I am a person that normally is satisfied with the little things, I do not need many people to have fun, believe me 2 or 3 mates are enough to make a day in the mountains memorable. However this morning I decided to venturing in solitary to reach one of my favourite places, Cantinaccio group in the val of Fassa.
I park my car in the uphill installations Vajolet 1- Vajolet 2 and I head with a good gait up to Pian Pecei where a wonderful pasture of cows welcomes me dancing in the meadows with their resonant cowbells.
In an era where you try to reach the peak with the most difficult route band you compete to make elevation gain in the shortest time I decided to go counter-current . I do not care If I get there first or overstep my limits to prove something to someone. I want to amaze every time that I come to these places and I want to live the mountain the way I like, without necessarily have to bring home the highest peak or the most technical via ferrata.
These pale rocks are the reason in which every Saturday morning I decide to wake up from my bed and travel for hundred kilometres. I have a special bond with the Catenaccio because is the first group of the dolomites in which my parents brought me when I was a child. Whereby I took my first cable car, I slept in my first refuge at hight altitude, I discovered what the vie ferrate were and made my fist peak above 9842.52 foot.
Arrival until the fountain where is located near the Garrdeccia refuge to freshen up in this summer warm day and I continue with a long climb until Presuss Vajolet refuge, where I decide to stop and eat a chocolate bar. I enjoy the wonderful amphitheatre with the most famous towers of the Dolomites and I close my eyes for a moment in order to recover the energy to face the most challenging part of the climb of todays day.
I returned to the kingdom of King Laurin to reach again the peak that the first time had fascinated me so much. I pass to greet Sergio at the refuge Passo Principe for lunch and then I head towards the via ferrata to the Catenaccio di Antermoia. I am alone, in the belly of the Dolomites, who accompany me on this wonderful way between exposed ledges and small walls to overcome. Is not a difficult via Ferrata even less technical but it offers a view on the crane truly breathtaking. At one point I start seeing the cross and I know that shortly I will have to walk the ridge that will take me to the summit. The same ridge that years ago had made me frightened for the (exposition) and now I look with a different eye, that of a person that between this peaks by now had made her bones and is well aware how to behave respecting the place in which is located but mainly himself.
I arrive just before sunset at the cross of peak and what my eyes see in this moment cannot be describable in words. The pile of clouds that accompanied me during the climb via ferrata finally leaves the space at the sunset that I desired to see from up there. The colours are getting brighter, despite the altitude the sun can warm up the hart and clear your mind of all thoughts . When you get at the top, the problems and anxieties of everyday’s life fade away, because up here everything that is important becomes so small to no longer exist.
At this moment I could get off the refuge for a hot meal and a comfortable bed but this time I took a different decision. I chose this time to remain and spend the night here in the summit to live the experience more completed.
I prepare my bed position with the bivouac bag, the mat and sleeping bag, I drink a herbal tea to warm me up and I get under the covers with the last lights of the dusk. I am terribly tired and as a result I can fall asleep immediately, but by 2 a.m. a gust of quite strong wind wake me up. I do not understand if I am still dreaming because when I open my eyes above me I see million stars running long a white strip, when I realise it is the milky way well distinguishable to the naked eye. I realise that I am awake in the middle on the night at 9842.52 foot on one of my favourites peak without anybody around. This type of adventures make me feel alive because they enable me to have a relation more pure and unspoiled with the nature that surround me.
The alarm rings, it is 5 a.m. and the first lights of the sun start to color the highest peaks, I have never experienced a performance like this in my entire life. Is truly difficult to describe in words such a strong emotion, certain things you cannot explain them, you have to live them to fully to understand it. I turn the gaze one last time towards the cross in the peak smiling because now I can tell to have truly conquered it, after all you learn to know a mountain when you sleep on it.
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