Ordesa National Park and Via Ferrata Sorossal

6-25-2019
DAY 7

Today was initially going to be another day of canyoning, but the temperature persuaded us to change our plans. The high today was 91℉ (which is quite hot as is) and 96℉ tomorrow. so we decided to do canyoning on the warmer day and do a hike in Ordessa National Park and a local via ferrata today. Ordesa and Monte Perdido National Park was created in 1918 so it is 101 years old. The Ordesa Valley and the Anisclo canyon were formed by glaciers, and now you can see evidence in the rock formations to years of ice grinding alongside, carving out beautiful mountains and valleys.

In Torla (the town where my mom and dad stayed about 20 years ago), we bought some baguettes, croissants, bananas, yogurt, ham, and cheese for breakfast and lunch. We decided to hike the Ordesa-Circo de Cotatuero-Faja los Canarellos-Ordesa trail — I believe mostly because it sounded like one of the most dangerous trails. The warning they give you is that if you have vertigo, this is not the trail for you. The parking is surrounded by huge cliffs and mountains and this trail follows and band along a cliff where there are just a few trees growing along it. It doesn’t look like there could be a trail that is in the middle of the cliff, but there is (and we hiked it).

We were worried that it would be too hot, but it was actually in the shade until about 12:30, so it did not get hot until the way down. The wildflowers were abundant and beautiful – I think Maya took about 1000 pictures of flowers. There was even wild oregano growing, so it smelled great.

Everyone (even James) seemed to enjoy the hike. We passed some giant waterfalls on the way down and snapped some photos.

My dad had told us to keep an eye out for the Pyrenean Chamois which he said was kind of like a mix between a sheep and a goat, so we kept looking for a "shoat/geet" while we were hiking. We didn’t see any on the trail, but we did see 2 while we were driving away from the park. We were so excited!

On our way back to Broto, we stopped for drinks (since we couldn’t find ice cream) in Torla to refresh. Then we headed back to our room to rest up and let the temperature cool down before doing our next adventure of the via ferrata Sorrosal.

Around 5:30, we gathered our gear and headed out to do the via ferrata. Sorrosal Waterfall is impressive as it plunges from high up on a glacially carved cliff.

The Spanish take their adventures seriously! This via ferrata goes up the cliff next to a big waterfall, dig a hole through the cliff to pop out above the waterfall, traverse above the waterfall in a gorge, cross on a Himalayan bridge, go up some more cliffs where there is a nice view of the village, and finally head back down.

At the top of the waterfall, we were greeted by some passing mountain goats!

This was such a beautiful, adrenaline filled adventure, although we don’t think Gramps will be very pleased that we did it. He says it negatively impacts his health when he finds out about our wild adventures.