When I planned this five-day hike through the Austrian Alps, I knew it would be one of the highlights of our year.
And it was! This was part two of the route Kai and I had started last year, and this time our friend Marina joined us.
Our friends Andreas and Andrea (A&A), two experienced alpinists who live near the Alps, also planned to join us for part of the hike. We didn’t know exactly where and when they would pop up, but we knew they would appear somewhere.
On our first day, we were happily chatting when we walked past a couple sitting quietly beside the trail. I greeted them and then suddenly realised they were A&A! They would spend the next two days hiking with us. Fabulous!
The first night also introduced Marina to the wonderful world of mountain huts, where you share a dormitory with twenty strangers or more. There is no internet, very little privacy, and if there is a shower, it is usually ice cold and has to be shared with an entire hut full of hikers.
But the atmosphere in these huts is magical. Everyone is there for the same reason, and by the end of dinner you’re chatting with the people at your table, exchanging route tips and mountain stories as if you had known each other for years.
The next morning brought the first small drama of the trip: one of the two toilets had become blocked just before breakfast. Not exactly convenient when there are 70+ people! Oh well, we dealt with the toilet queue and set off on our hike with only a few minutes delay.
We got to the second hut a few hours later. We were just about to have lunch in the hut, when suddenly, Andreas froze. “Where’s my wallet?”
It wasn’t in his backpack. Not in his pockets. Nowhere. Inside were his driving licence, credit cards and around EUR 500 in cash, which is important when every mountain hut only accepts cash.
He had last used it when paying the evening before – so it most likely must be in the first hut. Eventually, A&A headed all the way back while the rest of us waited, hoping for good news.
They searched the hut. They searched the trail. They searched everywhere they could think of. Nothing.
We reluctantly accepted that the wallet was gone for good, but we didn’t let it spoil the adventure. We still had a lot of beautiful scenery ahead of us!
The following morning, A&A continued with us as planned until lunchtime, when we said goodbye and continued on our own.
We set out the next day full of optimism. According to the guidebook, our hike should be “long, but easy”. Kai had downloaded the route onto his Garmin, so we followed it without a second thought.
Until the fixed ropes appeared. At first, I assumed it was just a short exposed section. But then Marina, who was ahead of us, suddenly shouted down: “Are you sure this is the right route? It’s getting steeper!”
I looked up and there she was, clinging to a steep rock face that looked never-ending.
A few seconds later, I was doing the same thing – hanging onto a steel cable and wondering how on earth this was still considered hiking.
Every fibre in my body was telling me to turn around, but going down looked even worse than going up.
My heart was pounding as if I were racing a 5K, and I felt breathless. Every inch felt like a small victory. Eventually, I reached the top and joined Kai and Marina. When I saw their faces, I knew that going down on the other side would be just as tricky.
Carefully and in complete silence, we climbed down until we finally reached easier ground.
Relief!
Only, an hour later we had another rope-assisted climb ahead of us. Fortunately, it was shorter. And by now, after what we had just survived, nothing could shock us anymore.
Only after we had completed both climbs did we find a warning sign describing the difficult alpine terrain. Well, thanks for that!
From then on, we started double-checking paper maps, just to make sure if we had another one of those climbs.
Once we were back in civilisation and had internet again, we discovered what had happened: we hadn’t followed the official hiking route at all. Kai had downloaded the route from Garmin’s heat map, which had sent us over a much trickier alpine route instead. I guess he decided the hike needed a little bonus challenge!
And then there was one final surprise! I got a message from Andrea.
The wallet had been found!
Remember that blocked toilet on the first morning? When the hut warden finally managed to unclog it… there it was, with every card and every euro still inside.
A happy ending all round!
- Did you lose something lately? Where did you find it?
- When was the last time you used something “old school”, like a paper map, a notebook, a printed book?
I am linking up with Jenny from Runners Fly and Jenn from Runs with Pugs for Tuesday Topics as well as Runners’ Roundup with Coach Debbie Runs, Confessions of a Mother Runner, Mile by Mile, and Runs with Pugs!