What We Learned About the Dolomites

The Citta dei Sasso was, on paper, the perfect stop-off on route for a good bouldering session. Besides, the 'City of Rock'?! Had to be done. But as we followed the Passo di Sella (there was a clue here, passes are not normally necessary through gentle hills...) through the clouds past 2,000m, we began to realise that we may have miscalculated. However, as every cloud has a silver lining, we did learn some new (for ourselves) and interesting facts:

• The Dolomites are not, as we assumed (assumption is the mother of all fuck-ups...), a slightly larger limestone crag. They are in fact a bona fide mountain range.
• Running down some of the towering cliff faces are real-life glaciers.

• There is quite a lot of snow there. It snowed as we arrived, and as we left. There is so much snow in places that they have even created 'ski stations'. We drove higher than these.
• May is probably too early for climbing here if you are not 'hard as nails'.
• Apparently, we are not 'hard as nails'.
• Glaciers are epic fun.
• As is scree-running.
• There are mountain goats! They are considerably more light-footed and agile than us.
• At least we didn't drive to the Dolomites in January.