Pizzo Coca, the highest crest of the Orobie Alps

I'm back to write here after years, I grew up a lot as a mountaineer during these 4 years in the Alps, and even became an kind of "alpinist" as I always dreamt... Living in northern Italy and eastern France allowed me not only to discover but also to make serious projects in several disciplines of Alpinism. I've climbed rock, snow, and glacier crests and channels, I learnt ski and skialpinism (my poorest discipline but I did it!), I did 3000 and 4000 m mountains, and a lot of multi-pitch and sport climbing. Thus, I write here back with the joy of having done it for almost every weekend of these 4 years and being super motivated as in the beggining!

View to the valley, tent place and our group.

This weekend, 25-26 August 2023 I've climbed the Pizzo Coca, the highest of the Orobie Alps (the Alps of Bergamo in Lombardia, Italy) with its 3050 m of altitude, in a group of 4 people dividing it in 2 parts to complete the 2200 m of elevation gain with a beautiful rocky crest of 350 m to reach the summit. Our group was me, Stephanie and Agostino, two great friends of my group of climbing in Milan, and Filippo, a friend of Agostino. We started at Friday evening, departing at 20 h from Valbondione, in Val Seriana (Bergamo province). The evening suddenly became night, and I love to hike at night. It's slightly colder and we see wild life as we normally don't see in the woods, like several spiders, 3 small scorpions (2 cm), and 4 chamois (kind of goat from the Alps). Also seeing the village lights in the valley and the moon rising is astonishing. We did 1150 m of elevation gain in 2,5 h and we found the Rifugio Coca still open at 22 h, having time to buy a glass of wine to accompany our dinner brought from home in the shelter tables. After that, we set up the tents in a small hill behind the refuge, and enjoyed the starry sky for a quarter of hour, ignoring the clouds that were coming through our valley. Until here, everything was perfect, and we were planning to wake up at 5:30 and departure at 6 h to the summit. 

Valley and moon in the beggining of the evening.

Small scorpion in the way (2 cm)

Chamois in the way.

At 4 AM, the first drops of water reached our tents. In the first part of the storm, I was calm, once it was not so strong and long, nothing changed. At 5:30, the time we should wake up, it was a second rain gust, much stronger, and we just communicated between the tents: ok, not anymore summit probably, so sad to renounce again... :( (but actually was not over). At 6:30 we wake up and surprisingly the visibility was not bad, actually we've seen a beautiful sunrise behind la Presolana, another important mountain of the Orobie Alps that I just climbed some weeks ago in another cool (and cloudy) adventure! After some discussion we said okay, let's have breakfast in the refuge and see if the weather stabilizes, and at least until the Lake Coca (30 min) we must go! 

Sunrise and the Presolana in the background.

Our group in the sunrise.

Breakfast in the refuge.

Lago di Coca.

I was becoming excited to walk again, and my partners were divided between the motivated and the wary ones. We reached the lake after an easy walk, the rocks were not wet actually, and with some discussion at 8:40 h we decided to walk until 10 h to reach the base of the rocky crest, then we would discuss again. 

The distant Pizzo Coca in the middle of the hike.

Lots of rocks and the distant summit.

Reaching the base of the rocky crest, we took some minutes to finally decide to go, there was the optimist and the pessimist weather forecasts... We have seen some people climbing the final crest and I confess it gave us a bit more confidence, so we started. 

 

The beggining of the rocky crest.

In the rocky crest and view to the summit!

The crest started with a dihedral of II degree by 10 m, and after that was a constant mixture of walking and holding rocks with hands, would it be a I degree climbing? I really like when there are more complexity in the way than simply walking, and specially when it's some kind of rock climbing, even if it's easy. The last 4 years served also showed me that I have a full passion for rock climbing in all its forms, like classical crests, multi-pitch, sport climbing and even boulder. It's always a pleasure to face the rocks and find the best body movement to adapt to it. 

We continued in the crest for 1 h, and finally reached the top around 11 h. There was not clear sky and we actually just see clouds. But, to be honest, I was super happy. It's clear that the pleasure of mountaineering is strongly linked with landscapes, but it's not only that. It's also linked with the effort and commitment you dedicate, with yourself and with your partners, to reach a goal, and with the mistery of nature, and that partially visible crest had it's particular beauty.

Reaching the summit.

In the summit of Pizzo Coca.

We stayed the time of eating a cereal bar and taking a photo, there was also a big group that arrived with us, and we started to climb down. Going down many times is the most difficult part of a moutain, not because it's really more difficult, but because it plays with your moral. In a crest there is the true difficulty of putting attention in the holds to climb down and don't slip, but in a normal hike it's a matter of leaving your body and fighting against tireness, knowing that there's no surprise anymore. This go down was long, 2200 m and 11 km, and it rained in the last 15 min for me and Stephanie, giving a note of brazilian extra-tropical montain! But as some of you know, I'm really used to face rain in the mountains, and I felt a but of fun remembering my trekking times in Brazil. My friends, however, were not so happy :S

Wet in the end of the adventure.

But for our lucky,  the luxury of the Alps of having a refuge to have a warm lunch, helped us to reach the base of the valley and the car!

I confess I developed more connection with this section of the Alps (le Orobie) this year after going to the Presolana 3 times and really falling in love with that lunar limestone (I hope to write about it soon). The Pizzo Coca was different, it was dark (once the rock changes to a shale), causing an intriguing contrast between the imponent black mountain and the white clouds. This is a typical climb that is in the middle for mountaineering, it's not really easy, once it's a lot of elevation gain and some technical difficulty in the crest and demands a good physical and psychological preparation. However, it's also not so difficult, once it's super well sinalized, there was no snow in the summer, and it's exaclty above 3000 m (so the altitude it's rarely felt). So you will classify this mountain according your level and experience with mountaineering as a joke or a seriour stuff, and being conscious about it, I'm proud and happy to have done it!

Each one sets up their goals with the experience one have at a moment, and it was a nice goal for me this time :)

In the middle of the climb to Pizzo Coca, Alpi Orobie.