4 Days of Climbing in the Dolomites

This last September, I spent a week climbing in the Dolomites with some friends! I’ll just share a few top tips in case you’re planning a similar trip.

Top Tips for Travel & Climbing

• Fly into Venice. Munich was the other airport suggested when I was doing research, but Venice is more straightforward and only a 2 hour drive from Cortina D’Ampezzo.
• Stay in Cortina D’Ampezzo. This area kept coming up when we were planning and is one of the biggest towns in the area. It’s very walkable and a short drive from climbing destinations.
• If you’re going to be climbing, you need a car. Cars are a must for being able to get into the mountains. I believe you can arrange some shuttles for hiking areas but for the climbing areas, having a car is really a necessity. The roads are a bit narrow and it can be hard to get a non-manual car, so be aware!
• Make sure where you’re staying has a parking spot for your car. In many of the smaller towns, most parking is street parking and crowded so check that your Airbnb or hotel has a spot for your car.
• You’ll have to pay a tourist tax, and may need cash for it. We didn’t need cash really for the lifts, tolls, or food (except to buy chocolate at Pichler’s) but we did to pay the tourist tax on our Airbnb when we got there and had to pay in cash.
• Buy a guidebook, but don’t expect it to be 100% accurate. I bought The Dolomites: Rock Climbs and via Ferrata (Rockfax Climbing Guide Series) which we would have been lost without but definitely missed a lot of climbs. There are often labels on the routes (carved in or as small plaques) with the route name and grade (get comfortable with the French grading scale – see table below) that are not in books, so just look around a bit. Mountain Project was supremely unhelpful and missed 95% of the climbs, so definitely don’t rely there. I didn’t find the conversion guide completely accurate but usually am comfortable climbing mid-5.10s and felt OK with any 5s (the 6s started feeling more like low 5.11s to me).
• Trad gear is helpful, even for sport routes. The multi pitch sport route my group did in Cinque Torri was very runout and definitely a mixed route. Bringing trad gear was essential for adequate protection. A lot of the climbing areas in the Dolomites are trad (but that’s not what my group currently much of) so hopefully I can go back and tackle more!

Climbing Areas & Favorite Climbs

Areas where we sport climbed:

• Falzergo Pass
• Sass Dlacia
• Cinque Torri
• Citta dei Sassi

Out of these Cinque Torri (five towers) was definitely my favorite! It’s a stunning area and I’d love to explore this area more for hiking. The weather cut our day short but it was great to be able to take cover in the refugio for sandwiches and hot chocolate and I loved taking the lift up to the climbing area.

My second favorite area was Citta dei Sassi – or “city of rocks”, a big mountain biking and hiking area, but the climbs were all very short (basically a field of large bolted boulders).

My two favorite climbs of the trips for pure fun factor were Per Le Donne, 5.10a at Sass Dlacia (fun big moves on great jugs and really cool rock) and Per Mario, 4c+ at Citta dei Sassi (easy easy route but really fun juggy climbing for a warm up).