I think I have been spoilt in the last few months when visiting cities, so many had kept their original medieval and Georgian sectors that Como after which Lake Como is named just felt more of the same. Narrow pedestrianised streets with tall thick walled buildings, many with murals and sculptured facades, small cafe lined squares surrounding elegant drinking fountains. The centre piece of the town was the Duomo, this cathedral built over many centuries, its interior features dark gothic designs with a renaissance exterior. The Roman writers and residents of Como Pliny the Younger and Pliny the Older guard the west facade.Lake Como and the Duomo
But this is all that really captivated me about the city. The cafe’s charges extortionate prices for their coffee and waiters looked bemused at my lack of tipping. Accustomed as I am to the refusal of any tips up in Val di Melo; Yvette tried to tip a Euro for a lunch we had and ended up with a one Euro postcard. The waterfront of Como was rammed with tourist boats and whilst still pretty and elegant didn’t hold the charm of the Canals and water ways of Annecy. But this is all partly my fault, I chose Como as a stopover on my way to Milan to pick up Yvette and could have easily chosen Belagio or some of the countless prettier towns on the western shore, although these would have been a bit of a drive.
The Gothic Interior
With Yvette’s visit came the end of my trip to Italy, I showed her the boulders, routes and beautiful valleys and she fell for this little bit of Italy as well. Dropping her off at Colico station I headed north to the Splugen pass. This tight mountain road, zig zagged up snow capped mountains, cars going up with their engines over heating in first and second and clutches stretched to the max and cars going down with burning brake pads. At the highest point you pass over the border and into Switzerland, waved through by a Swiss border guard whose only English was “Bye Bye”.
Rainy Como
But Switzerland immediately makes me yawn, good roads, quite ancient mountain villages with not an inhabitant to be seen and not a shop or cafe in sight; expensive food, expensive everything and completely lacking that atmosphere that you get in almost all other European countries. On the plus side the campsite is cheap at €3 a night, whilst for that you just get a porta loo and a small stream to wash yourself, clothes and dishes and drink from and with everything so expensive you quickly stop spending anything that isn’t necessary, well maybe a bit of that Swiss Chocolate.
The bouldering is just across the river on a steep mossy forest, the boulders are jumbled all on top of one another, making the landings generally awful. Walking around is a bit dicey with lots of holes to fall into and slippery slopes leading down to the river. The boulder problems are in general excellent, if all in the higher grades. The quality of climbers here is amazing, so many strong Euro Wads, climbing in the 8’s. I was invited out with Katy Whittaker and Ryan Pascal for a session, being joined later by Tyler Landerman. This was my first taste of really hard climbing, Katy ticked an amazing 7C, while I pulled through most the moves, needing to come back for the last move which apparently shouldn’t be the crux. Ryan and I pulled onto Jack the Chipper a very hard 7C+, and was quite pleased to see us both failing on the same move, although I’m sure without a dodgy finger he could have cleaned up.
The bad part of the area is the landings, being on my own there is little for me to do and I have to team up with other climbers and join in what they want to do. Being one of the weaker guys here that generally means throwing myself at seemingly impossible problems. It’s hard to find a project that I can work on my own, but have set my sights on Supernova a hard 7C on the Bruno boulder beside the river. One thing this place has done is to raise my game up to the next level.
Mountains around the Splugen Pass
