UKC

Looking to head out to the Dolomites in the next week or so.

Does anyone know what the latest conditions are like and whether its still possible to climb at this time of year?

Latest forecasts look good, I just wonder how cold it will be on some of the longer routes around Cortina/Corvara/Arraba.

Cheers

In reply to gaijin1976:
Not been in October but Cortina has an excellent array of sun / shade options if you have a car. If you are in the sun I would it plenty climbable, with some cold starts on longer stuff. Stuff on the Lastoi etc. might be a bit bleak.
Damian

In reply to gaijin1976:

You might be better looking at weather statistics. You can get a lot of annecdotal replies from people who might have been lucky or unlucky with the weather.

http://www.yr.no/place/Italy/Veneto/Cortina_d%27Ampezzo/statistics.html

July/Aug is great for Dolomites. Looking at the stats, conditions still look fairly ok for an average Sept but by Oct time, it is very cold. On the upside, it rains/snows less but I'd say you would have a more successful holiday somewhere lower down.

I had a year away recently and principally used "average daily maximum temperature" as my guide about where to go when. It worked very well for me. For me personally, 15 to 17 is ideal (at crag height), you can get away with less in direct sun but anything under 10 is rather chilly.
If it's 11 in Cortina, it's about 5 on your mountain route (at the hottest part of the day) and if you are on a 3000m peak, it's probably going to be about 0.
Add a bit of a breeze and it's going to be hellish.

In reply to henwardian:

I think you need to take those stats with a large pinch of salt. This year has been very different to previous years. They have had very poor weather during August with lots of rain. In a normal year August has lots and lots of thunderstorms as moist air comes in from the med and combines with warm temps over the po valley. September is often very stable weather wise, and certainly the first half of octber last year was also very stable with some cracking days as the temps further south are cooler and don't create the weather systems further into the mountains. I have also been climbing in February-april on south facing faces like civazes, the sella towers Ciampatch and others. If you have a little bit of luck, and you are diciplined about checking weather forecasts and interpreting them correctly, it's not often that you will get nothing done in a week. Yeah, maybe it won't be as good as maybe the last week of august, first two weeks of sept. but it could be. I have a friend out there at the minute who reports excellent weather although a little cold... just go prepared for cold weather...

In reply to gaijin1976:

We arrived in corvara on Monday and did the brigata tridents via ferratta yesterday. Cold in the shade with icey patches but not a problem on a via ferratta as we kept moving. Then it was lovely in the sun and would be great temp for cragging on the south facing low to medium level crags.
Temperature dropped noticably at the refuge 2600m as soon as the sun went behind the hill. You will need to be well prepared and equipped on any long routes.

Thanks for the replies. Very helpful

In reply to mike kann:

I agree, it's certainly possible to get nice weather at any time of the year. It's just a lot less likely. I've had great days out soloing at Reiff at new years when it was below zero and everything in the shade was dripping with frost all day long but I wouldn't recommend Reiff as a great place to go cragging in January because most days will be totally unsuitable.

Maybe if you are already in Northern Italy and can keep an eye on the weather and head to the mountains with a few hours notice it can work. If you are flying from the UK, even if you keep an eye on the forecast and book a flight the same day you see it start to come good, you are still going to have, at best, 3 or 4 days of predicted nice weather before it's too far in the future for meaningful predictions.

i'm heading down to the dolomite's on the 4th oct for a week, so fingers crossed it will be ok,

have been at the start of September in the past for 2 weeks and it was about 20 degrees with afternoon thunder storms the first week and below 0 with snow the second week.. seems to change quickly and be fairly unpredictable.

Arco (sport climbing) is about 2 hours away with more predictable warmer weather if it looks really bad in the dolomites.

In reply to gaijin1976:

I left the Dolomites 5 days ago due to cold, wet weather (Canazei) -down here in Arco, it's a totally different world (warm, mostly dry).

In reply to henwardian:

Just think you are being overly pesimistic. Autumn is traditionally quite a dry time in the dolomites, as indicated by your chart, not wet. Yes colder, but drier. So you can get good stuff done if you can hack it being a little colder...

In reply to gaijin1976:

Was Climbing at cinque torri today and it was t shirt weather when in the sun and out of the wind, but down jacket, hat and gloves weather when belaying in the shade and wind. Met a couple who had done a route on the Marmolada a few days ago who said it was alright but some verglas on the top couple of pitches.

In reply to mike kann:

Good advice. Been in September and 22c one day, -2 next day and snowed overnight. Be prepared.

In reply to henwardian:

My local guiding mates all consider September the best month for Dolomite climbing with early October normally good too (sometimes even into November). True, the days are shorter, nights are colder, but you are spared the excitement of electrical storms, not to mention being boiled alive in the midday sun as in July and August. The cliffs are also deserted, which is no small detail.
Obviously as the season progresses you have to move downhill a bit, and you logically end up in Arco, where you can big wall climb right through the winter.

As Mike says above, this year was a freak, with GB style weather all summer. The best weather so far this summer started on Monday 22 September and looks to endure (one rainy day tomorrow) into the foreseeable future.

So the answer is that the next two weeks will probably be good. After that toss a coin (i.e. 50/50). November is a long shot for the Dolomites, but Arco is nearly always good then. My advice is to AVOID July and the first half of August.

In reply to gaijin1976:

Don't forget that the lifts will have stopped operating by now, and I guess huts will also be closed.