The limestone slabs of the Val di Collina

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6 October 2017

Active

The limestone slabs of the Val di Collina

In his heart, when he goes to the mountains, every climber looks for mute emotions that only rock can give us when we enter into harmony with it. The high Valle del But is enclosed by cliffs with which I have had a ‘dialogue’ for years, and which have witnessed my growing passion for the vertical. Indeed, I feel a little bit at home there. I went back a few days ago to the slabs of Val di Collina, a large limestone face easily visible from the main road that connects Friuli Venezia Giulia to Carinthia via the Pass of M. Croce Carnico. Climbing in this area offers a mixture of sensations. You climb between not very visible, geographical, historical and environmental borders. Climbing up the wall, you touch on the historical events that affected these places, as the Great War has left a trace of itself in the small barracks still visible in the clearings near the malga (dairy) and the state border just a few hundred metres further on. The first holds appear just a few steps from the car. It is a compact rock, a grey Devonian rock in which water over the millennia has drawn the dark lines and furrows that allow us to climb today. We lightly pass over slabs and holds because here climbing is not done with brute force but with the balance of a vertical dance. The rock offers completely smooth blackboards or large natural holes in a succession of varying types of rock that feeds our imagination. Around, the warm atmospheres of autumn colour our hearts with warmth. The Friulian border between classic mountaineering and modern climbing also passes through these walls where today’s climbing equipment is flanked by old pitons placed by the famous pioneers of those who brought this discipline to Carnia. We descend from the wall together with a group of friendly Austrian climbers: a hundred years later it seems that the boundaries of hatred erected in wartime have been definitively eliminated.

Useful info

The Val di Collina slabs consist of various faces where it is possible to find routes for all; the difficulties start with grade four and rise up to seven and beyond in the distinctly sporty itineraries on the lower part. The most popular routes are “De Infanti” and “Dorigo” which rise a hundred metres on the upper part of the slabs. The routes are well protected and the approach is via an easy path from Malga Val di Collina bassa, reached by dirt track even with a normal car (leave the main road that leads to the Monte Croce Carnico pass at the third bend).

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