Cristallina

Floriano. Although we lived pretty close to each other and shared the same love for the Tessiner Alps, we never actually met. This to my regret. I came to know about him looking for info on Piz Rondadura. When he left us, I thought I would virtually meet him by climbing Piz Rondadura. I gave it a try, but that was the wrong day for me, my fitness wouldn’t assist at all and I had to back away. A couple of days later I chose to try climbing Cristallina which is a beautiful mountain I had in mind since quite a long time. It became a bit of a tough struggle, the last portion to the summit seriously straining me. Anyway, once atop I found, among the rocks, some remains of Tibetan prayer flags, not layed there by Floriano, most probably, but certainly linking to him. Quite coincidentially, that morning I had chosen to wear a Tibetan T-shirt myself. At once  thoughts ran to the clear sky. GBY, Floriano. Ooòmmhh.

My hike to Cristallina started from the shore of Lago Scuro, right below the Lago del Naret dam. An easy and amusing walk on a well indicated path (which ultimately will leads to Passo di Lago Nero). A little after passing beneath the high voltage pylon, there is an indication in paint to Cristallina (on a rock on  the right); not too evident, really, considering that the path’s direction is clearly straight ahead and that there is no path at all to Cristallina. I had missed the deviation some three/four years ago and consequently had missed the summit, and I understand it happens to quite some people. Perhaps a prominent cairn on the spot would help. However, once one gets on the correct direction, things go smooth, you have Cristallina in sight all the time. A number of tiny cairns are there to assist anyway. You reach a sort of a saddle and suddenly have a vision of the Cristallina glacier, almost extinct. Here things turn serious. The slope to the ridge is a chaotic pile of rocks which requires a certain amount of attention. Once on the ridge you would have to carefully undertake a couple of delicate and exposed steps in order to by-pass the critical points. The summit is then reached and, on a day like mine, it provides a most extraordinary view ranging from Rheinwaldhorn to Tödi to Finsteraarhorn to Blinnenhorn and so on. The descent, back down the same route, again needs to be engaged with great care. Lovely hike, definitely worth the effort.