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A really great wild camp




Google maps is too vague and OsmAnd maps have the line of the chairlifts and a dotted line showing the ‘track’ but really we only had our eyes. We access the ski run at a bend in the road down and that shortened it somewhat. “Can you get up there?” “Should be able to in a low gear and if we try hard enough”.

So into a low box gear we go and start upwards. It is very straightforward; the engine has enough torque and the revs stay high enough. I felt one of the ATBs ‘work’ as there was quickly arrested wheel spin. As soon as one wheel begins to spin, within a fraction of its rotation the torque to that wheel is moved to the wheel at the other side. No levers to press; it’s all automatic.

(https://ashcroft-transmissions.co.uk/product-category/limited-slip-differentials/)






Ok so the photos were taken on the way back down, a less stressful occasion. It’s also much steeper than it looks in the pics.

It’s a great feeling to climb up out of the trees and onto an alp. The roughness of the track stopped as the gradient reduced and we were on flat grass where the line of the ski run was just marked by snow ‘cannon’ poles. There we stopped and surveyed. What a place!






“This is perfect and we are hidden away”. I don’t think anyone will complain. We didn’t make any wheelspin ruts and we haven’t driven over much eating grass. We just turn around and park up level. The grasses are long; nothing has yet been sent up to eat them. The wild flowers are everywhere within the grasses. They will seed before they are eaten I’m sure. Maybe the seeds pass through but whatever, this ‘system’ works. It’s beautiful up here.



There we stay for one of the best nights ever. The sunset is good, the shadows on the mountains change and we watch them all. The moon isn’t up yet and it gets dark but at dusk there’s a noise from “somewhere over there”. It sounds like a horse cantering and galloping but that can’t be.





Then we realise that it’s a rock fall on the mountain opposite. It has to be. Maybe it’s only one pierre falling but it could be a few. It takes many seconds before it finally stops.

I can remember reading about rockfalls and the dangers of them, in all the ‘high ascent’ descriptions that I used to read (High Adventure, Everest the Hard Way, etc etc).

However “it’s over there”. Phew.



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