Bocca di Verdi to Refuge d'Usciolu

Up and down, up and down, this was the way today. Things were very wet this morning. I packed up early in order to try and make today a leisurely day given it would be another long one at nearly 8 hours. I stuffed the wet things into my bag and rushed through breakfast. The day started off with a steep rise through woods but leveled out for a bit and turned into bright green fields with a lovely river trickling through it before switchbacking to a Col.

It was very windy as the clouds rolled in, and I had to throw on my windbreaker, first time this trip! I made it to the top of the Col and was presented with amazing views of the Mediterranean Sea. The winds up here nearly knocked me over, and for some reason it was freezing cold as well.

There's a refuge up here called Refuge Prati, and as I passed by it just looked very "sad", I'm glad I didn't stay here, and I found out later that it was terrible. Apparently it was so windy that lots of people had to go into the refuge eating area to sleep because their tents were no match.

The views from up here were amazing. I had really great views of the clouds rolling by as I got higher and higher. I could see for miles in every direction, but the clouds kept coming and before to long the whole area was covered in fog. There were a lot of ridges to walk along. The trail also had a lot of narrow areas that had steep drops off to the right of me.

The elevation profile for the day ended up being up and down, up and down, all while clouds made it hard to see anything more than 30 feet ahead. I had to climb over a field of steep boulders that seemed like they would give way at any moment, and doing this in the thick fog made it even more scary.

Eventually the clouds lifted and I could see the trail stretch out in front of me. It was an amazing sight! It went along the ridge of a mountain for a while, and then through some trees, before starting to go in circles, or so it felt. At one point it felt like the trail was doubling back on itself around the top of a mountain. Col after Col, and still no descent towards the refuge.

Finally a descent! And finally a view of the refuge. It's much higher up than I thought it would be, which probably means an exposed camping area and rough winds. On the way into the refuge area I had to walk past some angry looking horses.

After finding a spot to pitch my tent I pre-paid for dinner, and bought some snacks from their general store because they didn't a have an a-la-carte kitchen, so I just picked up a bunch of small random foods and retreated to a nearby picnic table to scarf them down.

While I hung out in my tent waiting for dinner the tent collapsed on me from the strong winds. I reinforced all stakes with more rocks, and even tied out four additional guy-lines. It held together for now. This tent, while very being lightweight and roomy, was not the best at shedding winds without the ability to properly stake it down. Around this time it also started to drizzle.

This place, when I was there, didn't have a covered eating area, and the space to eat inside - which was actually the kitchen for hikers to cook their meals - was cramped and not many people could fit in there, so I had to eat dinner outside in the rain. While eating I made the decision to see if they had a tent available for purchase. Luckily, they did, and good timing to: my tent couldn't handle the increasingly strong wind, even with all of the extra stakes. I had to undo one of the extra stake-out points to be able to roll the door out of the way in order to pack things up, and as soon as I did the tent collapsed.

I chilled inside the bomb-proof tent while the rain raged outside. After getting all of my gear situated I read and then fell asleep. This wasn't the best refuge on the trip, but I made the most of it.

This trek has been great, with amazing views and varied terrain, and has been a great experience overall.