Location: North 47.53820, East 012.66064 (GPS on the summit)
Difficulty: YDS class 3
Climbed September 6. 2016.
Information:
How to get there:
If you travel on
the autobahn from Munich to Salzburg, then exit south towards Inzell shortly before
Salzburg. Drive through Inzell and continue south following signs for Lofer. You will
enter Austria (on Hwy. 178), then pass through the small town of Unken.
Continue on Hwy. 178, the next town is Lofer. Do not enter the centrum, but make a right
in the traffic circle immediately after a Shell gas station. Drive a bit more than one
kilometer from the traffic circle, watch carefully for the first (smaller) road that
runs left. Turn onto this road. You will soon arrive at some signs telling you that
it is illegal to drive any further. However, with smaller letters below on one of the
signs, it says that visitors to the Von-Schmidt-Zabierow-Hütte are allowed to continue.
Keep left at the fork in the valley, then continue a short way, slightly uphill, to the
end of the road where there is a parking area. Park here, this location is
N47.56366, E012.67222, elevation about 850 meter.
Route description: Hut climb
The Von-Schmidt-Zabierow-Hütte (phone: +43-6588-7284) is strongly recommended. The hut is
managed by Katharina Filzer-Meiberger and her family plus some additional help
on busy weekends. Katharina is very service-oriented and also very knowledgeable
of the local mountains. She is also a good skier!
From the parking/trailhead, take the very well made trail that heads uphill, first across some
small pastures (cows) at the valley floor, then more uphill in zig-zag bends to your left. The trail
gains a local shelf that is followed by a climb up a fairly distinct gully. Higher, the route continues
its climb as it nears the main, steep valley. Higher up, you will finally see the hut, standing
prominently on the top of a small, local top in the middle of the larger drainage. The last part of
the climb is on limestone, you will reach a signed trailfork about 10 minutes below the hut. The
final section is well marked with paint on the rock.
Summit climb
From the hut, first retrace your steps to the signed trailfork. Continue straight where the trail from
the valley descends left. Shortly, there will be a second trailfork, here a trail climbs right while you
should continue the traverse as the route passes the first mountain, Grosses Reifhorn, 2488m, on the north side.
The trail curves a bit right as it descends into the upper
section of the valley that lies between Reifhorn and
Ochsenhorn (on the north side), then climbs up to the north base of the Grosses Ochsenhorn. There is a signed
trailfork here. The route to the summit is called Schärdinger Steig and runs directly (right) uphill from
this fork. First, zig-zag up an easy slope to a small, local col. Here, at location N47.54213, E012.65904,
elevation about 2115 meter, you encounter the first, easy (YDS class 3) climbing section. What remains is 400
vertical meter of (YDS) class 3 and class 2 terrain. The class 2 typically consists of broad ledges ascending
to the climbers right, while the class 3 terrain
connects between lower and higher ledges. There are two sections
with quite a bit of (YDS) class 3 scrambling, the limestone rock has almost always lots of foot and
hand-holds and often alternatives. Near the top, you turn a small corner and one must here traverse/descend into
a distinct gully. This section is protected by about 10 meter of steel cable. Next, one ascends the top part of
the gully followed by a short, but somewhat steepish final climb before the short summit ridge. This ridge has
two humps and the summit cross is located on hump number 2.
The humps are nearly equal in height, the first hump has
a concrete marker and may actually be slightly higher.
Comments:
After getting soaking wet on Sonntagshorn in the morning, all that
remained on this day was an 1100 meter vertical climb to the
Von-Schmidt-Zabierow-Hütte. I was ready to go at 1300. Most of the wet cloths were in my backpack. I decided
that since I surely would get rained on again, the best approach would be to wear minimal of cloths. Thus, I started
out with shorts and a T-shirt, about all I had that were still dry.
The sign said 3.5 hours, so I was quite pleased when arriving already at 1445.
Katharina was the only staff, thus it did not take long before I had a large weissbeer and a bowl
of hot soup. It turned out that I was the only guest staying overnight, on busy weekends (with better
weather), Katharina told me that they could have as many as 80 guests. Dinner was served at 1900, I took
the opportunity to put all my wet gear up for drying. We had a nice chat about mountains and skiing, before
going to sleep. The forecast called for more bad weather, at least in the morning. We agreed that we could
have a late and lazy breakfast.
The wind died down, but the fog did not go away. I decided to give it a try at 1045. It took me
one hour to walk across to the fork where
the Schärdinger Steig begins.
I got my first view of the mountain when descending into the last small valley directly
under the west flank, when the fog partially broke up for a brief moment. It looked sort
of uninviting,
perhaps good that I did not know that my route would be directly up on this side.
The ascent was interesting, always fun to look ahead and see what is
waiting around the next rock/corner. This was more sustained scrambling that I would have
guessed beforehand. The fog persisted so I could only see the next few meter ahead.
In a few places, this meant not
seeing the end of a scrambly section.
Despite some wet
rock in places, there were generally plenty of holds, one just needs to figure
out what is the easier, safer way to do things.
I got to the summit at 1245, so 2 hours
from the hut. I stayed around for 15
minutes, but the fog showed no signs of leaving.
The return trip bacame a true copy with respect to time, one hour down, then one
more hour on the return hike.
I stopped for yet another weissbeer (well earned!)
at the hut,
stayed around for
45 minutes. Katharina had received reinforcement, she would actually also head down this
afternoon. Shortly after leaving, I met several parties on their way up, so more people
would stay tonight.
A young man had hiked up on a day trip, he caught up with me as I stopped to finally
get a picture of the hut without fog.
We then walked together back down to the parking
in 1:35, so 10 minutes faster than my ascent.
Overall, this was a very nice trip, despite somewhat miserable weather. The hut is a
perfect place to stay and the ascent itself is quite a lot of fun.
I returned to my B&B place in Unken, now ready
for the conference in Slovakia. Next
weekend I have again a reservation here for Saturday night, hoping to climb
Hochgölling that day.