The ferrata Via Amalia

Approach

You deter from the highway some seven kilometers west of Tarvisio and drive south into the Valbruna (Zajzera) valley. The road ends on an alpine meadow on the altitude of 1000 m.

Route Description

You start walking from the parking space in the direction to the pass Sella di Sompdogna on the route number 611. The other possibility (the route number 639) is now closed because of landslide. So you follow the signposts for the hut Rif. F. li Grego (1389m). From the hut you turn left in the way to Montaz and you still follow the route 611 all the way to the bivouac Stuparich (1578m) below the north face of Montaz. The route from the hut first goes in nice forest and then comes to the opened terrain where you scramble through dwarf pine, over some rocks, screes and grasses.

From the bivouac starts the ferrata Via Amalia and goes straight up from the bivouac over steep slope to the start of climbing part of Via Amalia. The first 200 meters are the hardest on the whole route. The verticality
is amazing and the difficulty of climbing is very high. Then after you climb the intro face you come on the nice grassy ledge on the airy ridge. From there you turn in the big ravine where you climb around UIAA II with help of some damaged protection. When you climb on the steep slopes above ravine and below the North tower (2680m) in Montaz you cross to the right on some ridge and then you cross below the upper part of Montaz and higly above Dogna valley to the bivouac Suringar (2430m).

At bivouac we turn sharp to the right and attack the upper part of the magnificant west wall. We scramble over rocks and ledges, the route is marked. Soon we pass a big cave (Caverna Brazza), where first climbers spent their lonely night. We continue the same direction and soon reach the bottom of a big rocky ravine, named by the man who first ascended Montaz - Hermann Findenegg from Villach (Beljak). We first use the left side, when the ravine becomes narrow we go by the bottom, later we cross to the right side. The route is marked, but not assured, so we must carefully climb, because rocks are rather crumbly. On the upper part of the couloir we turn again towards left and reach the main ridge. An endless panorama opens towards north, and to the summit we have only a few minutes over the north ridge.

If you want to descend back in the Valbruna (Zajzera) valley you descend back over the Via Amalia, the easiest possibility is that you descend on south on Sella Nevea over the Pipan`s ladder.

Essential Gear

Good hiking shoes, all stuff for ferratas (helmet, ropes...), a lot of water. In early season is good that you have an ice axe and crampons with you.

Miscellaneous Info

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Images

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