Pica d'Estats

July 15, 2025

Pica d'Estats

Pica d'Estats - 3144M

1275M Prominence

42.66694, 1.39790

July 15, 2025

HRP Day 25 stats

2781M Ascent, 3102M descent

35.22 KM

Last night I camped out in the unmanned hut "Cabana de Sellente", so I could get up and not need to pack up my tent before leaving. I knew this was going to be a big day if I was going to climb Pica d'Estats in the morning, and make it into the country of Andorra by evening. The morning began with a climb up to Col de Sellente, I then hiked down to the many Estanys de Baborte. There wasn't really much of a trail here, so I had to route find my way around the estanys and to the next col. From the lakes I immediately hiked back up to the col that separates Pic de Baborte and Pic de Pedres Blanques. From this Col I could descend another 250 meters down to Estany de Sotllo. There wasn't really any way to tie in Pica d'Estats into the day, as it was one of the peaks that was the furthest distance away from the HRP track that I had been loosely following, so I had to do an out and back. Since I was doing an out and back, I ligthened my load and stashed my camping gear by Estany de Sotllo. I then kept going along a trail that took me up to Estany d'Estats, and then further up the cirque. The cirque on the South West side of Estats was very large, I climbed 350 meters up to the North from the lake up to Port de Sotllo. From Port de Sotllo the standard route continued up and over the col and then East to Col de Riufret. I didnt want to add any aditional time and descent though, so I climbed directly from the Col. There was a sign for a route, that didn't really end up existing. I had a GPX route of this route though, so I knew it was possible. I ended up traversing a bit south of the ridge, then following a loose gulley up to some more solid rock. I scrambled a bit further and ended up with false summit Pic Verdaguer to my right. I thought it was the true summit at first, because there were crows on the summit, but I kept moving a little further to see the true summit. It was a busy day, but luckily there were only 2 others on the summit with me. it was a pretty cool summit with a some exposed faces on either side and an iconic cross sculpture. On the descent I tried to stick to my ascent route, as I knew it went. When I got to the loose gulley though I ended up just scree surfing it to the bottom until it joined the trail in the cirque again. I emptied out my shoes of pebbles, and then continued back to Estany de Sotllo to pick up my gear and continue on for the day. I made a 1200 meter descent past the beautiful Plat de Sotllo, and then bypassed a few slabby spots with some bolted chains. I took a break near the bottom of the valley at Refugi Vallferrera. After eating lunch I made my second to last climb of the day up to Port de Boet. I then descended to Etang de la Soucarrane, where the trail started to fade away for a bit until I started the last climb of the day. For much of the afternoon I was caught in a dense cloud of fog, but when I crested Port de Rat, Views cleared up. Port de Rat is a col at 2550 meters on the French - Andorran border, and the views down into Andorra to the East were fantastic. It was cool to have hiked into the third country of the trip, even if it is a micro country. From the col I hiked down into the Ordino ski area, then made my way down to the low point of the day to camp out just before the ski village of El Serrat. Adding Pica d'Estats to the day was a quite big deviation, and a big day, but it was the last 3000 meter peak that I had wanted to climb on the HRP from the start, and it worth it.