With a cloudy forecast we set off to climb an easy multipitch route on the Blankenstein, near Tegernsee. I was keen to do this route, having previously admired the Blankenstein while doing a winter circuit of the Risserkogel and Wallberg with James. We were supposed to be meeting with some friends from the IMG, however due to S-Bahn cancellations they were very delayed, so we set off alone as we didn‘t want to wait for 90mins in the car park!
The walk up was very straightforward and we made excellent time, the conditions were however worse than we were expecting! The temperatures were somewhat different to what we have had to become accustomed to recently! Despite the odd spit of rain, and the cold conditions we decided to set off anyway. One of the crux moves was the move off the ground, which was made harder by not being able to feel anything in my fingers having waited for the team in front of us to get to the first belay after getting lost!
Once the first move had been dispatched, the rest of the pitch was a delicate traverse, protected by pitons, which was sub-ideal given that it was actually raining at this point! Becky led the second pitch which was up a slightly awkward corner, with a belay which was definitely not where the guidebook suggested! The third pitch was an enjoyable pitch, which culminated with a fairly awkward chimney before the final pitch of climbing took us up a wall with some enjoyable technical balancey climbing.
A final pitch of scrambling took us to the summit, before a quick descent with some enjoyable scrambling took us back down to the Blankensteinsattel. As we were climbing the third pitch some of our friends arrived at the bottom, and we knew that they were on the final pitch as we got back down to the Blankensteinsattel we decided to wait for them. Although given the wind this meant we did get fairly cold while waiting!
Due to lots of slippery wet clay based mud on the ascent, we decided to descent via a different route, which turned out to be a mistake for other reasons as it was very slow underfoot and also very wet in places, although we managed to keep dry feet and were soon back at the road. We made a quick detour to admire a waterfall on the descent and were back at the car in good time to drive back to Munich.
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