In one of the Instagram posts in recent weeks he defined himself as “a happy child in the solitude of a late afternoon in winter 2021 on an untouched snow cover” and is the perfect definition of the ideal day of Carlalberto Cimenti, known as Cala, Piedmontese mountaineer and skier who lived every day of his life with the spirit of that child on a perfect blanket of snow.
That spirit took him to the highest mountains in the world. On the closest to home, a Sestriere, died hit by an avalanche.
Cala Cimenti would have been 46 on Valentine’s Day. He lost his life a few kilometers from Pragelato, where he lived, after an excursion to Cima del Bosco, a mountain overlooking the Argentera Valley in the municipality of Sauze di Cesana. With him there was Patrick Negro, 50 years old and two children, grew up in Sestriere and former stationmaster of the Alpine Rescue of Pragelato.
In the late afternoon of Monday 8 February, the alarm went off, when they were not seen returning, and the fear of a Avalanche given the heavy snow and high temperatures. The cell phone signal of one of the two gave the indication of where the bodies were, under the avalanche that broke off in the Cima del Bosco and Col Chalvet area. The bodies were under two meters of snow, were recovered and brought downstream.
Those on the home snow were little more than a training excursion to Cala Cimenti, a mountaineering legend accustomed to the roof of the world. “Climb mountains, possibly to descend them with skis on, travel, always up high”, the summary of his life philosophy on Facebook.
In 2019 he had conquered the summit of Nanga Parbat, in the Pakistani Karakorum, one of the most difficult to climb and where Daniele Nardi and Tom Ballard died. At 6 thousand meters he asked his partner Erika Siffredi to help her. “I’m lying on top of the world and I cry and I laugh and I love you.” Also in 2019, the accident on Gasherbrum VII, in Pakistan together with his partner Francesco Cassardo, which fell on the way back. Cimenti joined him and spent the night with him waiting for help after having gone down and up to retrieve sleeping bags and provisions. His presence helped to save the life of Cassardo, a doctor who returned to the ward a few days ago despite having returned with amputated fingers from that experience.
Cimenti was the first and only Italian to have achieved the Snowleopard for reaching all 5 of the highest mountains in the Pamir and Tien Shan mountain ranges and descending them on foot. In October 2017 he reached the top of Dhaulagiri, at an altitude of 8156 meters, and descended from 7000 meters on skis. Because for him, living meant climbing mountains and descending with skis on.
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