UKH

Morning All,

Over some of the summer I am planning to go to the Stubai Alps with a friend. I have the guide from Cicerone by Allan Hartley and also Eastern Alps by Dieter Seibert. My friend and I have some experience of the Alps from previous summers; we are scramblers really and not rock climbers. In the Alps we have been up Pointes de Mourti and L’Eveque to give you a sense of our limits.

I am trying to get some reliable information on the following peaks in the Stubai Alps:

Schrankogel

Windacher Daunkogel

Warenkarseiten Spitz

Zuckerhuetl

Sonklar Spitze

Any guidance at all, gratefully received.

On the tour, we will be staying in the huts in this order: Amberger, Hoch Stubai, Hildesheimer, Mueller, Nuernburger. Am I right in thinking we should book ahead, book the whole things before or do you think we can turn up on the day?

With thanks, Stuart

What kind of information are you looking for specifically, that's not in the guides you already have? I think a good map of the region will be most helpful. You can also check the websites of the huts, they usually have some information on the tours to the nearby peaks and treks to the next huts.

If you have a set itinerary you might as well book ahead. On some huts that's possible online, some yo have to call. But always call them to cancel in case you won't show up because of the weather. A no-show-fee has been introduced by some huts. 

Will be staying a week at Amberger Hütte myself this summer. Schrankogel is supposedly simple, not climbing, just scrambling (UIAA grade I) but of course a peak of 3500 m will have ice and snow. 

There's also the Collomb guide for the Stubai Alps by Jeff Williams published by West Col, all the peaks you've listed are covered in it. I got a copy a couple of months ago from Needlesports in Keswick.

This guide seems to cover most of your stages:

Stage 3 Amberger Hut to the Hoch Stubai Hut via the Wuetenkar Sattel
Stage 4 Hoch Stubai Hut to the Hildesheimer Hut via the Bildstoeckljoch
Excursion from the Schaufeljochbahn
Stage 5 Hildesheimer Hut to the Mueller Hut via the Zuckerhuetl and Wilder Pfaff
Stage 5A Hildesheimer Hut to the Siegerland Hut
Stage 5B Siegerland Hut to the Mueller Hut via the Sonklar Spitze
Stage 6 Mueller Hut to the Nuernburger Hut via the Wilder Freiger

https://www.cicerone.co.uk/trekking-in-the-stubai-alps

Available as an ebook

Thanks for your help. I have the Cicerone guide. What I am specifically wanting to know is the degree of difficulty, any grades, descriptions. As you know, in a guide, a description of a peak might come down to one phrase that is pretty general and open to interpretation. I appreciate the conditions and the like change the degree of challenge but I don't want to set out on a day that is way beyond my capabilities. Due diligence, do the homework, ask, find out all you can from those who have done it; that is what I am thinking. Thanks for your help.

Thank you. I will have a look for it.

Assuming the Collomb guide to the Stubai is the one published in 1991, I’d be wary about relying on it too strongly - Austrian mountains have experienced fairly significant glacial retreat since 1991, and (relatedly) warm summers, inevitably affecting ice and snow cover on these peaks: routes may not be as they were c30 years ago, and crumbling rock may increase difficulty and risk. Of course similar critiques can be made of Siebert’s Eastern Alps book. Hartley’s (Cicerone) book acknowledges some of these issues as far as I remember.

You might find some useful contemporary information on the bergfex website which has good quality 1:50k topo mapping with route overlays, descriptions, and photos. (It is mostly in German but I’d imagine Google Translate could help). Individual hut websites also often have useful photos and information about routes on nearby mountains.

OK, always good to collect lots of information before heading out. 

I am just quite wary of trip reports on the internet.  They are very subjective and in contrast to guide book authors, I wouldn't trust most users, or even myself, to accurately grade a route. I checked the Schrankogel tour descriptions on hikr.org and they vary between T3 and T5. That might even be the variance in reality depending whether you're do the tour in May, July or October. One website suggesteda full glacier kit including crampons and a rope while others never mentioned snow or ice and described it as a boring scramble. But I understand I'm also always trying to find as much as I can.

In case you ind some German language source and the Google translation makes no sense (or its a book page) feel free to post it here I will try to help you out.

When I do tour planning in the Alps I rely on guidebooks (what you have done) and a good map. It will tell you how steep the terrain is, what kind of terrain it is, how exposed it is and in which direction it faces.

I did some climbing in the Stubai Valley in 2013, the area seems very proactive in providing information for outdoor activities. Should you have time there's all sorts to do, alpinism, walking, rock climbing, mountain biking and via ferrata and there's a lot of free information available both locally and online.

Click around on these sites for a start

https://www.stubai.at/en/stubaital/

https://www.stubaier-gletscher.com/en/

If you get time there are some excellent via ferrata of all lengths and difficulties described in a free topo from the tourist information office.

Specifically to your questions. I used the Eastern Alps (Dieter Seibert) guide for the alpinism. I only did one route in this valley from it but used it for a few elsewhere and found that in every case the routes had altered significantly from the description due to the ravages of global warming, in one case the route described was totally unclimable. That's not to say the mountains are all now too difficult or dangerous, just that this guide cannot be relied upon for information.

Websites such as camptocamp, summitpost, peakware and planetmountain may well contain more up to date info and would be worth researching. It would also be worth enquiring locally in the guides offices and failing all else, the hut guardian will definitely be able to give you up to date advice but of course it might be too late by the time you've got to the hut only to find that the route from that hut is no longer feasible!

The mountain we climbed from the Stubai Valley was the Zuckerhutl. The book describes taking the cable car to the Eisgrat and traversing east from here accross the Fernau Glacier before crossing to the  Sulzenau Glacier. This crossing is now much harder and or more dangerous due to glacial retreat leaving steep rock walls and unstable moraine so the route takes a completely different line. The cable car no longer terminates at the Eisgrat, there is another section to near the Schaufelspitze. From here you traverse accross slightly to the south of Schaufelspitze and the Aperer Pfaff and on to the Zuckerhutl. There's some info on this route here

https://www.outdooractive.com/en/hiking-trail/oetztal/seven-summits-zuckerh...

The new route is objectively quite safe and easy, probably PD- and the line is fairly obvious once you get there.

There are also some routes described in detail with topos, photos etc on the Bergsteigen website, in german though so you may need to translate them, there are also comments from recent ascentionists.

Thank you to you all for your time and trouble.

enquiring availability/booking all your huts before you go might be a good idea.

Just wondering - do you have experience with crampons / ice axe on (maybe frozen) alpine snowfields? You'll need it for peaks like Schrankogel and Zuckerhüttl, even on the easiest routes.

I wouldn't plan the holiday too rigidly; the weather doesn't usually stay perfect. Maybe better to have a rough itinerary and play it by ear depending on the forecast, booking each hut 1-2 nights in advance. And the best place to get advice on routes and conditions is always at the huts themselves.

Hi Stuart

I did pretty much exactly your route last July with three friends from Ipswich. We used the Cicerone guide following the Gletscher Tour and also had the Eastern Alps guide. We are competent scramblers (Grade 3) with rock climbing experience (between Severe and HVS) and alpine mountaineering experience, including glacier travel, to at least PD+. Average age 60. 

You've made a good decision not to start with the crossing from the Franz Senn Hut to the Amberger Hut. This was a long difficult day that may not even be possible in August due to the condition of the bergschrund at the foot of the main col (I don't have the guide with me at present so I can't remember the name of the col). We found the glacier crossing after the col very crevasse ridden.

We pre-booked all the huts.. They were all happy to be flexible re date changes provided you phone ahead in advance. Each hut was willing to phone ahead to the next. 

In the end we stayed two nights at HochStubai and Mueller and one night at each of the other huts. We had reasonable weather each day, though you shouldn't rely on that. 

Re Peaks: we did not do the Schrankogel - our first day from Franz Senn to Amberger was quite long enough without it. On the spare day at the HochStubai we did the local horseshoe taking in the Windacher Daunkogel and Warenkarseiten Spitze (I think - I don't have the book with me). On the Hildesheimer - Mueller day we took in the Zuckerhutl (which could be missed out - a pity though) and the Wilder Pfaff (which really can't be). On the spare day at the Mueller we did the Sonklarspitze. Although we had planned to be more ambitious if conditions allowed we did just the easiest routes on each peak (apart from the HochStubai horseshoe day where we traversed both peaks). 

Many of the scrambly sections have some fixed wires but I would recommend grade 3 scrambling ability and experience moving together roped. Also you need to be happy moving roped on the glaciers (and happy to ignore a few riskier folk who cross the glaciers un-roped). 

It was a great trip, with some fine glacier wilderness environment, apart from the surreal intervention of the ski infrastructure between the Hoch-Stubai and the Hildesheimer Huts. Best to forget walking down beside the huge snow dunes created for free-style skiing competitions. Quickly forgotten though as you move on to the Mueller Hut - finest scenery of the trip.

Martin

Thank you for your detailed and specific information. Very good to have your thoughts on it Martin. 

Hi Stuart. I've just found my map and Cicerone guide. It was the Wildgratscharte that we crossed on the first day. I'd definitely recommend missing out this day and starting at Amberger hut although it does make transport more difficult.

And yes, it was the Warenkarseitenspitze that we climbed as part of the horseshoe from the Hochstubai Hut along with the Windacher Daunkogel. We went clockwise (Windacher Daunkogel first). It was  a good but (for us) quite long day. There was a sting in the tail. Fixed wires on the last descent don't quite reach the ground (the glacier has receded I think). 

We had hoped possibly to include the Pfaffenschneide en route to the Zuckerhutl and also the traverse of the Wilder Freiger by the SW ridge on the way from the Mueller Hut to the Nurnberger Hut but thought better of each and took the easier way - the weather was not perfect on that last day.

Hope you have a great trip. By all means email me for more information.

Martin

We found the Amberger Hütte full of a student group and got only Notlager in the first week of August, 2016. They were in a week-long alpine training. It is an easy-to-approach hut (plain dirt road), and the posters around suggests that such large groups are common.

Just in case you might have some plan about the Daunjoch, under the Hinterer Daunkopf. Forget it, 30 m UIAA II+ climbing on very loose rock hold togather by only mud.

Thank you to all who helped with this posting and the info on the Stubia Alps glacier tour following the Cicerone book by Allan Hartley. Special thanks to Martin for his input following his recent visit. If anyone is heading out to do the tour, I'd be happy to help; do get in touch. It was a brilliant week, we took eight days, and there was variety, challenge and splendor--all apparent. Thank you.