Our hike the day before was quite long (I think we estimated 18 miles and over 5000 feet of elevation), so we rested well. The food (and foosball…right, forgot about that), helped rest us quite a bit. While we had originally planned a long multi-day hike, the temptation of good weather was too strong. We pestered the owner of the Pension with questions about weather around the area and eventually concluded there was a good chance the Dolomites would have good weather tomorrow (Thursday). After that, it looked like foul weather returned. We decided to hike in a different direction and catch a taxi back to Bormio (now referred to as “Boromir” or “Borax”) and then drive back over the pass to the Dolomites to the Pale di San Martino area where we’d attempt the “Grand Pilaster” route on the Pala di San Martino.

OK, let’s do it.

Before going directly to pick up the taxi in the village, we decided to contour around and climb a small point for views. We figured that we had all day. True, but these late nights of driving and searching for a place to sleep had a way of happening over and over. “Bah!” was the attitude and we continued hiking. It was, in fact, another long day. Getting to the high point took longer than expect, but the views were good.

(above) Michael munches on an apple on our high point. See the little dilapidated shelter on the left?

We began our descent, hoping to arrive in the town before 4pm so that we could hopefully arrive in Borax by 5pm. Then, we’d make our drive to San Martino, throw down our sleeping bags in a convenient spot, then wake up in the morning for the Grand Pilaster. But, of course, fate would not have it that way.

(above) One of the many waterfalls that we passed during the descent.

We did find our way back to Bormio without too much effort, and though we had returned three days early to the parking garage, we still had to fork over a TON of coin to get out of the parking garage: 45 Euro! That’s nearly $75 for 36 hours. The chart had said 50 Euro for 5 days, but I supposed that because we were there for under two days, they calculated by the hour. Curse Bormio! We jumped in the car (which was beginning to smell due to the food stuffs in the back seat) and headed up Stelvio Pass.

We arrived at the top of that monstrous pass about an hour later and noticed that the road was closed! “What!?” We turned off the car and investigated. It turned out that there was rockfall on the other side of the pass and the road would be closed for at least two to three days. If we were going to climb in the Dolomites tomorrow, we now had a much longer drive in front of us. Fate had spat upon us again.

After more frustrations of not being able to find a decent place to eat, we pulled into a pizza joint at some small town. While the sun was going down and our pizza was cooking, we pulled all the gear out of the car and resorted and packed. Later, during the drive, I started to feel ill, no doubt due to fatigue. I believe everyone was feeling a little upset and frustrated. Here we were again, trying to get to some place in the middle of night just to sleep, with a big climb in front of us. Why couldn’t it go smoothly? Fortunately, those feelings would be short-lived.

Finally, finally…I don’t recall what time it was. 11:30? Midnight? We pulled into the town of San Martino. One of the first structures we saw was a ski lift. “Hey, these are good places to sleep. Let’s just go there”, Michael suggested. We went to the lower parking lot and parked in the corner. I pulled out my tiny, one-third-sized, sleeping pad, threw it on the asphalt, and prepared to go to sleep. There was at least one other car, a van, in this parking lot with folks sleeping inside. We’d have company in the morning. Thankfully, we all agreed to not wake up too early. We decided to just take the lift up when it first opened (most likely 8am) and save ourselves the physical effort needed to be on the route first (waking up 3 hours earlier and hoofing it up 3000 feet of elevation). This turned out to be a very wise choice.