[Veloski] Hochalmspitze E : from Spittal and Villacher HuetteMonday 20 April 2015
TODO box images
TODO box map
Route_description
day 1: bike: Spittal - Gmund - Maltatal, then up to 1400m (40km). walk to 1650m, ski to the hut.
day 2: Villacher Huette - ski summit of Hochalmspitze (didn't have crampons for the last 20m), and skiing up and down around Villacher Huette in the afternoon
day 3: more skiing around the hut, and back down to Spittal
Weather
Sun, very windy
Conditions
Skiable snow limit around 1750m, a bit lower on the road.
Was very windy and sunny, so the snow stayed icy with frozen 'dunes' from the wind above ~2500m, very nice spring snow between 1750 and 2500m, so I mostly stayed in that area (apart from the summit).
Access_comment
Train Vienna -> Villach -> Spittal. The train to Villach has hooks to hang the bike, so you have to take the skis off
Hut_comment
Very comfortable hut, lots of wood.
Commentaires personnels
Wonderful to go during the week (up on Sunday, then Monday/Tuesday), as there wasn't anyone on the mountain.
The road up is rather long to cycle with the added weight, but it's a beautiful valley, and in the spring everything is green.
I was planning to do more on the glacier, but the snow was just to icy, and with no signs of getting soft, so I did lots of little tours around the hut, where the snow was perfect in the afternoon. The final ridge to the cross doesn't seem very difficult (just a few meters), but with the wind and without crampons (didn't want to carry them), I didn't feel very comfortable, so I didn't try it.
more than 5000m of climb in 3 days, was a bit hard getting to work the next day :)