A cliff path is a route with the climbing engineered out of it. A steel cable runs the length of the rock, anchored every few metres; iron rungs, pegs and ladders fill the blank sections, and where the rock gives nothing at all, a walkway is bolted on instead. You clip a harness lanyard to the cable and walk. If you slip you fall to the next anchor, not to the valley. It gives someone with no climbing skill a day in terrain that would otherwise need a rope, a partner and years of practice. The Alps call these routes *via ferrata* — iron road — and the name travelled with them, but the idea is older and wider than the word.
Two families built them, for reasons that had nothing to do with sport. Italian and Austrian troops fixed cables and ladders across the Dolomites during the First World War to move men through vertical rock, and some of what you climb today is that infrastructure, tunnels and gun positions still in the cliff. On the other side of the world, Taoist pilgrims bolted planks to the granite of Huashan because a temple sat at the far end; the chains are old, the harness is a recent addition. Modern routes are built purely because the wall is there — cable bridges, overhanging ladders, a staircase hanging in free air between two towers.
What varies from route to route is not technique but exposure: how far the drop is beneath your boots, and how long it stays there. Grading systems disagree by country (Italian 1–5, Austrian A–F), so the honest measure is vertical metres and how much of it overhangs. A helmet, a harness and a ferrata set with a shock absorber are not optional — the fall forces on a fixed cable are high enough that an ordinary sling can kill you. Alpine routes are snow-free from roughly late June to September; the cliff paths in warmer countries run most of the year and close for ice.
Where on Earth it's best
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★ Signature spotBrenta Dolomites — Via delle BocchetteItalyThe route that defined the form. The Bocchette traverse cuts horizontal ledges across the faces of the Brenta towers at around 2,700 m — for long stretches you are walking a metre-wide shelf with 500 m of air under the outside edge and a cable at shoulder height. It links mountain huts, so it is done over two or three days rather than an afternoon, and it has almost no vertical ladder work: the drama is entirely in where the path goes.The Brenta group is limestone split into vertical towers, and the ledges are natural. Somebody looked at them in the 1930s and realised you could join them into a path. Late June to late September, once the snow leaves the ledges. Huts open roughly mid-June to mid-September; earlier than that the traverses hold ice. 2
Cortina d’Ampezzo — Ivano DibonaItalyThe First World War front line, left where it was: trenches, tunnels through the ridge and a 27 m suspension bridge across a notch at 2,800 m on the Cristallo massif. The bridge appeared in Cliffhanger; the trenches did not need a film. July to late September. Snow lingers in the north-facing tunnels into early summer. 3
LauterbrunnenBern, SwitzerlandA cliff traverse above the Lauterbrunnen valley with the Eiger, Mönch and Jungfrau lined up in front of you the whole way, plus a Nepalese-style suspension bridge over the Mürrenbach ravine. There is a zip line partway down, but only guided groups may use it. Roughly June to October, depending on snow; the route is closed and stripped in winter.4
Telluride Via FerrataUnited StatesBuilt without permission by a local climber and later legalised, it traverses the cliff at the head of the box canyon with Bridal Veil Falls below. The crux, the "Main Event", is a series of rungs across a blank overhanging wall with 150 m of air underneath. June to October; the canyon holds ice and rockfall outside that. 5
Nelson RocksUnited StatesTwo fins of quartzite standing on end in West Virginia, joined by a 60 m cable bridge 45 m above the gap. The first purpose-built via ferrata in the United States and still the one people fly in for. April to November; closed in ice. 6
Mount KinabaluSabah, MalaysiaThe highest via ferrata on Earth, starting at 3,776 m on the granite of Kinabalu’s summit plateau and dropping down the face after sunrise. You do it having already climbed the mountain. Year-round, but the driest months are February to April. The route runs in the morning only, after the summit push.7
Loen & RomsdalsstigenNorwayFjord ferratas: cable routes that climb straight out of the water up 1,000 m of rock, with the fjord staying directly below you the whole way. Loen has a via ferrata that finishes at the top station of a cable car; Romsdalsstigen in Åndalsnes is the longer, wilder one. June to September. The rock is wet and greasy outside summer. 8
Dachstein — Skywalk & DonnerkogelAustriaThe Donnerkogel route ends with the "Stairway to Heaven" — a 40 m ladder hanging in free air between two towers, with nothing behind it. It is the most photographed forty metres of steel in the Alps. Late June to early October, snow permitting. 9
Sacred Valley — Via Ferrata SkylodgePeruA 400 m cable route up the valley wall above Pachar, with transparent capsules bolted to the cliff at the top. You climb the ferrata to reach your bed and zip-line down in the morning. Dry season, May to September. The rainy months make the rock unsafe. 10
Mount HuaShaanxi, ChinaNot a via ferrata in the alpine sense — a line of wooden planks bolted to a granite face on a Taoist pilgrimage route, with a chain to hold and a harness added in recent decades. It exists because a temple sits at the far end. April to October; the mountain is climbable year-round but the planks ice up in winter.11
Caminito del ReySpainA metre-wide boardwalk pinned to the wall of the Gaitanes gorge, 100 m above the river, on the line of a 1905 service path built for a hydroelectric scheme. The old concrete ledge is still visible below the new deck — collapsed in places, without a handrail, and it is the reason the route spent thirteen years closed and earned its reputation. Open all year, closed on high-wind days and Mondays in winter. March–May and October are the comfortable months; July and August the gorge runs above 35 °C.