacular mountain. It is definitely nice to look at, but climbing it is more like fighting with a pile of rubble. Well, at least most years (See here, for example). This year was different. Due to wet summer, there was plenty of ice everywhere. And the classic north face has formed into an enjoyable ice climb. With the excellent weather forecast for the weekend we had to get on it.

North-East face of Lyskamm

"No sense packing a stove you can't light" Mark Twight

So we learned...

Dehydrated. Still happy.

Frieder, Saule and me were camped at the base of the Lyskamm north face after a long approach from Rotenboden. The face above looked really nice and the Matterhorn in the west made the view even better. The only problem was that our stove was not working.

Miyar valley, Himachal Pradesh

Upper Takdung glacier in Miyar valley. Lotus and Neverseen towers.

Always inspired by the Himalayan stories, I finally had a chance to visit them this August to September. We had an amazing gang with the strong youth Cyrill, the wise man Elias, the wild cowboy Aras and myself for some comedy value. Even though the weather didn't play along, we still had some great climbing days with jokes flowing in spades and good time guaranteed. 

Sea Cliffs of Pembroke

I am stuck in Heathrow airport, already gave up the hopes to reach Zurich, but still have my fingers crossed for a flight to Geneva tonight. Oh well, a good chance to write a few lines about the last couple of days.

Baltics go Bernina

When Dan said that they are touring Europe, climbing mountains, drinking wine and they are about to stop in Zurich, Saule and I joined them for the weekend with a holiday feel.

Piz Bernina. Biancograt is the right skyline

Grand Capucin

With an amazing weather forecast for the weekend, Saule and I packed our bags to take a train all the way to Cham. Just before leaving, however, we got an offer from Franz and Frieder to join them in the car. Needless to say, we were looking forward to the banter with the boys and the roadtrip southwest ensued.

Rise and shine!

Bockmattli

Ever since spotting the pretty rock face of Bockmattli during one of my bike rides round Zurisee, I was eager to check it out from closer. It turned out to be a really worthwhile cliff, almost a local small-big-wall. Fabio and I did the classic Direkte Nordwand.

The route goes just to the left of the huge corner on the main face