4.1 km to summit
21.0 km total
1,091 m start
1,796 m max
988 m gain
3 hr 46 min to summit
8 hr 5 min total
Return to Haidsteig after 9 years. If you're in love with Rax and live in Bratislava, it's very easy to come for another rendezvous:
1. Book a return train ticket at least a week in advance to have it relatively cheap (today, 2 x 25.50 Eur).
2. Wake up at 4:45, morning routines, leave home at 5:15.
3. Public transport from Ruzinov to Petrzalka at 5:33.
4. Onboard REX 7788 from Bratislava-Petrzalka at 6:11 with arrival to Payerbach-Reichenau at 8:28.
5. Onboard Bus 342 from Payerbach-Reichenau Bahnhof to Preiner Gscheid at 8:33.
6. Here we go, at 9:03, I'm starting another adventure in fresh air of Preiner Gscheid mountain pass.
At first, I'm hiking to Waxriegelhaus with short stop to log geocache TB Hotel Preiner Gscheid (GC7HZ33). Why not to make unnecessary vertical meters, when the weather is so great? Then I'm descending to Seidi-Schikane memorial, where I bite some snacks and made my backpack lighter by drinking of Urpiner 12° beer. Just here I decided, that today is the day for Haidsteig. I really wanted to try Konigschlusswandsteig, because I never tried this one before, but I was afraid that my physical and mental condition is not ready for D/E ferrata. I need to do more upper body excercises to improve my resilience. Hope I'll be there next time.
So I took a shortcut to Holzknechtsteig, which was extremely steep on little rocks at the end. I'd say this was a mistake and I should have take a forest road to marked Holzknechtsteig instead. Anyway, I made it and started HAID at 11:30. There were several groups of other mountaineers on the ferrata, but not too many. I enjoyed the climb pretty well, even with the rush of adrenaline, which I didn't expect. Shortly before black Madonna, in a chimney, there was a 15 minutes traffic jam due to large family with kids climbing. Surely they had a challenging day, I would be afraid to take my girls here. But it's all about training, I guess and I endorse them a lot. I reached the spot with the book at 12:30 and at 13:00, I was making a selfie with summit cross.
Then I was ready for ein grosses Bier at Ottohaus (arrived at 14:00). Then long descent to Payerbach / Hirschwang (16:15), today through Gsolhirn trailpost and final 4km walk by Schwarza river to the Payerbach-Reichenau train station. Washed my legs in crystal clear, cold water as always and onboarded to REX to Petrzalka (17:35 - 19:44) and further to Nove Mesto (20:08 - 20:20), arrived home before 21:00, evening routine & sleep for 10 hours. What a nice Saturday this is.
routefinding, no water source, rockfall/loose rock, crevasse danger
helmet, climbing rack, GPS device