Biancograt: 3 a.m. start, completely done by evening
An iced-up snow ridge, two ice screws and a very long day on Piz Bernina.
Machine-translated from the German original. The German version is the one I actually wrote.
Left the Tschierva hut at 3 a.m. Five parties out that morning, us somewhere in the middle.
The climbing sections weren’t a problem — the route goes at AD with rock to III+, and that’s about right. What wore us down was the ridge itself. The Biancograt is normally snow; for us it was bare ice in places. Deeply unpleasant. We had exactly two ice screws with us and protected it as best we could. In hindsight, not enough.
Over Piz Bianco at just under 4000 metres and on to the Bernina. The way drags. Franzi was completely finished at the top, and honestly so was I. A couple of Cokes at the Marco e Rosa hut sorted us out.
The plan had been to carry on over Piz Palü the next day. That didn’t happen — we descended directly instead. Still took over six hours.
Perfect weather all day, and the line deserves its reputation. I’d just have liked more ice screws.