Area: Northern Velebit, Croatia
A wonderful and memorable day, hugely varied and satisfying, combining a famed through hike with three very different peaks including the northern Velebit's highpoint. The day dawned clear as crystal again and I set off into a perfect morning, anticipating a bit of a treat along the Premuziceva staza. This is a famous path cut into the otherwise awkward and unforgiving karst terrain. It beings innocently enough, with woodland tracks east of Veliki Zavizan, but then it kicks up into a wonderland of copses, peaks and sculpted limestone. In this weather, in the early morning, it was almost implausibly beautiful, and I had it all to myself. This section to Crikvena is known as the best bit of what is actually a multi-day trek down to Paklenica. I had no real plans beyond the vague desire to do a long loop beyond Crikvena. Initially I just delighted in the unfolding scenery as the path twisted and turned through little karst valleys and over short rises. At the top of one, a side path leads up Gromovaca via a delightful short scramble, taking slabby limestone through dwarf woodland to a more open summit. Views of pristine woodland stretching right down to the sea, and the sun glinting off the Lika hills much further south. From here, the route gets even more stunning, past a miniature side valley to the stunningly situated Rossiya hut - just a bothy really. I looked for water in the well, as I was already running low, but the only two residents said they had too much (5 litres) and gave me a bottle. As well as being very generous this was a staggering stroke of luck, as I had already realised I'd have to curtail the day from Crikvena due to not packing enough water for the weather (the heat and humidity was building, and there's no water at all in these sorts of karst landscapes, obviously enough). So I now had options. The first task was to bag Crikvena at the end of the best section of the Premuziceva (he was the engineer who built the path). This came after a descent into woodland then a sharp rise up a gangway in space up to a tiny col. From here, a surprisingly steep and rather exposed scramble takes clean and open slabs up to gentler stepped walls to the summit of Crikvena: at least British grade two but with one or two bits of ironmongery to ease progress. I then had a dilemma. I considered a longer loop to the east but in the end decided to retrace steps to the Rossiya hut then try to find the path that cuts eastwards towards Mali Rajinac, which I really wanted to do before leaving the area. I hadn't seen it on the way out, but located it easily on the return. It gave a giant extension, losing a vast amount of height initially as the path descends endlessly into the valley to the east - sunken almost out of sight of the Premuziceva, almost troublingly deep. I had to check my position a couple of times in the thick soundless woodland - nobody around, bracket fungus and other flora to inspect. At last, it bottomed out and I joined a more defined path leading up to the big track of Skrbina draga which links Lubenovac with Zavizan. From this, I suspected I could get up Rajinac and this proved to be the case - although not without a significant climb after all the height I'd lost crossing eastwards. The character of the day had changed utterly. Gone was the exquisite beauty of the karst, but it had been replaced by lovely woodland and alpine meadows. The initial climb through woods gains a big open meadow festooned with hundreds of butterflies. After a snack, a long and tiring additional climb through more steep woodland eventually gains a broad ridge to Mali Rajinac - tedious and tiring at the top. Great views across unbroken woodland and a remote, wild feel, enhanced by the fact that I had still seen nobody since the Premuziceva (and even then only 3 or 4 people). I retraced with care back to the meadow, then headed as directly as I could back to Zavizan through more dappled beech woodland. Some of my clothing was gone when I got back to the hut, but that couldn't spoil a great day. I jogged the 5k down from Zavizan back to Babic Sica where I had started 30 hours before. I had eaten nothing but an austere diet of bread and sausages, so headed straight to the local cafe when I got back to Krasno for Velebit beer, chips, salad and cevapi.
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