Versante Sud Val di Mello climbing guide-book

Versante Sud Val di Mello is the climbing guide for trad and sport routes in the cradle of Italian free-climbing

"Among Alpine valleys, Val di Mello has no comparison. Above sheer rock faces, below a quiet, flat valley floor furrowed by the green-blue waters of the stream. It is a mythical place in the geography of climbing, where in the 1970s a group of youngsters were able to reinvent climbing, designing routes on nail-biting walls, surrounded by powerful and monumental nature.

This is also the subject of this guidebook. A wide-ranging monographic work, where each route should appear with its own character and strength, from those of the pioneers to the latest achievements. We have written contributions from some of these explorers, first-hand accounts of a legendary epic that marked a historical period and revolutionised the way of conceiving and practising mountaineering; this is in fact the cradle of Italian free climbing.

To follow the stories of Masa, Merizzi, Miotti and Boscacci is to breathe in the light, sharp air of those years. But above all, it is to go back to where it all began, to the courage and imagination that had no pretensions to power, but was able to literalise the generations that came after. So read it to understand and rediscover a stone world of unsurpassed quality'.