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| View from Schönbichler Horn |
This was a loop hike high above the Zillertal starting and finishing in Mayrhofen. It didn’t go through any villages and was well above 2000 metres the whole way. The length of my days was dictated by the position of the mountain huts and I had booked everything in advance. I had some basic route notes from the Berliner Höhenweg website. This hike is sometimes called the Zillertal Rucksack Route in English.
August 15 Mayrhofen to Gams Hütte 11.4 km. I was keen to get hiking. I walked from my hotel to the next village, Finkenberg, for my starting point rather than taking the bus that the route notes advised and had some difficulty finding the walk start. But I got some practice for my German while trying to find it. The start was actually near a bus stop that I had become very familiar with when skiing here two years ago: I had had to wait there over an hour for a bus one Sunday afternoon. I had a long uphill climb through forest and eventually emerged on the slopes below Gams Hütte. I could see villages and Mayrhofen far below. There was a nice view of a glacier from the hut and the weather kept changing all afternoon, sun to rain and back to sun. I gathered it must have been wet recently from all the puddles and mud.
August 16 Gams Hütte to Friesenberghaus 18.5 km. In the morning the hut warden yelled at me about something I had done and it took me two days to work out my terrible crime; I had left some rubbish on the table overnight. Reason: I couldn’t find a rubbish bin, and the answer was that the huts don’t have any; I’m sure this wasn’t the case last year. Once I got going this morning I really felt I was in the mountains as I remember Austria: a high contouring path, austere crags all around, sheep, streams flowing down the mountainsides. I had a long climb on a narrow trail that was muddy and wet. I slipped early on and tore my tights at the knee. Then I banged my legs on rocks. There was lots of scree and it was a bit slippery. The trail was thankfully well signed. I passed several shepherd huts. Clouds sometimes came over. Since I had brought my little stove and pot and gone to the bother of purchasing coffee sachets and metho I was keen to sit a while and have a coffee so I sat at the base of a huge cirque with many waterfalls and made coffee. I could see peaks in all directions. Today’s hike was quite a bit longer than the route notes implied. When the sun came out I sat in a sheltered spot by a little lake with a big reservoir in the distance. Friesenberghaus was busy, maybe because it had cable car access, and was in a lovely setting by a tiny lake with melting snow at the edges. Views were of craggy peaks and glaciers.
August 17 Friesenberghaus to Furtschlaglhaus 15.9 km. Today’s hike was unusually varied. I started on scree and encountered some goats on the trail.
I crossed several waterfalls. Along the ridge were great views of the glaciers I’d seen from the hut. I came to Olperer Hütte and then had a very long descent while there were an amazing number of people coming up, maybe 200, big groups, couples, families and I was constantly stopping. It was quite extraordinary. I tried to talk to some of them, and I could not imagine how the hut would cope with so many people, who were clearly going there for lunch. At the bottom (where I saw hundreds of parked cars) I had a long flat walk along the reservoir, where only a few daytrippers had ventured. I sat and made coffee (I’m sure it was illegal to use a stove there) looking at glaciers across the water; it was a warm muggy day. Then it was my my turn to climb. I had a series of switchbacks below the telpher line up to the hut and I enjoyed that. The hut deck had a great outlook but it was very busy and the dorm was huge. I finally realised that you don’t have to have the set 3 course meal at these mountain huts and that they have a menu too. That was a relief since I don’t like soup and don’t usually want desert.
August 18 Furtschlaglhaus to Berliner Hütte 10 km. I started with a long steep climb with switchbacks over scree, and aid chains. I came up to the Schönbichler Horn summit at 3134 metres with 360 degree mountain views and warm sunshine. I could see the hut far below, the air was still, and I sat there for ages along with a whole lot of other people.
The long descent was tricky at first with big steps and cables then more gradual but rocky and slow. I rested on a big flat boulder and made coffee. All the time the trail was alongside two glaciers.
I crossed a big creek, fast flowing, then sat on the grass in the sunshine. The Berlinerhütte had a lovely terrace and I enjoyed my afternoon Radler and apfel strudel. The view from the terrace was straight towards the Berlinerspitz, a conical mountain that partially obscured my view of the glaciers; I kept feeling I wanted to push the mountain aside. I seem to have developed a sore hamstring.
August 19 Berliner Hütte to Greizer Hütte 12.2 km. Everyone got up very early for some reason. I found out later it was because they knew that rain was coming. I had a nice climb above the hut with most peaks in cloud and glimpses of glaciers. The trail passed Schwarzersee with snow at its edges; the water was black but when I looked down on the lake from above the water was aqua. I had some snow patches to cross. The scree became very steep leading up to a notch, and at the top there were only views back to where I had come from; forward was all in cloud. I stopped briefly but it was cold up there. The descent was extremely steep with helpful cables and then a long downhill on scree and over boulders. The clouds occasionally cleared to produce craggy peaks. There was light rain and then it got heavier but my rain pants were not very accessible so I didn’t put them on. And I was also slow to put the waterproof cover over my pack so it got quite wet. I was a bit surprised how the weather could change so dramatically from one day to the next. I had more cable aided stretches and then a descent on a ladder. I had to cross a raging torrent of a creek on a wobbly bridge followed by a nice gradual climb to the hut. There were a few views of glaciers and masses of waterfalls but the bad weather moved in for good. At the hut as I arrived they were just taking cakes out of the oven. Everything in my pack was soaking wet but in the evening the sun came out and I could see my whole route down from the notch across the valley. I didn’t like the hut much because it was busy with several groups and it took them forever to serve dinner.
August 20 Greizer Hütte to Kasseler Hütte 11.5 km. The weather was not promising. I climbed to a notch but today nobody stopped at the top, then went down into another valley filled with scree and big boulders, some very tricky to clamber over and wet. When the rain started this time I was prepared with rain gear and pack cover. I had a patch of snow to cross. The long stretches of boulders and scree were slow going and it felt remote with just stony rocky mountainsides and rushing waterfalls. Some of the time I walked with a German couple who were doing the same hike from Gams Hütte to Mayrhofen. (There were three German couples who had been doing the same hike since Gams Hütte, but all the other people whom I’d assumed were doing the same hike gradually turned off onto other trails.) I crossed a big waterfall and could the see my destination hut way around the other side of huge cirque. Clouds were swirling in the valley and a river ran through the valley. I had glimpses of a village far below. There was a nice new suspension bridge before the hut. It kept raining all day and I felt claustrophobic in the hut. I finally chucked out my metho as I clearly didn’t need it.
August 21 Kasseler Hütte to Mayrhofen 25 km. When I was at breakfast it was clear that it was going to be raining all day but regardless I set out to hike. It was nine hours to the next hut (14 km) on a difficult trail according to my notes and then I would have to continue down to Mayrhofen as I had a room booked there. No one else left the hut for the Aschaffenburger Höhenweg so I felt like the last man standing. It was only light rain but I couldn't see anything; occasionally the cloud lifted and I could see distant peaks but not often. However in temperature this was great hiking weather. I found the hardest part the long stretches of huge boulders which were slippery and one time I fell on my shoulder. There were four big climbs: the first was ok, the second had a very steep and difficult descent with metal pins, the third had a very steep ascent on scree through a notch (but I saw nothing even though the sun was trying to come out). I saw a man with a dog and then a few cows and glimpsed a couple of deer in the mist. I didn’t see a single hiker until I reached the next hut but there was no way I would have said the conditions were dangerous. I got fed up with the boulders and fell again; I was becoming a bit exhausted. At 13 km I stopped for a while and while the sun was out I could see peaks and glaciers and also, unusually today, the path ahead. This fourth climb was grassy with a few rocks and I hoped the boulders were finished. The final descent, which I was not expecting, was at first steep and then more gradual down to Edel Hütte where I escaped from the rain to have cake and coffee. It was full of people who would have come up from Mayrhofen on the cable car and were presumably waiting for the rain to stop.
The hike down to Mayrhofen was long, on open hillsides and then forest. For the only time in my entire holiday of hiking I had to let some other hikers overtake me. I found the descent quite endless. At the bottom for some reason I followed my phone gps rather than the hiking signposts and I was sent on a very circuitous route into town, but I got to see the Ziller river in a deep gorge. This was ten hours of hiking in total. My legs felt the sorest ever due to scrambling and the odd movements as I went over the boulders.
In the evening I walked into town; it was really quiet. I had a Radler then got a pizza and chips and took them back to my room.
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