Pico de Aneto – Day 1: The Calm Before the Climb
PICO DE ANETO
Day 1: The Calm Before the Climb
August 13, 2025
PART I
Boy, do I love early-morning flights. Nothing better than waking up before 4AM, right? The others seemed largely unfazed by the ungodly timing when we met at the airport. Meanwhile, I looked like a sleep-deprived zombie that had been dragged out of its grave and forced through security.
Over our morning coffee, I confessed that I suffer from severe airport anxiety. No matter how early I arrive, I’m always worried sick that I’ll miss my flight. I repeatedly check the time, the gate and my boarding pass, as though one of them might suddenly change when I’m not looking.
Here, Harry told us that he lived with OCD and that, for years, travelling had been incredibly difficult for him – especially while working on his PhD. Flying forced him to surrender control over far too many variables while trapping him inside a metal tube thousands of metres above the ground. Thankfully, he was now in a much better place and, suddenly, my gate-checking didn’t seem quite so dramatic.
Enter Julie
And so, we boarded the plane. Luckily, I had been assigned a seat away from everyone else, allowing me to indulge in my usual flying routine of reading, listening to music and sleeping without being expected to maintain a conversation.
After a couple of hours, we landed in Barcelona, made our way out of the airport and took the metro to the railway station. I suppose this was where we truly broke the ice. For some reason, the conversation suddenly began revolving around sex. Within minutes, I had learnt far more about everyone’s tastes and preferences than I was entirely sure I wanted to know. Thankfully, the journey was a short one.
When we reached the station, a woman suddenly came running towards me and wrapped me in the tightest hug, laughing and smiling the entire time. This, turns out, was Julie – a 46-year-old French woman who had moved to Spain around 20 years earlier to learn Spanish. Once her career in hospitality took off, she decided to stay.
Despite my completely baseless assumption that people from colder, more mountainous parts of Europe are born with trekking poles in their hands, this would be Julie’s first proper trek, and she was positively thrilled about it. She had decided to join after Carrie told her about the upcoming trip. The two of them had met during a fitness holiday several years earlier and had maintained the kind of friendship that allowed one to invite the other to climb the highest mountain in the Pyrenees.
After their happy reunion, we headed outside to find Barbara, a woman from Benasque who would be driving us towards the village and the Posets-Maladeta Natural Park. The long drive kept us entertained throughout. When the mountain scenery wasn’t holding our attention, the increasingly personal conversation certainly was.
Yet Another Maltese Celebrity
During the journey, I discovered that Kelly was a singer that had competed in Malta’s national song contests. Although she never represented Malta at Eurovision, she had apparently come close several times and was well known among Maltese audiences.
This, of course, led to Kelly telling me about the difficulties of fame. My eyes began rolling once again as I realised that I was dealing with yet another Maltese celebrity. You see, fame in Malta is kind of a strange concept. It doesn’t really exist in the contemporary, Westernised sense. Local celebrities aren’t generally chased by paparazzi or treated like gods, apart from perhaps a handful of influencers I can think of. Even people who become household names can remain completely unknown to the sizeable portion of the population that never watches Maltese television. The idea that this level of fame could prevent someone from dating whoever they wanted or getting drunk in public seemed simply outrageous to me.
Fortunately, the conversation inevitably turned towards Eurovision songs. Immediately after announcing that I didn’t usually get drawn into the competition, I proceeded to sing around 20 Eurovision entries from memory. Apparently, I was more invested than I cared to admit. I had watched it back in 2019 and my playlist still features a few songs!
PART II
Into the Posets-Maladeta
The journey flew by as we sang our way through the mountains. By the time we reached the trailhead and prepared to begin walking, it already felt as though we had known one another for considerably longer than a day.
The national park looked nothing short of a dreamscape. Jaded though I might have been about trekking again, I could hardly wait to get started. The Posets-Maladeta Natural Park lies in the Aragonese Pyrenees and contains some of the range’s highest summits, including Aneto at 3,404 metres and Posets at 3,375 metres. Its high-mountain terrain includes granite massifs, glacial valleys, lakes, forests and alpine meadows.
Aneto itself was our ultimate objective, and while Nick had originally described it as a moderate-to-difficult trek, I felt he was somewhat underselling it given that the ascent is a serious high-mountain undertaking involving substantial elevation gain, snow or ice, a glacier crossing and the exposed Puente de Mahoma immediately before the summit. In other words, this was not going to be another gentle stroll through the Maltese countryside.
Marmots in the Meadows
We began on a tarmac road running through a pristine alpine landscape. Pine trees lined the route, wildflowers spread across the meadows and the mountainous backdrop kept us entertained as we walked. The highlight, needless to say, was the sheer number of marmots we saw scuttling across the rocks. They more than made up for the ones I had failed to spot in the Maritime Alps!
Every few minutes, I switched conversation partners and learnt a little more about each member of our increasingly peculiar group. A steady incline eventually brought us to a refuge stop, where we took a quick break and a nice cold beer. We then continued upwards.
The terrain became progressively rockier and steeper, with several switchbacks carrying us deeper into the park. Nick and Harry, evidently the fittest among us, remained at the front. Then came me, followed by Carrie and Julie, with Kelly trailing behind. Although I was panting and heaving myself, I found my attention repeatedly drifting backwards towards Kelly. She had struggled during our training session in Malta, and this was merely the approach to the refuge.
The following day would demand far more from all of us and I couldn’t help wondering whether she would make it to the summit. To be fair, I was beginning to wonder whether I would either.
The Road to La Renclusa
After around seven kilometres and approximately 400 metres of elevation gain, we reached Refugio de La Renclusa.
Situated at roughly 2,140 metres in the Benasque Valley, La Renclusa is a mountain refuge and one of the principal bases for the northern ascent of Aneto. The stone building stands in a rocky bowl beneath the Maladeta massif, surrounded by boulder fields, mountain streams and sweeping views across the Pyrenees. It was simple and rustic, but it felt like the perfect place to be – particularly after such a long day and because the rain started pouring almost the moment we arrived. Our timing, for once, was impeccable.
Completely beaten and drained, we settled into our dormitory before taking some much-needed showers. We then headed downstairs to the cosy communal area, where we were served a hearty lentil soup that tasted like the best damn thing I had ever eaten.
We spent the next few hours chatting and going over the plan for the following day’s ascent. Most of us were visibly intimidated by what lay ahead, although nobody seemed particularly eager to admit it. A few glasses of wine certainly did help assuage our fears. They also made the prospect of sleeping in a shared dormitory considerably easier. Eventually, we crawled into our bunks and tried to get some rest.
The next morning, we would discover whether two laps around a Maltese hill, a vague equipment briefing and several glasses of wine constituted adequate preparation for the highest mountain in the Pyrenees. What could possibly go wrong?