Photo 1. The Ponti Hut, Monte Disgrazia (3678m) and the Italian flag.
Photo 2. Piz Bernina (4049m).
Photo 3. Climbers descending Piz Palu (3905m)
Photo 4. Climbers ascending the Biancograt.
Photo 5. On the summit of Piz Bernina with Piz Palu behind.
Photo 6. Climbers on one of the fine knife edge ridges of Piz Palu.
On the 14th July Rosie, Nicola, Graham, Damien and I had a good days climbing at La Duchere. This crag is located near Les Contamines and gives excellent climbing on gneiss up to seven pitches in length.
I departed for the Disgrazia and the Bernina groups on the 15th with Mountain Guide Bruce Goodlad and climbers Liz and Brian. We stayed at the Ponti Hut and on the 16th made the ascent of Monte Disgrazia (3678m) via the North West Ridge which is currently climbing at AD due to the large amounts of snow and ice still present on the crest. It is the 150th anniversary of the first ascent this year.
For the past three days we have been in the Bernina. This trip began on the 17th with a pleasent walk to the Tschierva Hut before our traverse of the Piz Bernina (4049m) via the Biancograt and Spallagrat to the Marco e Rosa Hut on the 18th. Again, there is a lot of snow on the upper rock section which is making the route a little more time consuming.
Today, we traversed Piz Palu (3905m) to the Diavolexxa lift station. This is a brilliant route with excellent rock scrambling, knife edge snow aretes and fantastic views of the Piz Bernina traverse.
