Clarabides - Gias

Panoramic view from the summit

My second excursion with the local mountain club aimed at two 3000m peaks in the Pyrenees: Clarabide and Gias. An incredible number of 20 hikers, mostly of an age of about 50 years participated in the excursion and Saturday at 9 am we initiated our trip to Benasc. After lunch we parked the cars on a near parking and about 2 to 3 hours later arrived at the mountain hut of Estós.

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The bigger of two mountain lakes

 At about 7 am on Sunday we already had had our breakfast and began walking. The meteorological conditions were not perfect, but we trusted in the clouds holding back any drops of water as well as electrical discharges. The clouds were of trust and their presence, as it turned out, furthermore were a great aid, because we didn't have to suffer the typical Spanish summer heat. We passed by two lakes. At the second of them we paused, so that the whole group was able to reunite before the final ascent to the Gias Col (Puerto de Gias) at 2921m. From then one the group lost some of its members, but I'd guess that some 17 of us still made the first summit called Clarabide Oriental, which is listed as a secondary summit. Together with Xavi and Lluís I went on to the 3020m high Central Peak, where we arrived in a matter of about 10 minutes.

Clarabide Summit with Xavi and Lluís

Descent from Gias

While the further diminished group slowly was arriving, I went on, in order to summit the secondary occidental Clarabide. The trip was very short, but had an quite interesting aerial pass I was able to cross by just jumping over it. Back at the main peak most of us went on to the Gias mountain. This one was a little bit more difficult and required the use of hands which was not to everybodies delight. Even so some 10 of us coroned this peak as well.

Pere was inclined to try a different way down to the second lake, we had seen from the last summit. Our group split and 5 of us jumped to this new adventure of the unknown. There actually turned out to be a slightly marked path and by following it as well as we could, we saved us at least half an hour of our descent. Since we later waited for the rest of the group to appear, we actually didn't gain anything except the pleasure of having tried a different, entertaining way.

Once we arrived at the mountain hut, we rapidly prepared our loads in order to get home as fast as possible, where we arrived around 9 pm, not without having stopped in Alfarras in order to eat some sandwiches and, even more important, satisfy our dried out throats with some well chilled drinks. 

Plantlife at 3000m above sea level