Our goal of the hike on the first day was the rocky peak in the middle of this picture. It was about a 4,500ft elevation gain.
Here are a few pictures from the way up.
Is this not stereotypical Alps or what!
The wildflowers were in full bloom and the blues and yellows were incredibly bright against the dark green grasses.
Getting closer to the top...
Not a bad spot for a quick lunchbreak.
This is a video showing the panoramic view just below the summit. What a view! (don't get dizzy)
SUMMIT! (We started from the town on the left side of the picture. It took us about 7 hours from start to finish.)
These peaks were the original goal, but because this picture was taken at one of the clearest points of the day, we decided to just go to a hut a few hundred feet below them instead of going all the way up.
In order to reach the cross at the summit, we had to climb up about 25 feet through a narrow "chimney". Notice the steel cable to hang on to on the ridge on the bottom left. It's a good thing the cables were only necessary for about the last 75 feet or so! (it actually sounds worse than it was because the cable was really just to give you something to grab onto to help get over the rocks on the side, but I'm not a big fan of heights anyway).
This is looking down the chimney. The 2nd loop you can see is a handhold/foothold. Unfortunately the cable wasn't super tight, so it would swing when you put your foot into it. I was just about to call it close enough and stop there, but Alissa questioned my manhood, so of course I had to go on up after that!
SUMMIT! (We started from the town on the left side of the picture. It took us about 7 hours from start to finish.)
The 2nd day started out really cloudy with periods of rain, but cleared up later. We ended up not going as high since we couldn't see much anyway, but was still a good hike. Here we were just getting up in the fog.
Herd of sheep (livestock, not wild) right around the treeline.
Herd of sheep (livestock, not wild) right around the treeline.These peaks were the original goal, but because this picture was taken at one of the clearest points of the day, we decided to just go to a hut a few hundred feet below them instead of going all the way up.
It cleared up quite a bit after we started down and turned into a really nice day.
There were huge fields of these wildflowers everywhere. It's too bad the pictures of them didn't come out better.
View to the south from our hotel balcony. The very first picture was the view to the east.
