Badile NE face - Cassin

Finally, we did it!!! After driving a lot of kilometres first to Val di Mello, then to the Ecrins, back home to Holland and then again to the Bergell we managed it to climb one of the big north faces in the Alpes.

I spent two days at home when the weather forecast suddenly changed and predicted a good weather window for at least three days. I drove back to Basel, picked up Bernd and again we went to the beautiful Bergell in the very south east of Switzerland.

The Badile is a 3307m peak, which is well-known  for its granite quality and is famous for it’s routes. The north ridge is first climbed in 1923 and is accessible to climbers who easily climb long routes (up to 25 pitches and a difficulty level of 5a max). Back in 2008 I climbed that route together with Peter.  Another well-known route is the long route in the north east face climbed in 1937 by the alpine legend Ricardo Cassin. He opened the route in three days (free and artificial climbing), on the last day they were caught in terrible weather which caused the death of two climbing mates! The Cassin-route on Badile is one of the most famous north faces in the Alpes together with the Eiger, Matterhorn, Grand Jorasses, Les Droites and Les Drus. Nowadays the route is climbed in one day and usually It takes 6-10 hours for the climb itself, another hour to the top of the Badile and three hours down to the Italian side.

At arrival on the Sasc Fura hut we got the information that maybe there is still ice and water in the north east face especially in the exit chimneys. Bad news if you have to climb 20 pitches up to 6a+ in a route from where it’s difficult to retreat. But our motivation was still high and we thought to give it a try and decide at the start of the route.

The next morning we started at 4.30h, the face looked quite dry and we were at the base of the route at 7.00h (one abseil to get to ledge, making the traverse under the serac and climbing up to the start). There were already 2 parties climbing and another 2 parties starting. Unfortunately the latter ones were very slow so we actually had to wait a lot which made it a very long but exciting climbing day. On the other hand the weather forecast predicted no thunder storms and skies looked really good during the whole climb.

Badile at approach, from the highest point the north ridge comes down towards the observer, the NE-face is to the left (of course)

let's do it!

walking down to work...

the lower part of the face in the first sunlight - terrific!

Bernd started the first pitch. I had to lead the first difficult pitch, it’s a 6a and I was a bit nervous, because there are 4-5 difficult pitches in the route, not bolted and we had quite heavy backpacks (mountain boots, crampons, water, blizzard pack,…). So I thought, if I climb this pitch solidly I will have a good day on the mountain, otherwise  I thought it might get a tough one. But the 6a was good to protect with friends, there were a lot of (old) pitons and I didn’t found it too hard. So I was really happy after that pitch.

We continued climbing and the 6^th pitch I was leading again. The pitch makes a traverse to the left, goes up, and turns around a corner to the right. The traverse to the left is easy but because it’s alpine, I’m used to place a lot of protection in case of rock fall or whatever can happen to you in this environment. I started to climb up and suddenly the huge block where I hung on started sliding. I fell for about 2 meters and then the last clipped piton hold the fall! After a short assessment I continued the climbing with a painful right hip, a sore ankle and some scratches on the elbow and hands – I was the lucky guy that day!!!

the upper part of the face

The climbing continued on slabs, diedres up to the middle of the wall where you have to make a traverse under a small snow field to the start of the upper part, which is the most difficult part of the whole route – 4 pitches starting with a 6a+, 5c+, 6a, 5c and after that another  7 pitches to the north ridge.

The Spaniards in front of us chose to avoid the steep crack of the 6a+ and instead they went up to the right. It took quite long and after 10 minutes or so the lead climber told the belayer that he would leave his backpack on a piton to continue the pitch without, because the climbing was too difficult. I thought, ok, let’s go up the original pitch, it looked really steep but I saw a lot of possibilities to place protection. It was really sustained climbing and after 25 metres I ran out of pieces, luckily 2 metres above me I saw two old pitons. I made belay on the pitons placed the last remaining friend as a third anker – done!!

the crux pitch

nice view: on the right in the foreground Piz Cengalo with the well-known Geiser-Lehman on the north-pillar, the Sciora group in the middle and Piz Bernina with the Bianco ridge in the background

the exit chimneys

We continued climbing and after another 4 pitches the famous exit chimneys came into sight. I hoped that they would be dry, the climbing itself should not be too difficult but if it is wet it can be really hard. At that moment we were on route for more than 7 hours. The weather was still good and we enjoyed to be on the mountain.  It turned out that the exit chimneys were wet but climbable, yeah. And again I got a quite difficult pitch to lead, “just” a 5+ but on the bottom of the V-shaped chimney there was a lot of water. I had to climb inside to place protection and afterwards climbing out of the V with either my back on one side and both feet on the other or one foot on one side and the other on the opposite side – a scarry sensation to climb like this on the V realizing that the climbing shoes and your hands are wet. In the older days they called this a III+ section, hahaha.  After a nice workout of about 20 minutes I managed it to get to the belay.

doing the workout in the V-shaped chimney, good exercise :-)

This pitch was the only pitch I climbed without the backpack. In consequence Bernd had to second this pitch and pulling up my backpack as well. He did a great job. After that pitch I got some energy problems maybe as a consequence from my fall earlier that day. Bernd offered me to lead the next pitches (I didn’t say a word but the non-verbal signals I think were obvious). These are the great moments of comradeship in the mountains – taking responsibility for each other without needing a lot of words.

in the exit chimneys

Bernd leading in the chimneys

Bernd led the next 3 pitches. For me this was enough to recover, get it warm again and at six o’clock I made the last moves to get out of the cold NE-face into the sun on the north ridge – GREAT. 

the last pitch...

Bernd exiting the NE-face, feel the sun!!

We sorted out our gear and decided to climb on a running belay technique, which means that we both climb together with about 20 metres rope between us. The lead climber places protection and the secondary climber cleans up. This is a very efficient way of save and simultaneously climbing. After another hour we were on top!! We met a few people on our way up who climbed the north ridge, but they were really tired and decided to stay in the bivouac hut on the top. For us, this was no option, we wanted to go down and have a beer on the hut.

feeling like real mountaineers! happy to be out there, thanks Bernd.

We started the first abseil when suddenly I heard a lot of noise of falling rock and screaming people on the top. At that moment Bernd already had abseiled down the first pitch and I stood on the top of the abseil. I never before experienced a huge rock fall like that one. I saw a huge block coming down from maybe 40 metres above me, I mean huge in sense of huge like my car!!! That block was slowly tumbling down pulling out a lot of other smaller rocks. I was secured at the belay and jumped as fast as possible behind a big block. I shouted towards Bernd that he should move his ass as fast as possible out of the impact zone. A few seconds later I saw Bernd lying on the ground. He was hit, but responding to me. It seemed that the Spaniards above us had launched this enourmous rockfall – they apologized, thanks guys…. 

I rappelled down to Bernd, he was conscious but was not able to stand on his feet. He told me that he was hit by a rock in a size of a football. After a short assessment we decided to wait a few minutes. I pulled out the ropes and prepared everything to abseil down – if possible. We had not a lot of options, it already started to get dark and calling a helicopter would not really be an option. So the best thing would be to make it down to the hut. I remembered all the abseils from my trip with Peter 4 years ago. We had a 60 meter rope which would make the abseils very efficient. After taking some ibuprofen we decided to try to make it down. Abseil for abseil we did our best to stay calm and indeed I found immediately all the abseils and the traverses towards the end of the couloir. Bernd did all the stuff amazingly good. After the last abseil it was dark – good timing. We put on our head torches and made it down to the hut. We arrived at 23.00h, and the best thing was: we got some polenta soup and German Wahrsteiner beer, what a final!! After that we took another beer….

Next morning it took a while to get up, Bernds hip and stomach were aching and I had a really sore right hip. But the spirits were high, we climbed the route and survived a serious rockfall caused by this stupid guys, sorry for these words but already in the route they were climbing above their limits and then this shit in our descent.

Anyway, we walked back to the Sasc Fura hut. A nice hike in a great alpine environment, it took 6 hours to get to the hut. We had some really good soup and pasta and after that we walked down for another hour.

Facts: TD+/ED-, 800m, 20 pitches to the north ridge, another 5-6 pitches to the summit, 3 hours descent to the Gianetti hut. We took a good rack of friends (0,5 – 2), nuts and 10 quickdraws with us. Before starting you should try to get some information about the serac at the base of the wall (crampons???) and you should think about the return (rappelling down the north ridge or going down to Italy). From the Gianetti hut you can walk down in the Val di Mello and rent a taxi to go back to Switzerland (veryyyyy expensive) or walk back in 6 hours to the Sasc Fura hut.

And never forget: Cassin opened this route in 1937!!! Great mountaineer!