Why Ferrata

Are we yet getting bored of via ferrata, not a bit of it.

The aire last night had everything and a bit extra. The electricity allowed us to charge everything and use the computers without fear of them running out of power. Talk about taking advantage of a freebie. The main part of the aire was peaceful and ordered, but another sector was a bit different. A washing machine seemed plumbed in, although it sat on the tarmac ejecting its water into the nearest culvert. A constant line of washing was also hanging out to dry. Some of these vehicles were caravans, but they didn’t look like they had moved recently!

We did our morning chores after breakfast, cleaning Dora, and set off down the valley.

Susana is always entertained with my fascination with pipes, as she calls it. Not so much pipes, just human ingenuity. Presumably this is some hydroelectric infrastructure, but what a dramatic leap across the gorge!

You could make a really nice modern via ferrata using such pieces of the modern landscape, suspend a wafer thin bridge beneath it, or weld on a few stemples to the side. The possibilities are endless.

This is part of the interesting thing about via ferrata, because they are artificial you could, realistically put them anywhere. Up the face of a dam, either direct or traversing, and why stop at old buildings, maybe new buildings could do with the odd bit of cable and a few spikes as people balance precariously around the outside. This means you need not stop at the countryside, move into the towns and cities, reclaim the vertical!

 

The title of the climb we have chosen today is Via Ferrata Les Vigneaux and it is located in the Hautes- Alpes

It is in two stages, but we chickened out of stage B, so we won’t be talking about that one, maybe just a little.

Stage A

La Voie du Colombier

Length	450m
Ascent	390m
Descent	390m
Technical grade	2
Exposure	4
Seriousness	A
Time	3:00
Approach	0:20
Climb	2:00
Return	0:40
Notes	No escape points

So we have been discussing ways to vary these posts, and Susana and I come from slightly different starting points. The problem with via ferrata is that from a blog point of view they may come across really similar. Once you have discussed the kit; here I am putting on my helmet, a must for every fashion conscious ferratist (and one that doesn’t want concussion from falling rocks!)

In many ways even the photos come out looking the same.

But I have always maintained that the blog should be a record of our travels, a way of securing the memory, putting it down, good and proper on the hard disk.

We should not compromise the description because it may come across similar to another climb, otherwise we might not remember what it was really like, when we reread it in years to come.

But then, we might want to introduce a different discussion point, alongside the route.

The thing about via ferrata is that although the ingredients are usually the same; rock, cable, stemple, handhold, three wire bridge, plank etc., the landscape is always different, and the configuration of those ingredients is always different.

We gain height quickly today, so the exposure is particularly tangible, with the village sitting snuggly below you.

After a bit of a climb we are traversing around the hillside, with quite a lot of rock contact.

Even on the steeper sections, but when near vertical

When the views are at their most magnificent,

we revert to stemples, although you can still go ‘old skool’ if you wish.

We didn’t feel up to a grade 4 today, so we continued with our grade 2, although it is always difficult not to harbour just a little bit of regret!

Other times, after hesitating we have been brave enough to go for the difficult one, and find out that the description sounded much worst than what the route was really liked. So, I wonder how many tackable routes we would have dismissed. But then, you cannot really blame the guide entirely. Descriptions are always subject to perception. SM.

2 kms

2 hrs

Our next climb is Via Ferrata de Tournoux near Puy St. Vincent and in Hautes- Alpes. It is about half an hour further down the valley, so we retrace our steps, get back on the valley road before heading once again off to the right, climbing up out of the valley up into the small villages that perch up high, beneath the rocky buttresses where most of the via ferrata are located. This one is higher than normal and eventually the road ends, giving way to a dusty track. Dora is not afraid with a loss of tarmac and, as it is not too rutted, we continue up to a small col or pass where we can park. The climb starts after a further twenty minutes walk around the base of a rocky cliff, but set within a fairly dense wood.

Unusually this climb only has one stage.

Length	450m
Ascent	190m
Descent	190m
Technical grade	3
Exposure	3
Seriousness	B
Time	2:15
Approach	0:15
Climb	1:40
Return	0:20
Notes	North facing 1 escape point

 

It starts with a pretty much vertical wall. A good start, quite strenuous, which might bring us to our discussion point; why?

For me, via ferrata is even more abstract than climbing, because it is artificial. This rock would be pretty much un-climbable were if not for all the artificial aides that are put in, to make it climbable, but is this climbing?

You might use the facile answer, the old cliché, ‘because it’s there’, but it wouldn’t be there, without all this help.

The grades are as abstract as the climbs, which run hand in hand; if you start removing some of the protection, you soon get to a point where it is no longer a ferrata, it is now a climb.

So where does it sit?

A halfway house to climbing?

Its own sport?

 

Or is it just there to give you a great view, and expand our use and appreciation of the countryside!

Certainly, the more modern French via ferrata are so far removed from their counterparts in Italy, both in the lack of historical significance, and I think it can be said, in the grandeur of the landscape.

And different countries take different  approaches. Some French vie ferrate are more similar to the original Italians. However, Switzerland has opted for an adults version of a fun park. We are looking forward to see what the Germans ones are like. SM

The challenges are slightly different from climbing, the route being very prescribed.

Our guide suggests there are different ways of approaching ferrata using all parts of the protection, to the extent of hauling yourself up on the cable, although this is somewhat energy sapping.

A purist might reject this approach, preferring to use the rock when available, and the protection is just that, in case of accident;

But then this begs the question, why not just climb?

It is not as if this is inherently much safer.

Or, much easier.

For if it was, what would be the point.

I for one, am happy with the view, and getting you to parts of the landscape that others fail to venture into.

However artificial, when there is just the two of you, balanced precariously on air, just a 15mm diameter metal rod holding your weight, and a grasp of a flexible wire, you get to appreciate your vulnerabilities, your fragility.

And for me that is enough, there need not be any further explanation.

This climb, once you have reached the summit, you must come down. Usually a path snakes its way off of the hilltop.

This one is different; this one comes with a down-climb.

Now I consider down-climbing to be much more difficult to going up.

Maybe not the physical aspects, but from a concentration point of view.

It is much easier looking upwards to see the next handholds and footholds, much more difficult looking downwards, therefore a lot more concentration.

But Susana is really enjoying the different experience that comes with going down.

Different skills are to be put into practise here, and the more vie ferrate you do, the more creative you become with your moves and your thinking of getting out of tricky positions. From my point of view, this is  what I like about vie ferrate, the challenge of working your next move out and  trying to get smarter and smarter at moving on the rock. Looking at people who control themselves at that level is incredibly beautiful. SM.

Luckily this section is shorter and less severe than the upward bit and soon we are back on terra firma.

Wandering back through the woods, back to Dora.

It is always so hard, looking back at a route, trying to pick out the stemples and the cables, but somehow we went up there.

The mountains around here are just delightful; not as epic as Switzerland, but still stunning.

We take them in before we leave. We have been tempted back to Briancon and that electricity.

Having used all our data we park in the McDonalds car park and abuse the free Wi-fi for a while, uploading some posts and videos before heading back to the aire. The cupboard that houses the electricity is closed. We fear it is locked. No, still open. Within minutes we are plugged in and once again connected back to the mains.

An argument erupts from the other side of the site. It gravitates back towards the quiet area….It could be a while before we get to sleep!

8.8 kms

3 hrs

GDR

04/09/2015