It isn't the journey that kills you, but the speed

Happy and naive, thinking we reached the top...

Not so dangerous hiking today! Markus wanted to join us and we had planned to take our bikes to Toblach, which is very close to Niederdorf, but because of Markus' schedule, we drove there and started hiking up the mountain north to Toblach. The trip started lightly with a road that was in a very good shape. We continued up and greeted some cows on the way. There was a crossroad; one sign said 17 degree ascent and the other 27 degree. We picked the first one, which was probably a bit longer but hard enough for us. The fat one (Gleb) got sweaty, but he was the one carrying two bags, backbag and "frontbag". Though if we continue hiking and biking so much, he will most likely lose the latter.

Markus shows no mercy.

We continued on a field, all the while rising up the mountain like it was nothing. Markus kept on talking and walking while the both of us were just huffing exhausted and nodding. We could already see the hütte (=refuge) we were heading but the road just kept on going.

When we finally reached the hütte we ordered something to drink and continued up. Aino had thought that the hütte was the destination so she draggled behind. When we reached the top we admired the view for a while, made ourselves clear a route we could hike with clients and found another way down. It was pretty cloudy up there, so you coudln't see all the mountains. On the other hand, if it had been sunny, the trip would have been a lot harder to make. The way down seemed to go on forever, our legs were sour from the ascent and now they were shaking. Then Markus got a call and made an agreement to the client that he could see him after 30 minutes... so we started running down.

Aino's hair gone wild! (and the view is allright)

The ascent up to the mountain was about 1000 meters and the route was 5 km long. It took us about 2 hours and we definitely learned not to underestimate the height of the mountain, or overestimate our own condition. It's like Markus said to us: "It isn't the journey that kills you, but the speed". (though yesterday it would have probably been the journey)