Oberissalm - Vordere Sommerwand (normal path)

Access to the starting point:
From Ljubljana, take the motorway past Salzburg towards Munich. At the Dreieck Inntal multi-level junction, take the A93 towards Innsbruck/Kufstein/Brenner. On your return to Austria, continue to the Innsbruck-Mitte exit. Here, do not turn towards Innsbruck, but continue on the A13 motorway towards the Brenner Pass. Leave the motorway at exit 10-Schönberg and follow the comfortable road through the Stubai Valley to Neustift im Stubaital, where you take the first exit at the roundabout in the middle of the town and follow the ascending road to the village of Milders. In Milders, follow the Mühlenweg and the signs for Oberissalm. To get to mountain pasture, there are about 8 km of increasingly narrow asphalt road, which is often used by cattle, so you need to factor in any waiting for a crossing into your estimated driving time. At mountain pasture, Oberiss is parked in a parking lot with a parking fee of 5 euros per day.

An alternative is to drive through northern Itali: in this case, take the A2 motorway from central Slovenia to one of the border crossings with Austria and continue to Lienz. Here you continue on the 100 road and pass the Prato alla Drava crossing into Itali. In Itali, follow the SS49 all the way to the junction with the A22 motorway in the direction of the Brenner Pass. After the pass, continue in the direction of Innsbruck to the Schönberg exit. From there, follow the route described above.

Path description:
At mountain pasture, at the signpost above the parking lot, turn onto a wide dirt road, which, within a few minutes of mainly horizontal walking south-westwards, leads to a well-marked off-ramp of a narrow lane, which, with fine views of the eastern part of the Alpeine mountain range and the mountain pasture Oberiss below, leads you in a rather gentle curve through the sparse high mountain forest. A little higher up, we change to grassland with alpine alpine vegetation at the edge of the upper Obergbach valley, and the steepness gently subsides with fine views towards Franz Senn's hut and Vordere Sommerwand above it. Following a pleasant and scenic path in the last part of the way to the hut, you will pass the mountain pasture Alpeiner past a shepherd's hut and climb through an attractive watery landscape to the popular Franz-Senn-Hütte in just over 15 minutes; from the starting point it is about an hour and a half walk to the hut.

At the hut, you will see a signpost pointing firmly south along the path leading to the Sommerwand Glacier and the Vordere Sommerwand. At first quite leisurely, the path winds across a grassy slope and, at a slightly higher altitude, runs parallel to the torrent conceived on the Sommerwand Glacier. Crossing a partly rocky ledge, we approach the northern ridge of the Sommerwand and continue along the rocky world below the eastern slope of Vordere Sommerwand. After about an hour's walk from the hut, you will come across a signpost pointing sharply to the right. Following a sometimes precipitous but technically easy path, we climb in switchbacks to the summit ridge of the Sommerwand, where we are greeted by the two large cairn, one of them marking the corner 2676, which, according to most maps, represents the top of the Vordere Sommerwand, located right on the edge of the summit ridge high above the Franz-Senn-Hütte.
From here, it is about a 10-minute walk along a challenging and airy ridge to the summit, marked by a cross. From 2676 to the summit, the previously perfectly marked path is no longer marked, but the route of ascent is clear. Nevertheless, the entry to the ridge cut already presupposes an initial problem, the solution to which is twofold: firstly, from the platform where the marked route ends, the ridge can be climbed directly, crossing some easier-to-climb rocks (I). The second, technically easier option appears when descending below the ridge cut on the eastern side of the ridge, where a relatively easy passage to a higher level soon becomes apparent. The continuation of the route along the ridge is orientationally straightforward, but in places quite exposed. In a few places we are helped by the fixed safety gear (ropes and steps), and occasionally we have to free-climb a little (I). The relatively short final ridge widens a little below the summit with a cross and takes us to a very scenic ridge, where there is only a little space by the cross.
Vordere Sommerwand is one of the easiest and fastest peaks to reach in the rather wild surroundings, but getting to the point with the big cross still requires a sure step and some mountaineering experience, even if all the difficult spots are located on the relatively short finishing ridge. The view from the summit is attractive and the tour can be done in passing by climbing the Innere Sommerwand or staying overnight in Franz Senn's hut.   

On the way: Franz-Senn-Hütte (2147m)

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