The mountain adventure in Gran Paradiso we had with Jennifer was really something. This season is always pretty unconventinal and hard to predict. There are days of sun where the summer looks like it is going to start and other days when it’s snowy even at low altitudes. The climate we found in this 3 days mountain adventure hike it was a bit of a resume of what you can find all year long. We started the first day with a snow storm. Even though the weather was perfect, the wind blew strongly making all the soft snow flying up and creating a clouds of snow at more than 80Km/h. It was not easy tor each the hut we were plannning to. We had several moment when it seemed better to come back but at the end Jennifer was very proud and we did reach the hut nestled in the rocks.
After a very nice night dinner with ravioli (in Italy you can’t miss pasta or ravioli even when you are living a mountain adventure) and wine we had an excellent sleep after our first of the three days mountain adventure in Gran Paradiso.
The second day we started with the descent that was pretty “spicy” as you can see from the video:
After we’ve been back to the grass we could enjoy the fantastic wildlife of Gran Paradiso, waking up for the spring. An herd of Chamois and another onr of Ibexes (or Steinbock) was enjoying the mild temperature and the first green grass coming out after the winter. The Marmots were playing happy after the long winter sleep and the sky was populated by alpine Choughs. It was just great to go back to a more mild evnironment. We also saw an unidentified predator that could be a wolf or a fox. The adventure we lived in the snow was great but also stressing somehow and hard. Down the 2000 meters a real Gran Paradiso(big heaven in Italian language) was waiting for us.
We enjoyed a lunch in a restaurant and we than went up for another hut, this time much less tricky to reach buy still very beautiful! Usually I come here in winter and discover it in spring was really wonderful. Lots of flowers, green grass and without the wind, the Gran Paradiso in this valley was spectacular!
The last day the legs were a bit aching but at the end we did complete the trek we were supposted to do. We trek until 2300 meters enjoying a new majestic and breathkaking view of the end of Orco valley, the Piedmont side of Gran Paradiso. This last day was pretty nice as the wind was definitively not strong any more and we could really take it easy having all day long without snowshoes and with a pretty light backpack.
This mountain adventure was certainly special and I have to thanks Jennifer for her nice company and bold spirit. We really had a crazy three days mountain adventure!
