
Day 3 - Bulgaria, BANSKO --- For this International Trip
2nd ascent of Vehren and Koncheto Ridge, however I had planned a slightly different route involving an ascent of a Grade 1 scramble over a boulder field to a grade I/II gully up Hvoinati (2610m) require\ing great care.
We had to park approx a mile further down the road due the number of vehicles already at the Vehren Hut. Again the weather conditions were perfect sat the start of the day and at the end of the day, however during midday we were to encounter a thunder & lightning storm - which was one of the most frightening experiences of my life.
So from our parked car we headed up to the Vehren Hut and onto the Boulder Field - the boulder field was to take us a few hours to ascend, taking great care as we ascended. I was navigating us to a gully to the north side of Hvoinati. On arriving at the base of the gully we needed to take great care as rocks had fallen in the gully and we needed to be extremely careful that we were not going to encounter any rock falls. We carefully ascended taking us a good hour. From here here we were soon at the summit of Hvoinati. We then descended to the saddle (2560m) to the South side of Vehren. We then ascended to the summit of Vehren (2914m). We continued on and descended the North side of Vehren to a saddle (2660m) that led us to Kutelo (2908m). On summiting Kutelo we approached Koncheto Ridge (2810m) with care - at this pint the weather had completely changed - our view was very poor and we starting getting static from the via Ferrata cable - this was very worrying. We decided to continue across the Koncheto Ridge as we reached the other side - we started to hear the clap of thunder and signs of lightning... We very quickly started our descent back to the saddle along the side of the Koncheto Ridge and Kutelo. This was very frightening with the storm that had come in and the mountain changed from a grey to being completely white with the pea size hail that had fallen. Once we were back at the saddle the weather front had passed and the glorious sun was back out. We decided to ascend Vehren once again and to descend on the south side of Vehren back to Vehren Hut and along the road to our parked car.
Vehren is the highest peak in the Bulgaria's Pirin mountain range reaching 2914m. It's Bulgaria's 2nd highest peak after Musala (2925m) and is in the Rila mountain range. Koncheto Ridge (2810m) is a narrow ridge with a via Ferrata along the Arete and is between Kutelo (2908m) and Banski Sudodol (2884m).