Do it scared (especially at 61)…
The unguided ‘Nordegg with Love’ via ferrata was a little more than we bargained for.
I’m so proud of us for doing it.
I think when our guide from the via ferrata we did last year suggested we do the Nordegg climb, he probably meant the blue diamond climb, not the double black diamond climb.
I feel we were a bit irresponsible in tackling this given our lack of climbing experience. We are NOT climbers. Alan has done two guided via ferratas before (in 2022 and 2023), and over the years, I’ve done a few more guided climbs. But ‘From Nordegg with Love‘ was WAY more than anything we’ve ever done.
Honestly, we were pretty arrogant and stupid in this attempt. Even though nothing terrible happened, we were lucky, partly because we are quite fit we were able to muscle through overhangs etc that we didn’t really have the skills to do properly.
So, I would NOT recommend anyone do this climb without a lot of experience and preparation.
We’ve discussed how things could have gone sideways. There actually isn’t much choice to quit once you start. You can’t go down and there is no cell service in the area, you just have to finish. I was pretty scared a LOT of the time. I talked to myself out loud through much of it, thankfully Alan was calm and encouraging and if he was rattled, I’d never have known. This goes to show how powerful having someone believe in you is when the going gets tough!.
Alan & I celebrated our 4 year anniversary with this near death experience. I wouldn’t want to nearly die with anyone else.
Here’s to many more adventures together…(Happy anniversary my love – Thank you for being such an adventurous fool, maybe one of us should be the voice of reason going forward.)
Photo credit for drone footage to @normalpeopledoingepicstuff8295
Would you do this via ferrata?
If you’d like to take on big adventures, you CAN, no matter what your age. Like I said, I don’t recommend this one in particular, but there are PLENTY of other via ferrata adventures or OTHER adventures you can do, IF you are fit and strong. And please be smarter than we were in your preparation!
If you’re not as healthy as you’d like to be, we can change that. Let’s talk: http://tinyurl.com/ShawnaK-blog