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Spalla del Durrano

IgorZlodej27. 07. 2011 14:55:51

After careful preparation, weather, route, conditions, on Monday (25.7) I drive via Učje - Čenta - St. Daniele - Maniago - Barcis into Valcellina valley towards Erto.
There I turn into Val Zemolo to the parking at Cas. Mela. From the parking I take the lower abandoned road (why waste steps in vain). The road is debris-covered in places, but nicely passable; when it ends I reach wide scree slopes, find a crossing over the water and on the other side catch the marked path that gently leads through the forest to hut Maniago, crossing the supply road twice in between.
At the hut I stop, there are no people, the warden is preparing for mowing with a glass in hand, not particularly interested in visitors, so I quickly continue. Immediately behind the hut on the left is the start of the path, the sign promises much, but later it turns out that the path itself has almost nothing to do with alpinism. Along a nice trail, onto which thorny branches force their way, I reach a small cirque, above which Duranno looms on the right, blocky Spalla on the left. Up the wide cluttered gully to the left to the saddle, the view on the other side stuns me, since ahead of me are only Dolomite giants, deep below in the green bivouac Baroni. I go left, behind my back the mountain on which I will probably never stand. I climb to Spalla, descent follows, the trail is quite good but seems very little walked. Apart from nice views there is nothing particularly thrilling on the path, the step must be reliable all the time, descents and ascents follow, sometimes steeply in rocks where cables assist. At the fork of course I take the right variant along the ledges, at the end I climb a few meters to the summit, sit a bit, then descent through quite dense scrub until I reach the gully that turns south and is supposed to be particularly difficult I.-II. Initially again nothing special, later one must be somewhat more careful because of the jumps, where however the scrub assists everywhere, of which there is really plenty here around. The gully lasts quite a while, the difficulties are not exaggerated. I've been seeing the traverse path for some time, but still haven't reached it. Well, when the scrub almost completely covers the gully I leave it by turning right and in a few steps I am on the nice marked path. Since on that abandoned pasture I lost nothing, I turn left towards hut Maniago, but don't go there as I turn down towards the starting point earlier. The cloudy day was just right so it wasn't too hot, high cloudiness provided wonderful views, the path as such, yeah excellent warm-up for the next day. In the town of Erto I also view the landslide from Mt Vajont, which affected these areas in October 1963. Then I drive into Cimoliana valley.

Spalla del Durrano when the abandoned road ends, I spot it, mighty Duranno

Spalla del Durrano the hut is not far anymore, but could turn left here and go in the opposite direction

Spalla del Durrano no Metka and Janko were there, just a bit sleepy caretaker

Spalla del Durrano right behind the hut this path starts

Spalla del Durrano view towards the valley and part of the landslide from Vajont mountain

Spalla del Durrano pink passage into the cirque

Spalla del Durrano cluttered ledge offering the only possible passage

Spalla del Durrano this ledge is quite steep to the left

Spalla del Durrano on the other side the great Dolomite mountains abound

Spalla del Durrano especially Monte Pelmo stands out

Spalla del Durrano on the summit of Spalla

Spalla del Durrano behind me the mighty Duranno

Spalla del Durrano and I go ahead, the ridge looks quite wild

Spalla del Durrano at harder places there are reliable fixed cables

Spalla del Durrano secured ledge on the right

Spalla del Durrano Descent gully among the brushwood

Spalla del Durrano in between there are also such rocky steps, the brushwood on the left or right helps

Spalla del Durrano and again on a nice path

Spalla del Durrano near the parking lot, I came via the lower overgrown path

Spalla del Durrano dam over which the deadly wave splashed

Spalla del Durrano it happened at 22:39, when most people were already asleep

Spalla del Durrano this is all that remains of the former large artificial lake

Spalla del Durrano towards evening I drive to Ciomoliano, for two years now they don't charge here

jaz27. 07. 2011 15:47:02

My Spalla del Durrano too. Regards!

(+1)

Jany27. 07. 2011 15:59:15

Vajont valley disaster was caused during dam construction. As it seems, after half a century wounds still very unhealed. Do people around there still hold to their homes?

Bojan_A27. 07. 2011 16:18:00

We with uni were two months ago in Vajont on a study trip. Of course the huge landslide and fracture plane on Mt Toc are still very well visible.

Villages that the so-called land tsunami (water went 150 m over the dam) literally erased and killed 2000 people have been rebuilt completely new. No worry for a new disaster as there is no water behind the dam anymore. Only behind the landslide a small lake has formed.

The cause for triggering the landslide is pure human greed and ignorance. Everything very much reminds of our road over Rebrnice ...

(+2)

ksena5. 08. 2013 14:38:10

Next day, 4.8. we ascended Spalla del Duranno (2234m) and along ridge with ferrata inserts, nasty bushwhacking through scrub (seems path little visited and thus not cleared through scrub), descent down streambed over series of jumps and "arrived" to hut Casera Bedin di Sopra. Short rest, then in considerable heat seeking shade continued to hut Mela little below parking where we left cars.
Spent two great days and did two really nice tours.

(+4)

ksena5. 08. 2013 22:23:22

Igor, sorry if I missed your post from two years ago. I got M'ret's Duranno route description right away, but obviously missed yours on Spalla del Duranno.
That the traversal of the mentioned ridge is a logical consequence of the ascent to Spalla del Duranno, as you wrote, is not necessarily true. We could have just ascended to Spalla and returned to the hut....
Regarding my wording.... quoting Wikipedia: "Secured climbing paths (called ferrate in Italian) are very demanding hiking paths that are equipped for most of their length with iron protections and aids. The purpose of equipping secured climbing paths is to allow access to the most demanding summits or over walls also to hikers without alpinistic knowledge." ...I wrote about inserts, not about a complete ferrata. On these inserts we all belayed ourselves, although there were alpinists in our group who climbed Duranno without belaying.
Just for clarification.

(+10)

mirank17. 09. 2018 21:41:32

We started relatively late due to a series of construction sites on the highway from Palmanova to Portogruaro, then from Sacile onwards there was a complete closure, so I only got back on the AC in V. Veneto zavijanje z očmi

. The ascent above the Mela alp is a real pleasure for walking, at the Maniago hut the warden is not to be disturbed while cleaning porcini, so we immediately turn left onto the Osvaldo Zandonella path. In less than three hours we are at the Spalla summit, unfortunately there was no view of the Dolomites beyond the Piave. Only nearby peaks like Cima Laste, Cima dei preti were visible, Duranno was mostly hidden...
Continuation from Spalla onwards requires a sure step, especially when crossing washed-out hard scree fields, and the terrain is also crumbly, on the untrodden path it is evident that there is little traffic and we indeed met only two guys. The protections, where they are, are reliable. The descent gully, compared to the previous terrain, is more of a relief than a difficulty. The continuation of the descent via the abandoned Bedin alp to the car is completely easy. By returning via the San Osvaldo pass through Barcis, Maniago to Videm, I shortened the route by almost 30 km, time-wise it was about the same.