UKC

Hey, I'll be spending a long weekend around Munich, looking for tips for some routes to do:

• longer, alpine style multi-pitch, but relatively easy-ish: < UIAA V
• ideally something that's fast drying, as it's raining right now, but weekend is expected to be sunny
• within public transport reach, if there's a hut at the bottom, even better

Any recommendations?

Alpspitze North face, combine BW 3 Weg & Adamplatte, long and easy to reach with the cable car. Public transport easy to Garmisch.

https://www.bergsteigen.com/fileadmin/userdaten/import/topos/bw3_adamplatte...

Not sure about routes to climb but we got the train from Munich to Garmisch it was about an hour and excellent value for money, we hiked up Mt Wank. The town‘s nice and well set up. 

Alpspitze was also going to be my suggestion too: easy, benign multipitch with a lift to the start, and a train from Munich to the lift. Likely to be pretty busy at the weekend though - including me! Planning to head up there on Sunday.

Still trying to convince my partner to do the three hour walk up instead of using the lift, as training for our summer Dolomites campaign.

You could ask if Kreuzeckhaus has any places free, and walk (or get the Hochalm lift!) up to the Alpspitze from there. Not the most scenic walk though, as you'd be going through the middle of the ski resort, and out of season ski resorts tend to be a depressing mess to walk through.

Alternatively, if you don't mind a *big* walk, you could go up to the Meilerhütte and do nice sunny routes on the south face of the Musterstein. Lovely spot, way more remote & scenic than the Alpspitze but a lot more walking involved. Train to Garmisch then a short taxi ride to save half an hour of road walking to the start of the path.

If you do go to a hut, bear in mind that huts currently require actual sleeping bags not just sheet sleeping bags as a covid precaution: shared blankets aren't being used.

Garmisch lift info here https://zugspitze.de/en  If it's too wet to climb but OK for mountain stuff then you could hike the HollentalKlamm. You can hike up and down (two paths, one in the Klamm, one crossing above it), or take the Alpspitze cablecar up and hike it down via the Rinderscharte(?), (but that's a lot of descent if you have dodgy knees), or take the Zugspitze funicular up and get out at the Riffelriss station and do the easy VF over the Riffelscharte to the Hollentalhutte and down. There's a grade 1+ summit on the ridge whose name I forget you can take in on the way. If it's too bad for proper high mountain stuff due to thunderstorms then you could train to Unterammergau and hike over the Stierkopf and Hoernle peaks and down to Bad Kohlgrub.  Excellent (large) kaiserschmarm at the Hoernle hutte, and a chairlift to avoid the descent if wanted.

Oh, the Alpspitze still has some snow on the north face, dunno if the routes are affected:- https://www.foto-webcam.eu/webcam/wank/ (click the pic to zoom in)

Awesome, thanks, this looks perfect and the topo is useful.

Looking at the tips, we'll head to Garmish and try to get the guidebook for the area. Seems like there will be something to do.

Keep in mind that you would have to use the path through the Höllentalklamm both ways. The Stangensteig that passes above the gorge is still closed due to the flash flooding two weeks ago that damaged the bridge at the end that you need to cross back to the side with the path. Fording the Hammersbach is impossible this time of year.

The Rinderscharte path from the cable car station was also affected, but appears to be open again.

CB

There is a new guide published by Am Berg-Verlag. I picked mine up in October from Alpinsportbasis. Easy to find...on Bahnhof Strasse. They will also have the DAV 1:25000 map.

There is a fine hill/ridge walk immediately north west of the town. Can’t remember the name and my map is in Munich with my daughter, but I started from by the sports stadium on Maximilianstrasse.

David

Good point about that guidebook: I haven't had it in my hand yet but it looks better value than the expensive Panico. Good shop too - shame to spend time shopping if you're only in the area for one weekend though.

That said, there's an excellent post-send ice cream parlour just across the road from the station & down the road from Alpinsport at Ludwigstr 99

Had a look at the webcam - the central snowfield is the Herzl shown in the topo. The upper one is right of the route a shouldn't be a problem. 

There's a bookshop in the station in Garmisch if I remember correctly which could well sell guidebooks.  It certainly sells maps.

How do you know all that stuff, is there a 'latest conditions / closures' -type webpage somewhere?

Nothing magic, the flash flood damaging the paths was in the Sueddeutsche newspaper (they actually flew the guests at Höllentalangerhütte out by helicopter), then I checked on the DAV website for the hut for details.

So when the topic cropped up here, I re-checked the hut website.

CB

edit: the link is here:

https://www.alpenverein-muenchen-oberland.de/hoellentalangerhuette/tourenve...

Jesus wept. Whatever happened to the idea that people who go up mountains should be self-reliant? There are plenty of other ways to walk out from that hut, even if they do involve looking at a map and going uphill.

That is what I initially thought as well, but according to the DAV all other routes out of the upper Höllental were indeed blocked as well, both crossing towards the Eibsee side (Riffelscharte) and up to the Alpspitz cable car. From what I have seen in the newspapers, that looks entirely plausible, mainly destroyed bridges and exposed sections of path that had been swept away, when the streams were definitely not fordable.

I am sure that true climbers (who are not the typical guests at that hut, I always have done that side of Zugspitze in one go from Hamersbach to avoid staying there) could possibly have found a way to climb out, possibly even via Zugspitze, but even that would not have been fun (and would have required skills and gear people will not have had) given all the fresh snow higher up.

CB

Fair point, I was being a bit harsh. There are a lot of "Zugspitze once in my lifetime" tourists there, and all the other potential ways out would be quite serious mountaineering undertakings in bad weather.

I can well imagine big streams full of rocks flashing off parts of both those routes so it was almost certainly the right decision.  I've been in Kandersteg when a rainstorm on the tops turned the waterfall by the via ferrata in the valley from a sprinkling shower into a coffee-coloured thunderhose full of rocks within 5 minutes, and that stream has a much smaller catchment than the routes from the Hollentalhutte.

Thanks for the link CB