From canyoning to climbing — a summer adrenalin rush in Arlberg

By Claudia Steiner

The pool in the mountain stream is cold — ice cold. “One, two, three - and go!” the group calls out in chorus. Two men and three women jump into the crystal clear water.

“Oh, that is really bitter cold,” yells Vera from Munich.

Everyone is wearing neoprene suits and socks, sports shoes, hill climbing equipment and helmets. The members of the group slide one after the other on their trouser seats over the water-polished rock into the next pool, called a “gumpe.”

Canyoning is the name for this nature-sport experience in Warth-Schroecken in the Austrian state of Vorarlberg.

“For me this is not primarily an action-sport kind of thing, but a great nature experience,” says canyoning guide Juergen.

So that all participants master the two-hour tour without incident, there is an introduction on dry land: the participants train to abseil from a terrace.

“Feet against the wall and now lean backward,” explains Juergen, who supports this writer and the others. “And now slowly walk down the wall.”

In addition, he instructs the group how to use hand signs, because in the rushing springs and thundering waterfalls it can be too loud to talk. Thumbs up means, “Everything okay.” Sliding a flat hand over the other means: “Careful, slippery!” And when the guide sticks his hand flat against the oncoming participants, this means, “Stop!”

In the water-bound tour, abseiling is more difficult than from the dry terrace. Six waterfalls lie ahead of the participants. The walls are slippery from moss and algae. Fifteen-degree-cold water springs into their faces.

Their hands are clammy, as they descend by stages of 40 metres. Still participants scarcely notice the heights — all concentrate on how not to get a full gush of the water over their heads.

“It’s important is that you be active, that you don’t hang like a wet sack on the line,” says Juergen. Arriving at the bottom, the climbers have to unhook themselves from the safety line, and then swim through the gumpe and climb onto a rock.

A young man gives the thumbs up and calls out: “Everything’s okay!”

Juergen pulls the cord up and hooks the next one on. After two hours the last one climbs wet and shivering off the stream bed. It’s so exciting that you forget to be scared.

In summer, when the snow is gone, most of Europe’s Alps offer exciting walking tours, but only a few locations like Warth-Schroecken offer tourists a range of adventures at the next-highest level.

Canyoning, with its constant adrenaline surge, is just one of them.

Another experience where you feel you only just survive by the skin of your teeth is a jump with the community’s flying fox: a series of six steel cables strung over gorges and through the forest.

You sit in a climber’s harness and swish at a height of between 20 to 90 meters over the water and among the trees.

“We did this a year ago, and it was so great that we wanted to experience that pins-and-needles feeling all over again,” said a father who is here together with his 14-year-old daughter.

Another exciting adventure nearby is a giddying climb by a “via ferrata” up the Karhorn, a local mountain. A via ferrata is a system of steel ropes and steps: there are about 1,000 such routes in the European Alps.

This one has been given a relatively easy rating of A/B by the German via-ferrata website Klettersteig.de and is therefore ideal for people who have already enjoyed mountain walking and would like to progress to an easy version of mountain climbing.

The via ferrata, with rungs cemented into the rock, ascends around 250 metres, sometimes over very steep passages. But one finds everywhere a little ledge that provides support. And when not, the guide, Christian, helps the beginners.

“Go a little further to the right, and you will find better support,” he says.

After nearly two hours, the group reaches the summit, 2,416 metres high. The view is fantastic: The peaks of mountains such as the Zugspitze in Germany, the Biberkopf, the Mittagsspitze and the Raetikon can be seen.

“I was already a bit scared - that was my first climb,” said Maria proudly. “But it worked out well and was really a lot of fun.”

Experienced via-ferrata climbers can proceed beyond the summit via ferrata over the Westgrat. This route has the via-ferrata difficulty rating of C/D.

For those with the right physique and stamina and wanting more action, Warth-Schroecken offers a Seven Summits Tour that covers 48 kilometres horizontally and comprises ascents that total 5,000 metres.

This extreme tour led by guides lasts at least 20 hours, usually ending long after dark.

“It’s not primarily about speed, but the experience on the mountain and it’s for a good purpose,” said organizer Juergen. The profits go to an aid organisation, Rokpa, which helps finance schools in Tibet. -DPA