The Riffelspitzen are two neighbouring peaks in the
Wetterstein range in
Bavaria
Bavaria ( ; ), officially the Free State of Bavaria (german: Freistaat Bayern, link=no ), is a state in the south-east of Germany. With an area of , Bavaria is the largest German state by land area, comprising roughly a fifth of the total lan ...
. The Southern Riffelspitze (german: Südliche Riffelspitze) is 2,263 m high; the Northern Riffelspitze (''Nördliche Riffelspitze'') attains 2,242 m.
[Bundesamt für Kartographie und Geodäsie, ]Landesamt für Vermessung und Geoinformation Bayern
The Bavarian State Office for Digitizing, Broadband and Survey (german: Landesamt für Digitalisierung, Breitband und Vermessung Bayern) or LDBV, until 31 December 2013 Bavarian State Office for Survey and Geoinformation (german: Landesamt für Ve ...
: digitale topographische map 1:50,000
BayernViewer
, accessed on 23 September 2010
Situation
The Riffelspitzen rise from the ridge of the
Waxenstein
Waxenstein is a mountain of Bavaria, Germany
Germany,, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It is the second most populous country in Europe after Russia, and the most populous member state ...
kamm in the northern Wetterstein Mountains. To the north is the lake of
Eibsee
Eibsee ("yew lake") is a lake in Bavaria, Germany, 9 km southwest of Garmisch-Partenkirchen and roughly 100 km southwest of Munich. It is above sea-level and its surface area is . It is at the northerly base of the Zugspitze ( above se ...
, to the south runs the
Höllental. The next mountain to the southwest is the
Riffeltorkopf (2,230 m), which is separated from by the knife-edge of the 2,163 m high ''Riffelscharte''. To the northeast the ridge continues to the 2,264 m high ''Schönangerspitze''.
Whilst on the southern side grassy slopes, punctuated by rocky ''
schrofen
Schrofen, a German mountaineering term, is steep terrain, strewn with rocks and rock outcrops, that is laborious to cross, but whose rock ledges (''schrofen'') offer many good steps and hand holds. It is usually rocky terrain on which grass has est ...
'', run almost to the summit ridge, on the northern side, bare rock faces drop steeply away.
Bases and routes
The wind gap of the ''Riffelscharte'' to the southwest forms a crossing between northern and southern sides of the Waxensteinkamm crest and can be reached on marked hiking trails from the Eibsee (partly over protected ''
klettersteigs'') or from
Ehrwald, as well as from the valley of Höllental. The most important base for these mountains, the
Höllentalanger Hut
The Höllentalanger Hut (1,381 m) is a managed hut owned by the German Alpine Club in the Wetterstein Mountains of Bavaria, in the district of Garmisch-Partenkirchen. The hut lies in a narrow defile between the Höllental-Blassen and Waxenstein-Ri ...
(1,381 m) lies in the last-named valley.
The Southern Riffelspitze can be reached from the ''Riffelscharte'' in about 20 minutes along a
grade I
In the United Kingdom, a listed building or listed structure is one that has been placed on one of the four statutory lists maintained by Historic England in England, Historic Environment Scotland in Scotland, in Wales, and the Northern Irel ...
climb. A climbing route of grade V− difficulty runs up the northwest face.
The normal route to the Northern Riffelspitze runs from the Southern Riffelspitze in 20 minutes and is a climb of grade I difficulty. In addition the mountain can be climbed along the southeast (I) and northeast (II) ridges. The route first used by Willo Welzenbach and E. Müller up the northwest face is rated as grade V.
Sources
* Stephan Beulke: Alpenvereinsführer Wetterstein. 4th ed.
Bergverlag Rother
Bergverlag Rother is a German publisher with its headquarters in Oberhaching, Upper Bavaria. Since 1950 the company, that formerly went under the name of ''Bergverlag Rudolf Rother'', has published the Alpine Club Guides in cooperation with the Ge ...
, Munich, 1996, p. 147ff, {{ISBN, 978-3-7633-1119-4.
References
Wetterstein
Two-thousanders of Germany