Dent de Combette

I've been meaning to discover more of the Freiburg Alps for quite a while. The exhaustive SAC Alpinwandern/Gipfelziele Freiburg guide book offers many great and often challenging ideas. Ironically, the choice fell on a route that's pretty much entire just across the border in canton Vaud.

As seems to be the case with many routes in the region, you would be able to start much higher by using a car, rather than public transport. However, the long trip from Zürich is much more enjoyable by train. In the end, we decided on the train, so we started down in the valley in Rougemont.

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The ascent from Rougemont via La Forcla and La Manche to the alp of La Matte is uneventful but still enjoyable thanks to the fabulous weather and beautiful autumn colours. From here, a pretty path through fir trees interspersed with rocks climbs up towards the Rochers des Rayes. Some 100m below the summit, the woods suddenly end and a beautiful open meadow leads to the summit. (T3)

The absolute eye catcher here is the Dent de Combette. Like Pit remarked, the rock is almost shaped like a space shuttle at take-off. A small ledge on the west side of the rock offers a direct route up. This looks daunting at first, but is in fact a lot easier than it looks. The lower half of the ledge is unexpectedly wide and comfortable. The upper part involves some easy scrambling and a short traverse, the only point where you get to feel the exposure a little, but there are fixed cables to help if necessary (T4+ / I). We join the ridge (with the white-blue-white marked normal route) a little north of the summit. Descent along the normal route (T4-).

Many more adventures are possible:

• Instead of following path through the meadow up to the Rochers des Rayes, you can follow the ridge to the west of the path. Briefly T5 where some firs block the ridge and you have to do an exposed traverse in the west face, painfully grabbing on to stinging branches for security.
• Between Rochers des Rayes and the Dent de Combette, you can again stay on the ridge where the path traverses lower down. Briefly T5 where the ridge is at its sharpest.
• The Doigt de Combette (P. 1942) is a small crack immediately next to the path between Dent de Combette and Pertet à Bovets. T4, not particularly interesting.
• The Rodosex (P. 1921) rises spectacularly above the saddle of Pertet à Bovets. Climbing up is unfortunately not as attractive. You have to reach the south ridge over unpleasantly steep and brittle terrain, then climb through (literally) some fir trees, after which the remaining ascent to the summit is thankfully less problematic. T5+.
• The Corne Aubert is also most impressive from a distance. The highlight of the ascent from the Selle Aubert (P. 1910) is the view down a spectacular gulley south of the summit. T4+, some unpleasant loose stones on the ground near the summit.
• Of all the secondary summits around the Dent de Combette, the easiest one is in fact also the most worthwhile. The Haute Combe / Labihubel is a gentle grass hill with a wonderful panorama all around. T2-T3 depending on how steep you choose your ascent.

From the Col de la Forcla, we don't take the shortest way down through the valley of La Manche. This would involve a lot of asphalted roads and just remind us that we could have driven a car all the way up to Raye du Baillif. Instead, we take take the longer way back via Les Rodomonts (leaving out the summit). This is definitely a more pleasant route and sunnier as well. A little north of Rodomont Devant, there's a very welcome water source. We enjoy the glorious autumn sun to the very last and witness the sunset as we descend back down to Rougemont.

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Beautiful autumn conditions, sunny weather and fabulous scenery all came together to make us enjoy every last minute of this rather long day out. Considering that you can also reach all the highlights with much less effort by driving up to Raye du Baillif, the area is surprisingly quiet. A first class Geheimtipp, this hike!