Whether the weather

There was a plan, and this was it. We were going to leave Oviedo at 6:45, Xuaco driving, pick up Jorge en route and head for Sotres. We’d leave the car there and walk up to the refugio (the hut) in the vega del Urriellu (three and a half to four hours later). We’d leave our stuff there, book a bed for the night, and head up to the south face of the Urriellu, the easy one, climb it and head back to the refugio before doing another climb on the Sunday and then heading back down.

That was the plan.

We saw the weather forecasts, and on friday they put a snow symbol on the mountains, rain everywhere else. Still, it shouldn’t be much we thought, a light dusting, after all it was only the 4th of October. After the early morning mist, from the motorway, we could see the Picos, looking worryingly wintery.

At Sotres we debated what to do, should we take all the climbing gear (Jorge had a 15kg rucksack, full of metalwork, Xuaco and I had a rope each, in addition to provisions for a couple of days). We decided to take everything and give it a go.

This was revealed to be the wrong choice as we got higher. We met one of the wardens of the hut on the way up and he said the conditions weren’t good, water and snow coming down all the routes. As we got closer the snow got thicker underfoot until we were in full winter conditions at about 1700m (despite that it was a beautiful day, all of the snow having fallen the day before). No point turning back, we got up to the refugio at around 12:45 (Jorge, being the fittest, reached it 20 minutes ahead of us). We had lunch and decided to go have a look at the south face without our climbing gear, there was a place where there were some (even more) stunning views.

That path hadn’t been used since the snow so we were breaking trails, or rather Jorge was… which is bad news when you’re in your lightweight, flexible (waterproof but inappropriate for winter) shoes, without gaiters and getting wet feet. We decided to come down, conditions wouldn’t change too much overnight and we didn’t have the right gear. Who expected so much snow on the 3rd of October?

It was the right decision, I think, it wasn’t dangerous at the refugio, the weather was stable and clear, but we couldn’t do much else but wander on a few of the bigger paths, anywhere off those would have the same knee-deep (at times) snow. So we retraced our steps. Sotres is at 1060m, and there’s a river between it and the central massif of the picos, El rio duje, which I hate, beause it’s at 800m so after you descend from the refugio at 1953m you have a sting in the tail… which I trudged up last, to a very welcome beer.

So on the Sunday (today) we went to a local crag near Pola de Siero for a little sports climbing. It was blazing hot, south facing, and good fun, even though I was weak… I did lead a V, which is a better lead than I’ve done for a while, but I also ran out of strength and took a rest while seconding a V+, so come the winter I need to hit the indoor walls, and find some bouldering to get some strength back in the arms. Still, it’s going to be a fine place for James, because there’s a day’s worth of Vs and 6a’s to play with.

Despite things not going to plan I really enjoyed it, thanks to Jorge and Xuaco, and it gave me a taster of just how spectacular the mountains are going to be in winter.