Ari and I set off to the Salzkammergut for 10 days of climbing. I took the train from Lindau with 40+kg of gear, ropes, quickdraws, trad gear, and also my bike. Ari flew to Vienna from Barcelona, rented a car and picked me up in Salzburg. We arrived late on Saturday and it rained all of Sunday but Monday to Wednesday were predicted to be good so we planned to get as much multipitch climbing in as possible during those days. On Monday we drove to St Gilgen and climbed Äskulap, an easy multipitch route at the Plombergstein. The plan was to do a bunch of these Plombergstein routes over the following days and then to climb at the Ewigen Wand, near our Air BnB in Bad Ischl.
Äskulap started with a 5- pitch followed by even easier pitches. It was a mix of hiking and gardening but still good fun and nice for a first day. It got quite busy near the top of the route and to try and avoid the traffic we crossed over to Taxus (as the couple that had been climbing it got confused and crossed over to our route). Ari improvised with an anchor somewhere in the middle of a pitch after the rope drag got too much and I lead the last pitch, improvising near the top and climbing directly to the viewing platform. I used the base of the viewing platform to set up an anchor and belayed Ari up the last rope length.
I hadn’t been feeling quite right in the morning. I was feeling pretty average in the evening. I was feeling much worse on Tuesday and on Wednesday we decided I should take a covid test. The two bars lit up immediately and we spent the rest of the trip until the following Monday in bed with the dreaded Corona virus. On Monday we were feeling somewhat better and I struggled back to Lindau by train and Ari drove to Vienna and flew back to Barcelona. And that was the end of the Worst Holiday Ever!
1) We found an old style telephone box.
2) We went climbing at the Plombergstein. The plan was to do a bunch of the easy multipitch climbs throughout the week. We started with Äskulap an easy 8 pitch route that was mostly between UIAA grade 3 and 4.
3) The climb was nice and cruisy and a mix between hiking and gardening.
4) We had nice views out over the Wolfgangsee.
5) There was a bit of a traffic jam on the climb so we took a more creative route on the last couple of pitches and I belayed Ari from an anchor around the viewing barrier at the top.
Above: First climb done!
Above: We walked back down to the car and that was the end of the holiday, more or less. The following 7 days were spent in bed with covid in our Air BnB. Boo.
