After a good night of sleep because of the cooler weather, we pack up slowly, continuing to mull over our options. It’s so hard to stop short of our intended goal, but our feet are failing us right now. Maybe we pushed it too hard in Duluth, or perhaps we are just not used to this heat and humidity? Whatever the reason, we come to a unanimous decision that we can no longer continue hiking with the current state of our feet. (more…)
We are super slow getting out of camp this morning. Our tent is wet from the rain last night, and taping up all of the blisters on our feet takes a while. With a slightly shorter distance to hike, we decide that this is a good morning to cook up our trail-tested (patent pending) crunchy Frito bean burrito, and it is a welcome change of pace after so many mornings of breakfast bars. (more…)
It’s nice and cool when the alarm goes off at 4:30. I hit the snooze button for 15 minutes knowing we will pay dearly for that later in the morning when the temperature begins to soar. Even so, it’s so hard not to indulge in a few extra minutes of rest. Once up, we break camp as quickly as possible, hoping to get a few miles in before the heat becomes unbearable. We do alright and are on the trail just after 6. (more…)
We wake up at 5 am and can feel the heavy humidity in the air and on our sleeping bags which we barely crawled into last night because of the heat. We are getting the sense that the drought and this kind of heat is a little unusual for Minnesota at this time of year. We move quickly but, tried and true, an hour and a half seems like our usual pace for packing up, so we hit the trail by 6:30, hoping to knock off some miles before the sun really starts heating things up.
For the first time in quite a while, we “sleep in” until 6:30, and it feels heavenly. Matt has a coffee date with our host, Chris, to say good-bye before we hit the SHT for real. We have lots of packing and real-world tasks to get done before we leave for the start of the next section which won’t be until around 3. (more…)
We wake up in our hotel room in San Martino di Castrozza refreshed and ready to get back on track after all the difficulties with timing and route finding yesterday. We grab breakfast, pay for the hotel and head for the funivia (cable car). To make up for lost time—and to save the legs—we take not one, but two cable cars up into the Pale di San Martino range. Ascending 3200 feet in a matter of minutes, we arrive above Rifugio Rosetta where we had intended on staying last night. The clouds in the early morning sun give the mountains an ethereal, gauzy feel. It’s good to be back on top, baby! (more…)
Today we stumbled into culinary heaven in a small hamlet in the Dolomites, the finest finish to a day of hiking one could ask for, but I’m getting ahead of myself. We start the day at Rifugio Passo Fedaia with a surprisingly good breakfast buffet, the highlight of which would be gigantic fresh coronetti marmolada, fittingly since we will walk around the famous Marmolada glacier today. (more…)
For some reason or another, everyone in the rifugio wakes up at 6 and heads downstairs in a mad dash for breakfast, leaving us all alone upstairs. I don’t mind the early rise because I am wide awake after a terrible night’s sleep. I tap Matt awake in our cosy, little loft above the German family and start getting dressed. What is everyone in such a rush for? Maybe the breakfast is just as good as last night’s dinner?!?!
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Breakfast is at 7 at Rifugio Geneva, and, for the first time in all of our rifugio stays this summer, there is a long line of hikers waiting for the buffet. We are on the tail end of the rush and decide to take care of our other chores first. By the time we are finished packing up and visiting the bathroom, there’s hardly a wait. This rifugio has all the breakfast standards plus hard-boiled eggs which provide a little bit of much-needed protein on these trekking days. (more…)
Take A Hike Photography 