Editor's note: Please take care when hiking, and give the reflections at the bottom of this page a read. Always follow local authorities and safety guidelines.
Content warning: Sarcasm, Strong language
Hello (introduction)
My name is Campbell, and in this story I am 50% of an idiot sandwich. The other half of the sandwich is called Liam.
The following trip report indirectly discusses the do’s and don’ts of hiking, specifically hiking in the mountains, and in a foreign country. It focuses significantly more on the don’ts aspect, as we didn’t really do anything right. Nobody got hurt, and nothing bad really happened, but nevertheless we skirted the edge of danger in such a comically fortunate manner that should anybody attempt to repeat our journey, serious injury or death is possible. Not that anybody was going to. (Please don’t).
It’s also worth noting that Liam’s phone broke less than a day into the hike, so most photos in this article are of Liam and taken by me. It’s okay though because he is much sexier than I am.
Liam enjoying the Italian sun at Rifugio Padova.
From the 5th to the 7th of July, Liam and I spent three days in the Dolomites, and during that time, I crossed a flooded river, had an icebath in a rainstorm without a towel, camped illegally, nearly died climbing up a rockfall, got stuck in a snowstorm, narrowly avoided shitting my pants, and almost had to pay for a rescue helicopter after we were reported missing. But the food was great!
Disclaimer: This is a story of poor decisions and silly risk-taking, a style of outdoor adventure which puts yourself and others in danger. Use it as an example of what not to do - See how many bad practices and mistakes you can spot. Always hike according to your level of experience.
A bit of context
I became friends with Liam in 2023 after hanging out with him in Sydney, and at the start of 2024, he moved to northern Italy where he now lives with his family. When I embarked on my first Euro summer earlier this year, I made sure to spend some time with him in Treviso, and go hiking in the alps.
We set aside three whole days to complete a two-night hike in the mountains, and I let Liam do most of the planning, as he knew the area better than I did. A few days before I arrived in Treviso, Liam sent me a link to a Wikiloc trail entitled ‘Ez hike’.
Screenshot from Wikiloc.
At first glance, it didn’t seem too difficult. Our longest day would be only 15 km, with a measly 1300 metres of elevation gain. Chump change. Having left northern Pakistan only a week prior, and being acclimatised to 4500m above sea level, I was ready to absolutely thrash my Italian hiking partner in the hills. But due to unforeseen circumstances, we never actually completed the entire loop. The specifics of those circumstances will soon be revealed.
Day zero/one
On the eve of our first day of hiking, we caught a train from Treviso to the small town of Calalzo di Cadore, which sits amongst some of the most popular hiking regions in the Dolomites. We stayed at B&B Dolomiti, and for just €50 each we had a warm bed, hot showers, and kind owners who made us a delicious Italian breakfast the next morning, complete with caffè espresso.
After brekkie, the owners brought out their large-scale topographic map of the surrounding mountains. As Liam outlined our intended route to them, they became increasingly agitated in tone - They were speaking Italian, but I found out afterwards that they were strongly discouraging us from embarking on our hike. Nevertheless, half an hour later we strode out the door, unfazed. A ‘she’ll-be-right’ attitude will get you far in life, although you may end up living less of it.
Crossing a bridge to reach the trailhead.
The weather that morning was drizzly, cool, and overcast, but equipped with the wisdom of ‘be bold, start cold’, I made sure to remove my jackets before beginning my ascent to the mountain pass. Liam, on the other hand, made sure to wear all his layers, and I’m surprised he didn’t die of heatstroke twenty minutes in. Soon, we came to our first obstacle. It was a dodgy-looking river crossing, next to which signs had been erected that read: “DIVIETO DI TRANSITO AL PEDONI”. We pondered what to do next for about ten seconds, then continued on.
I wonder what this sign means?
Halfway across the river, the stepping stones became too slippery to safely stand on. This meant I had to walk on the riverbed. Forced to choose between turning around to take off my boots, or full sending the crossing, I full sent it and soaked my boots inside and out. Three days later, the smell emanating from my Topo Trailventures could’ve had them classified as a biological weapon. At least I saved two minutes.
Bird’s eye view of the crossing
A bit dodgier up close
Soon, it was time for lunch, and I couldn’t wait to see what my hiking partner (who works as a cook in a boujee cafe) had assembled for us to eat. Before the hike, I’d been informed “we’re gonna eat like kings twin 👑”. Cue a massive five-kilo bag of food, which I carried most of. The first meal of the hike… 300 grams each of tuna and beans, cans pre-emptied into a zip-loc bag, lightly seasoned. Commence flatulence. We enjoyed lunch at the first major landmark of our hike, Rifugio Padova. It was beautiful, and straight out of a postcard.
Admiring our protein-rich lunch
Refilling our water at Rifugio Padova. The fountain was labelled ‘acqua non potabile’, whatever that means.
Leaving the Rifugio, we continued our ascent to Forcella Scodavacca, a mountain pass that lies 2042m above sea level. Upon reaching the saddle, we enjoyed an hour’s rest, which consisted of 15 minutes of drone flying and 45 minutes of napping. Rain clouds brewing in the distance triggered us to begin our descent to Rifugio Giaf at 1500m.
Crossing Forcella Scodavacca
At this point, Liam informed me of an important rule regarding camping in the Dolomites: Wild camping is prohibited in the mountains unless it’s an ‘emergency’. The definition of ‘emergency’ extends to hikers who are far from any Bivacco (mountain hut) or Rifugio (mountain hotel), who are at high altitude or above the treeline. Our mischievous idea was to deliberately get ourselves in this scenario, so we didn’t have to pay for a night’s stay in Rifugio Giaf, at the bottom of the valley on the other side of the saddle. But the weather had other ideas, because as soon as we approached Rifugio Giaf, it began positively pissing rain.
In a bold move, we set up camp in the forest not even a hundred metres from the front door of the Rifugio. This was probably disrespectful, and definitely illegal. But considering the sun was setting, it was wet, and we didn’t have a spare 50 euros each to pay for a night’s stay (i.e. we were broke af) it was morally and ethically okay. Our original plan had been to keep hiking and climb 500m above the Rifugio, then camp in the alpine meadows, but this never eventuated.
Liam soon realised that we were right next to a pumping mountain stream, and only a minute’s walk from our tent, there was a platform we could shower on. It was certainly a questionable decision to have an outdoor shower while it was 10 degrees Celsius and raining, we didn’t have any towels, and we were camping in a leaky tent, but I’m not a chicken. Liam and I both stripped down to our undies and prepared ourselves for pain. It was fucken cold.
Having an ice bath to end the day
Soaked head-to-toe and with no tarp to shelter us from the pouring rain, we donned woolen thermals, chucked a raincoat on top, and let GoreTex do the work. We were half dry by the next morning. Liam began preparing our first dinner, which (thankfully) was not another mushy sack of tuna and beans. I was treated to fettuccine with zucchini, tomato, and parmesan cheese. I let Liam eat some too.
After dinner, we crammed ourselves into my one-and-a-half-man tent. Thunder boomed, wind raced through the pines above us, and rain bucketed down outside. Liam’s phone decided it was the perfect time to give up the ghost, cutting off our only form of communication with his family. He was also sharing a live GPS track with his mum in Australia, and the sudden disappearance of this track set off alarm bells back home. This triggered a series of unfortunate events that spanned the globe.
Day two
We awoke to a massive puddle in the tent, and the forest shrouded in mist. We packed up and were ready to go by about 8am, but only after a classic camp breakfast of oats and dried fruit, plus a spoonful or three of Nutella (Italian Nutella absolutely slaps). Considering that we had hiked a shorter distance than intended the day before, I pitched to Liam a minor amendment to the planned route, which would involve “less work” and “more fun”, or so I thought.
Basically, instead of going the long way around, we could simply climb up to the inconveniently named Bivacco Antonio Marchi e Renzo Granzotto (henceforth shortened to Bivacco Antonio), maybe camp there for the night, or maybe continue to the next Rifugio we had reserved, but not yet paid for. See map below.
Original route in blue, proposed new route(s) in red. Our location circled in pink, with an arrow indicating the proposed direction of travel. That night, we would camp at either Bivacco Antonio or Rifugio Pordenone. The next day, we would head back to Rifugio Padova.
It was easy to convince Liam to opt for the “more fun” option, since he no longer had access to any kind of map to double-check the trail I had haphazardly drawn up in Gaia GPS. In fact, the only navigational tools available to us at that point were the compass on my watch, and the map on my phone. Not an ideal toolset for hiking in the alps. As we soon found out, there are some things you can’t see on a topographic map alone.
Our view in the morning
Badass motherfucker
We made a beeline for Bivacco Antonio, on an “established” trail that was well marked by red-and-white stripes spaced about ten metres apart, painted on pale-coloured boulders. Following tiny Indonesian/Polish/Monagesque/Austrian/Peruvian flags, we ascended 300 metres in under an hour. We soon found ourselves above the treeline, and at the base of a rocky chute that cut between two massive spires of limestone.
The chute itself was loose and chossy. By the time we hit 1850m, every planting of the foot had to be repeated two or three times to compact the gravel enough to form a sturdy step. Like the good nature-conscious hikers we are, we began walking on small plants and patches of grass, the roots of which made the pebbles a little more secure, to ensure we didn’t start any more landslides.
The base of the rocky chute - Pretty steep
This tactic of walking on plants quickly stopped working, due to the lack of plants. The trail was also getting steeper, looser, and closer to rock climbing than hiking. This is where a she’ll-be-right attitude becomes very dangerous.
Liam clinging to the trail
Don’t look down
Having second thoughts now…
In hindsight, we probably should have turned around several hours before we reached this point.
About fifteen minutes before we reached the top of the chute, we split up. I found myself on the left side of the chute facing uphill, while Liam was on the right. A rocky spire split the chute down the middle right before the crest. Now, it was every man for himself, although we could still hear each other swearing our heads off as we grappled with life or death. Occasionally I’d consider the fact that if I tripped, or stepped on a dodgy rock, I would be dead within seconds. It didn’t really help to dwell on this, so instead, I locked tf in.
The very last section of climbing involved a vertical chimney of about three metres. I had no idea what was on the other side, especially because Gaia Topo didn’t really show any of the features we’d encountered on the trail behind us either. Would I be on top of a craggly peak, unable to get down? Would there be another ten metres of climbing beyond this? I struggled upwards, peeked over the edge, and…
The mountain vista at the top
I hadn’t felt happier in a long time. I let rip a gleeful “FUCK YEAH”, loud enough to alert two hikers almost 500 metres away from me. They must have been thinking “che idiota”. I turned to my right, and there’s Liam, smiling because he beat me to the top, and on top of that, I was still alive. We were finally safe, and absolutely never doing that stupid shit again.
In the distance, we could see Bivacco Antonio. It was a little red dot nestled comfortably amongst swathes of green and towers of grey. We allowed our heart rates to settle down a little, and then pushed onward. Reaching the Bivacco, the clouds cleared a little, and we made use of a small window of sunny weather to dry out the saturated tent. The window didn’t last long.
Soon after we arrived, a wall of freezing rain enveloped the peaks surrounding the Bivacco, and we quickly gathered our belongings and sealed ourselves inside. We had just begun an all-night stay - another thunderstorm had rolled in, and as lightning crackled outside, we laid out our sleeping bags for an epic three-hour nap.
At around six o’clock, we woke up for dinner, which consisted of delicious cheesy flatbreads and Nutella sandwiches, along with Liam’s Michelin-star pre-cooked couscous, which we only had to reheat. While chowing down on dinner, we noticed the rain had stopped drumming on the roof, and opened the upper half of the Bivacco’s door to take a squiz at the situation outside. The rain had stopped alright - It had started snowing. “It’s fucking snowing!” as Liam put it. It was his first time seeing snow.
Snow outside the Bivacco
Earlier, at the top of our Dumb and Dumber ascent up the rocky chute, I’d sent out an email to Rifugio Pordenone (that we’d reserved a room at), using the little reception I had, to inform the owners that we likely wouldn’t be spending the night there, and would instead opt for the Bivacco. Little did I know, the email address on their website was a dud, and my message never went through. Now, the combination of apparently missing hikers and a snowstorm in the mountains had triggered the Rifugio to report us as missing, using Liam’s booking information. Go figure.
At the same time, Liam’s mum had obtained my phone number from local connections in Sydney - although, due to the lack of mobile coverage at the Bivacco, I didn’t find out until the next day. Regardless, there were suddenly four groups of people looking for us - My family, Liam’s family, staff from every Rifugio in the area, and local hikers who volunteered to search for us.
Meanwhile:
Ever been out in a stowstorm wearing thongs?
It was incredibly lucky we holed up in the Bivacco when we did. If we’d chosen any other route through the high Dolomites, we would have been caught out in the storm, and with only my porous three-season tent as shelter, we would certainly have gone hypothermic, especially due to our lack of proper sleeping bags, insulation layers, and foil blankets. Foresight is a skill that I will be working on.
We went to sleep that night snuggled (separately) deep beneath flannel blankets, and prepared ourselves for the long trudge downhill the next day.
The snow continued into the night
Day three
We awoke on the final day of our adventure to silence, and a slight warmth in the air. Checking the time, we discovered it was already 10am, and the sun had been up for over four hours. We needed to get going if we wanted to make it back to the train station in time. But before I could begin packing up, nature called. I was about to lay an absolute monster crap.
Heading down the hill away from the shelter, I began scouting out an ideal location for my alpine squatting session. Unfortunately, before I settled on a proper site I realised I was literally touching cloth, so I hobbled a few metres into the scrub and commenced the crappening. It was truly a dump for the ages. Despite my best attempts to bury the turd obelisk in a posthumously-dug hole, I was forced to erect a small cairn of melon-sized rocks to conceal the crime. If you are one of those people that knocks over cairns on the trail, maybe avoid doing that in the Dolomites, just in case.
Once Liam and I had both packed our bags, we sent the drone up for a few photos. Looking closely at the live footage, we noticed a man hiking in jeans and carrying a tiny backpack (he must be European!) around 300 metres away, and quickly approaching.
Bivacco selfie, ft. our soon-to-be rescuer (spoilers!) in the background.
Arriving at the Bivacco, the man asked us “Are you the two missing Austrians?”
Liam had a long conversation with him in Italian, and to summarise what he told us, in English: Rifugio Pordenone had reported that two Austrian hikers were missing, and they were last seen at Rifugio Giaf. That morning, locals (including the man) had been scouring the mountains in search of them. And yes, he had confused Austria and Australia - We were the missing hikers.
‘Well, now we’ve been found. No dramas, right?” I asked Liam.
“If we had been found two hours later, they would have called in a rescue helicopter to look for us, and we’d paying for it”, he replied.
An example of what could have happened to us - Source: backpacker.com
Even though we were never missing, it was a relief to have been found, and especially to not have to pay for a rescue helicopter. Our local saviour quickly departed, promising to inform the Rifugio community that we were safe, and call off the search. We laced up our boots for the last leg of the hike, which was 12km long with a descent of 2000 vertical metres.
The remainder of our journey, at least in comparison to the first portion, was uneventful. Aware that it had been raining a lot over the past two days, we chose an alternative route on the way down that bypassed the dodgy river crossing from day one. This was probably the first good decision we’d made in three days. The only downside was that the detour involved 7.5km of walking steeply downhill on a paved road - I got the biggest blisters of my life, and they lasted for two weeks.
Liam had an extended conversation with his mum and the rest of his family to reassure them of our status of ‘still alive’, and we made it safely back to Treviso, where we enjoyed a spritz or two each to celebrate the end of our adventure.
Goodbye (reflection)
Key takeaways
- Always bring a paper map as a backup
- Share your emergency contacts with your hiking buddies in advance
- Have a proper backup plan that you’ve researched
- Don’t walk up a rockfall as part of your backup plan
- Don’t eat a massive amount of tuna and beans at the start of a three-day hike
- Always bring an EPIRB/PLB (which we had, but it’s still good to mention)
- Pack warm clothing for the worst-case scenario (random snowstorm outta nowhere)
- Make sure you have travel insurance that covers adventurous activities when hiking overseas
Want to see more pics from my recent travels in Pakistan and Europe? They’re on my Instagram @cjonesphotographs 📸
Peace out ✌️
Campbell J
Bonus pics (click to zoom)
