A freezing night in the Alps: Bivacco in Grignetta (Grigna Meridionale)

Since October 2019 I've moved to Italy and never stop exploring (good publicity!), also passing through COVID times. Actually, COVID restrictions resulted in a good opportunity to explore the entrails of Italy. Sincerely, living abroad is far from being the endless dream that people believe, at the same time that I love this country, many times I'm borred, annoyed, and depressed, it is not straightforward. 

Anyway, there is a lot of personal and professional gains and opportunities, and I will focus my posts on the purpose of this page: my moutaineering experiences.

Today I will tell the story of an extremely freezing night in an epic mountain here in the pre-Alps near Milan, province of Lecco: La Grignetta or Grigna Meridionale. 

Cresta Cermenati in Grignetta, summit at the background.

La Grignetta is not a very tall mountain, it is only 2177 m, it is less than the Mantiqueira Mountains in Brazil. The main route should not costs more than 3 hours to ascend. Nevertheless, it does not make it less wonderful, and completely frightening in the winter. There is a shelter (bivacco) in the peak, null and small, but useful and friendly.

The adventure starts in the Friday of 1st February, 2021. I shared with my friend Mauro Panz, that I've met here in the group with which I join almost all the mountains: "I Salmoni di Montagna" (Salmons of the Mountains ahhahaha). His idea was ascending this mountain with the large backpack, to test his new equipment: tent and sleeping bag. I was the only friend that joined the adventure at the same moment, because I'm totally adept of camping, I think it is the only way to feel completely what the natural environment have to offer: silence, immensity, wilderness... Also, camping in the snow is not common for me, I did it sometime in Spain and Chile, but there was still in the down valley with few snow. This was my first time camping in a peak with a LOT OF SNOW. This year had an anomalous high accumulation of snow in the pre-Alps and the environment becomes completely alpine. Specially Grignetta is a mountain with characteristic steep slopes, with needles of rock divided by vertical channels that eventually suffer avalanches (photo). 

 

Canale Porta, accumulated snow from avalanches a little over.

The adventure starts with an episode related to avalanches. First thing, our initial idea was not doing the normal route, the "Cresta Cermenati", but doing another one called the "Cresta Sinigalia". It should be more adventurous, and of course more risky, but still okay. However, we commit the first error starting too late. We started to walk at 10 AM, in a very warm day. The snow was not good and starting to melt after some days of increasing temperature in the valley.  We've passed by the woods, traversed a wide vertical channel that is the "Canale Porta", that day with large accumulations of unconsolidated snow from old avalanches (photo). It causes impression, and we stop to put the crampons. 

 We remained long minutes putting the crampons, it was almost as an intuition. Some seconds after we finish, a small avalanche happen just in front of us, in a small channel 1 meter wide. It was scary and exciting at the same time, it was like a river of unconsolidated snow, flowing by more than one minute. More scary was the noise that it emitted when it falls down the valley, it is very strong! This was not dangerous for us at that moment, the avalanches there are very canalized, but can be dangerous if you are inside the channel. For our luck, we were just in front, and decided to not go by that way, even if it should be easy to transpose this part. The impact of the moment said us to come back to the normal way, la "Cresta Cermenati".

View from the Beggining of the way.

 

During the ascent.

Last part close to the summit of Grignetta.

We turned to the woods and with the heavy backpack everything turns harder and slower, and we had additional equipment like the harness and carabiners that are useless for the normal route. During the way we could see that the snow was a shit, it was very warm, and we still have seen two other avalanches in the farther vertical channels. One of them formed a big snowfall. It is astounding the strength of nature. However, the normal route was very stable and does not offer any danger that day (even if it could). The last part of the crest is very steep and have precipices to both sides, kind of scary. We finally arrived at the summit, very satisfied to see the Alps that appear in the north, the Grignone (Grigna Setentrionale), the cross and the shelter.

 

Video of the last part arriving the summit.

In the summit with Grignone in the backgroud.

Me and Mauro in the summit, cross and bivacco in the background.

The weather changed drastically in the summit and becomes completely freezing due to the strong cold winds that never stop that day. We quickly started to freeze and enter the bivacco. This is a bivacco sacro that seems a tiny church of wood, with a cross inside and some tributes to a mountaineer that died. The atmosphere is dark orange and strange inside, light comes only from small circular windows in the top, and outside it is covered with a metallic structure that makes it similar to a space shift or a submarine.

Rifugio Brioschi at Grignone completely covered of snow.

Inside the bivacco, soup cooking.

In the first moment, my friend hesitate on putting the tent, but I insisted since we have climbed with that additional weight in the back. There was only one safe place to put the tent, just in front of the shelter, that has a kind of a depression more protected from the winds. First, sorry but this was the most strange tent I've ever seen (and I've seen several kinds of tent in my life). It should be armed from the exterior cover, to then connect the intern part. The pegs don't stayed fixed in the snow and Mauro had to bury the piolet in the snow and connect it to the tent with a string, to guarantee that it would be fixed. Finally we've done but I had not the desire of entering in the tent, because of the cold!! 

Our tent.

We've had dinner inside the shelter, we've cook a minestra (soup) of pasta and beans, some chocolate, stayed talking, and also receiving the people that use to attack the summit to see the sunset, that was beautifull, but I was so cold that I couldn't enjoy it completely. My hands and feet was completely freeze and I've never stop shaking, my bouts were straight and I had not big gloves. For my luck, I had an additional pair of sportive shoes that save my life, wearing the bouts would mean loosing fingers (poetic exaggeration, but truly freezing hahaha).

The full moon has born illuminating the valley. Two guys arrived at night to practice ski alpinism (what for me seemed crazy, but people here are expert on this variation of alpinism). After their departure, the only thing that rest was trying to sleep... in the tent!! 

Cities becoming illuminated.

Let's go, first moment: nice! Second: not bad. After 10 minutes: that's fucking cold!! 

Trying to sleep in the tent ?

I've detected that the main problem was the rising cold from the ground, and I was only with my yoga mat to protect me. I have to use my ski jacket bellow me, and put also ALL the clothes I've brought, and I managed to sleep 3 hours. At 2 AM, I wake up, the temperature seemed to have decreased. Also Mauro wake up, the winds were very strong at that moment, and he asked me: "Can this wind drag us away?" I've answered: "I don't know, but we should not test anymore". Then, we've decided to enter again the shelter. The problem was that Mauro wanted to just stick the tent inside the shelter, without disassembling this. I've knew that it will not worked, and I disarmed the rods first, but I've still tried to just press a little the smaller rod to enter the door, and it broken because it was frozen. Sad first night for the tent. Okay, we tried to sleep then in the shelter, but meeen, it was still fucking cold! Even without the wind, temperature was nothing better than the tent, maybe by the humidity or the wind entering by the cracks, I've remained shaking and breathing deeply. 

 Full moon in the early morning and sun rising.

Finally, at 6 AM night was done, let's see the sunrise... But I don't want to put the frozen bouts, I don't want to go out from the shelter, I neither want to move... During the morning many people started to reach the summit, I did a pair of photos and came back to my sleeping bag to try to warm myself again. I was not feeling very good actually, because I was cold all the night and I did not drink a lot of water during the way, I think I was dehydrated. I've eaten a piece of panetone, tried to unfreeze my bouts in the stove, put them, put the crampons, and still had to wait Mauro to be right, that was a torture. 

 

Lecchese part of the Lake of Como during the sunrise. 

Grignone during the sunrise.

Okay, finally, let's go. In the first steps to down the crest I fear very scary! The crest is very steep as I said before, and I feel my legs debilitated due to the hard ascent with weight in the past day. I did it very slow and carefully, people start to pass me. Crest done, there was just a matter of going slow and confident until the end. The snow was very better that morning, before the begging of the warming.

We've reached the end of the adventure without any real problem, and, even with all the lacks of comfort, It was AMAZING, and completely immersive, as I love. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I think we need to feel uncomfortable to fell our freedom, to feel our bodies, to feel our consciousness. I was never forget this night in the snow in a summit as Grignetta, that is not a common place. This is an special place that hold the heart of all the mountaineers that reach it, even if is not a big deal. Because this is a unique place: the steep channels, the rock needles, the view for the Alps and the view to the Lecco (Como) Lake, the wind, the shelter, all of this is unique in Grignetta.  

This is what we search as mountaineers: uniqueness, wilderness, adrenaline, deepness... and this was this trip!

PS: It the first time that I write in English here, I always thought that this site is to put my personal experiences and I should use my native language to allow expressing my complete emotions on the stories. However, in the last years I've gained friends from several nationalities and I decided to make it available to everyone. Sorry by my mistakes!