Matterhorn Advice

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 Deezel65 16 Jan 2022

Hi folks - sorry for being long winded but looking for some pearls of wisdom. Myself and a partner are planning to do the Matterhorn traverse this August (up Lion down Hornli) however we’re unsure how best to approach the trip. Do we fly or do we drive. Do we camp or if we drive (in a camper) can we make use of the roadside facilities. Do we stop around Zermatt or Cervinia (looks like Zermatt has better options for acclimatisation). How easy grigia lift system to navigate and if staying on the Italian side is it a good idea to book a night in the Hornli hut rather than risk missing to lift back. And finally any experience of the Carrel Hut. Many thanks for any words of wisdom. Just to add, i’ve Never been to the Zermatt area before. Thanks. Ross

Post edited at 09:16
 walts4 16 Jan 2022
In reply to Deezel65:

Advice fir the Carrel hut.

Even though it’s a bivi hut, you have to book & pay for a place at the guides office in Cervina prior to heading up there.

 Take some hand gel as the toilet is fairly basic & most definitely wear a helmet on the approach long before you get anywhere near.

OP Deezel65 16 Jan 2022
In reply to walts4:

Thanks Walts- good to know cheers

OP Deezel65 16 Jan 2022
In reply to walts4:

Also is it safe to just book the day or so before or is that a risk with limited space? Cheers

 walts4 17 Jan 2022
In reply to Deezel65:

Probably best to pre book days in advance if heading there in the height of the season.

we headed up there in September whilst the lifts had finished for the season, walking in from Cervina. It was still busy.

OP Deezel65 17 Jan 2022
In reply to walts4:

Cheers

 Fellover 17 Jan 2022
In reply to Deezel65:

I walked over to the Italian side having parked in Zermatt (parking is actually a short free? shuttle train ride away), which worked quite well. The relevant lifts to get lifts over weren't running at the time and even if they were I doubt we'd have paid for them. We got the Schwarzsee lift up (same one as for going to Hornli) because it's fairly cheap, then had to cross some glaciated terrain to get over to the other side of the ridge line. If you fancy trying this let me know, because we aimed for the wrong col on the ridge initially and had some faff - I can send some photos which show the relevant col to aim for and the one not to aim for...

We didn't have to book the Carrel, maybe we were supposed to, or maybe it's changed since then. Wasn't a problem because there were only a handful of people there anyway, though friends went the following year and it was rammed. As others have said, the toilet is revolting. The mountain was very dry when we did it and there wasn't any snow around the Carrel so we were very glad we carried a lot of water up, other people in the hut were struggling for water and examining old dubious bottles on the shelf trying to work out if they were safe to drink or not. If there is snow around there's a big urn in the hut that people fill with snow to get communal drinking water. We put money in an honesty box, but when my friends were there the following year a Cervino guide was going round collecting money and organising people in terms of leaving time.

Carrel hut sleeps up to 60 people I think, so there can be a lot of people on the ridge and obviously the Hornli is famous for being over popular, so that's something to consider before being dead set on doing the traverse. We did it on an adverse weather day between two great weather days, the hut had barely anyone in it overnight and we didn't see another party all day. In contrast on the day we went up to the Carrel there were what felt like hundreds of people coming down the Lion ridge and there were lots of people in the Hornli getting ready to go the next day. At the time I was not a massive fan of the weather, but in hindsight I feel extremely lucky to have been on such a popular mountain, on such popular routes, with only my partner for company.

It's nice doing the traverse knowing you're parked in Zermatt and don't need to worry about getting down the Hornli in time to make the lifts over to Cervino, worst case scenario you just walk down.

Traverse is fantastic - enjoy.

Post edited at 09:59
OP Deezel65 17 Jan 2022
In reply to Fellover:

That’s a lot of super useful info cheers - we may consider walking over then so any photos would be great cheers. You can email them if that’s easiest cheers. I’m thinking being based in Zermatt then heading over is looking like the sensible option.

OP Deezel65 17 Jan 2022
In reply to Fellover:

Which if any acclimatisation routes did you do? 

 Fellover 17 Jan 2022
In reply to Deezel65:

I was in Saas Fee the week before and did Allalinhorn, Alphubel and Lagginhorn. Was lucky enough to be a student with very long summer holidays then, so we did the the Matterhorn traverse en-route to Chamonix. We were acclimatised easily well enough, though acclimatisation is very personal - I'd have been fine after only one of those, but I know other people need to do quite a bit of gradual acclimatisation before going >4000m. I've not done anything else in the Zermatt or Cervino area, so can't recommend anything there I'm afraid. Those in Saas Fee were good acclimatisation, but Allalinhorn and Alphubel are very much snow plods with nothing in common with the Matterhorn traverse. We traversed the Lagginhorn from the Weissmies size then down the normal route which is much more like the Matterhorn traverse as it's basically all rock, a lot easier than the Matterhorn traverse, less fixed gear though.

 jcw 17 Jan 2022
In reply to Deezel65:

one thing essential. get your ass in gear to move out of the hut in the morning, no faffing.   Inevitably a guide will beat you to it, but there is a bottleneck around the start and you will find yourself in the tail of the queue if you aren't totally ready to move off as soon as that door is opened. Likewise get yourself organized at the summit to get started .down smartly. I have done three ridges of the Matterhorn, but never the traverse, we descended the Italian,up and down and back in Cham the same day. 

OP Deezel65 17 Jan 2022
In reply to Fellover:

Cheers

OP Deezel65 17 Jan 2022
In reply to jcw:

Cheers JCW

 Fellover 17 Jan 2022
In reply to Deezel65:

> That’s a lot of super useful info cheers - we may consider walking over then so any photos would be great cheers. You can email them if that’s easiest cheers.

I'll just put the info here in case it's useful to anyone else. Tbh this is probably all extremely obvious if you have a map, but at the time we didn't want to buy one and didn't have any data to use google maps...

This will probably make more sense if you have a look on google maps at the same time, all the places are clearly marked.

You want to aim for the Rifugio Teodulo. We went to the Furgsattel ski lift, between the Furgghorn and the Theodulhorn, discovered there's just a chossy cliff on the Italian side, then traversed the Theodulhorn to the Rifugio Teodulo, which was actually surprisingly straighforward, but definitely more effort than just going to the right place first time.

If you want to use lifts on the Swiss side then going to Shwarzee cuts off a lot of height gain from Zermatt, there's some benefit in going slightly further to Trockner Steg, but the easiest thing to do would be to go to Testa Grigia and then walk down the piste to the Rifgio Teodulo. We went for the Schwarzee option as it seemed the best value for money. If you go to Testa Grigia and there's decent visibility you can't get lost really, you'll just be able to see everything you need.

Once on the Italian side the way you go depends on whether you're going down to Cervino or across to the Abruzzi hut/then up to Carrel hut. There are a lot of gravel tracks/roads which were pretty obvious, though if they're covered in snow it'll be a lot more of a pain. Leave yourself plenty of time if you're going to walk all the way from Zermatt to the Carrel hut in one day, the final bit between the Abruzzi and Carrel is PD or so in it's own right I think, so it's not all a walk.

The photo below was taken at some point on the walk from the Schwarzee lift station.

Post edited at 16:38

OP Deezel65 17 Jan 2022
In reply to Fellover:

Superb - really useful and will be good to digest with map in hand. Thanks again.

 Fellover 17 Jan 2022
In reply to Deezel65:

No problem enjoy your trip

 AndyAndyAndy 17 Jan 2022
In reply to Deezel65:

Map data is free as in beer and free as in speech for Switzerland, also extends into Italy but at lower resolution. Online here (https://map.geo.admin.ch) or the app to look for is SwissTopo. Also possible to download sections in the app for offline use. 

OP Deezel65 18 Jan 2022
In reply to AndyAndyAndy:

Just downloaded Swisstopo today along with a couple of others and ordered a paper map too. Cheers


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