Stubacher Sonnblick

Stubacher Sonnblick – Schibergsteigen – the LAY-BACK variant started early at 7, almost in the middle of the night, because the good Pawel had to make the journey home to far away Poland at the latest around 1500. Early-Bird, then. But nothing worse should happen, get into the car, on free roads on the 4th Advent off to the Enzinger Boden and up to the Rudolfshütte. The gondola ride with the Weißsee glacier railway is rather something for schilift nostalgics, but the Oberpinzgauer make up for this with a good portion of friendliness and accommodating. At the Rudolfshütte at 2300 m there is an end to technical ascent aids, then it is called Ho-Ruck: skins on it, over the lake and the surprisingly steep glacier slopes due to the meagre snow situation. The hard snow surface, which was strongly pressed by the wind and made walking not necessarily more comfortable, but in the steep, currently still rocky passages a little mountaineering feeling arose. Climbing the last few meters without skiing, we stood at the summit cross after a brisk 3.5 hours and were happy to be the first on this day. The descent then stung itself as less sparkling: hard, wind-pressed snow, interrupted only by 30-cm wind ducts – but thank God – all the seals remained inside. We have been concentrating. After all: Better driven badly than gone well. All in all a worthwhile tour, but like the rest of the Alpine region still suffers from the precarious snow situation.