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DeutschJuly 21st
Start: Simplon Hospice, 07.55; finish: Monte Leone Hut, 18.15
Distance: 22,4 km
Time:10 hours 20 minutes (plus 50 minutes for the stops)
Vertical distance: 2340 m uphill; 1490 m downhill
Summit: Monte Leone, 3553 m
Following the frontier from just below Gondo to the summit of Monte Leone would have involved a climb of 2750 m, and even more if all cols and pinnacles before and after Punta Valgrande were counted as well. Besides, the first section is very steep scree and rubble, normally only done in descent by abseiling. Dave and I decided this was too much, especially with heavy rucksacks! So we opted to start at the Simplon Hospice, which saved 1200 m ascent. But because we could only get breakfast at 7 a.m. in the hotel in Simplon Dorf this made for a late start. We made good progress but suffered from heat and soft snow later on. The easy scramble up large slabs and boulders on the final ridge seemed endless before we finally reached the summit at about 2 p.m. Reasonable weather but quite a few clouds. On the way down, Dave suggested crossing to the Monte Leone Hut directly, without losing height, but we were blocked by gullies and small cliffs so had to go down in any case – the result was a loss of time of at least 30 minutes. Beware of short cuts in mountainous terrain!