Last weekend (from Friday 14th to Sunday 16th of March 2014) we headed to the Hinterrheintal in the south of swiss to climb the highest peak of the Kanton Graubuenden: the Rheinwaldhorn / Adula (3402 m). We choose to stay at the Zapport hut on Friday in order to climb the Rheinwaldhorn on Saturday since the weather forecast predicted a depression during the night to Sunday.

We took the direct line to the Rheinwaldhorn from the east face without passing through the so called Läntalücke. This involves a 50 to 55° step ice field to get to the main glacier (the Läntal glacier) and from there to the top. Due to the upcoming depression the conditions at the summit were very bad: very cold, strong winds with more than 100 km/h, with snow drifts and ice crystals hitting the face. We quickly choose to ski down, since the weather became worse and the conditions were very bad due to snow crust and ice all the way down to the hut.

In summary, not my most enjoyable mountaineering ski trip, but again a beautiful scenery as you can see by looking at the following photos. On Sunday, several parties also tried to get to the summit, but the winds were even stronger and the visibility worse, and therefore most of them had to cancel the last part to the summit.