Tour Du Mont Blanc (TMB), September 2017
Won-Hee and I flew from Vancouver on Sunday, September 3rd on Air Transat flight to London, Gatwick Airport where we arrived approximately 6:30 am, Monday morning, September 4. Waited until a double delay of our EasyJet flight to Geneva which finally left Gatwick at approximately 1:45 pm, and landed in Geneva approximately 4:15 PM Geneva time, checked into our hotel, went to a nearby restaurant for a beer and pizza dinner, had a bit of walk in downtown Geneva, and then crashed.
We hoped to do a walking tour of Geneva on Tuesday morning, September 5, however that was overruled by a bus trip to a French suburb of Geneva to obtain a French telephone sim card and that’s when we discovered that although I had paid the $50 to have my phone unlocked and went through the process, it was not unlocked, such that the card did not work.
As a result, we took the bus back into central Geneva to go to the Apple store where they couldn’t help us, we then went into an electronics store (FNAC) and bought a cheap Android phone in which we slipped the French phone sim card and got our French phone.
This brought us to lunch time, had lunch in downtown Geneva and then caught a cab to go to the station to catch the bus to head to Les Houches, the starting point of our TMB.
The trip to Les Houche was a hybrid bus, then train, trip, the first hour being by bus, the second 45 minutes, after a half hour wait, was by train all the way to Les Houches. The train trip was basically flat except for the last 15 to 20 minutes which was a steep climb up to 1200 meters into the Alps. We arrived in Les Houches at the Hotel du Bois, checked in, had dinner, met a few people who were at least starting on the same schedule as us Wednesday morning September 6, and eventually crashed after essentially 2 and half days of traveling to get from Vancouver to Les Houches.
Day 1, September 6, 2017:
Our first day was from Les Houches to Les Contamines, such that we traveled generally southwest around the western edge of the Mont Blanc massif. However, we started out with a 600 meter elevation ride in the old gondola there, built in 1937, which took us up to an elevation of approximately 1800 meters. That’s where we started our walk, which eventually took us to the top of the Col du Tricot (a « col » is a mountain pass). This was the high point for the day, at approximately 2350 meters.
Just after starting this hike we came to an old cog railroad called the Mont Blanc tramway, which starts at 580 meters elevation and eventually ends at a point called the “Eagles’ Nest” at 2,380 meters.
Another point to add is that one of the highlights of this first section was a suspension bridge over a fairly deep ravine. It was quite “swingy”
After going over the Col du Tricot, we had a quite steep, zig-zag downhill of approximately 500 meters to a very lovely refuge called the refuge de Miage.
These refuges along the TMB are all privately owned, are very well maintained, they have great accommodation and the one we experienced at Mottets at the end of our second day had great food, and even better atmosphere.
We went through the Miage refuge, stopped there for 15 to 20 minutes to have a bit of lunch and rest and continued on our way because we had another climb of about 400 meters up to the Col du Truc, approximately 300 meters up and 35 minutes along the trail. The auberge du Truc was one of the highlights of that day being a wonderful little hostel located in a beautiful mountain meadow. The owners served us a cup of coffee and a glass of Myrtle (myrtille) juice, kind of like blueberry nectar. Following that we had a descent for about an hour down into the town Les Contamines where we arrived around 2:30, stopped at a little restaurant that had a terrace and had a nice cold beer. We then walked to our hotel called La Chemanaz, a very pretty hotel with a nice room, very friendly owners who also served us an excellent dinner. The only problem with this place was it had extremely poor wifi making it very difficult for me to get messages back to the office.
For this day we walked 18.5 kilometers over 5.5 hours, total time including all our stops was 7 hours, our gross ascent was 1,550 meters, including the gondola ride at Les Houches.
Day 2, September 7, 2017:
This was a very long day, 8 ½ hours, where we walked 24 kilometers. We left the hotel in Les Contamines, had a walk of approximately 1 ½ kilometers with a very nice threesome, a father and his two young adult children. In fact the daughter was a lawyer starting her first year of practice in New York.
After a walk of 25 to 30 minutes on flat surface, we arrived at a very sweet little church called Our Lady of the Gorge and stopped there for a 5 minutes look-see. This is where the first climb of our day started heading up over the Col du Bonhomme at 2,330 meter. This was a good 2 ½ hours including some hilly areas, some flat areas, walking up a nice valley on a road with a great surface and areas with cow pastures. However, after the cow pasture, the climb became fairly steep all the way up to the Col du Bonhomme. At approximately 1425 meters we crossed an old roman bridge over a steep chasm. At a little over 2,000 meters we came across a large flock of sheep, with every sheep having a bell, creating quite a symphony. There were a couple of shepherds and about six dogs herding the sheep to different grazing grounds. Following the Col du Bonhomme, there was a bit of descent, maybe a 100 meters where we met a couple of German cyclists who seemed to be carrying their bikes a lot more than riding them. This is where we had lunch for that day.
Approximately a half hour later, we took a sharp left turn and went up another 300 meters where we reached an elevation of 2,665 meters over the Col de Fours following which we had a long descent of approximately 775 meters down to the refuge des Mottets.
A few highlights on the way down was that there was another group of about a dozen people and instead of having transfers of their luggage by vehicle everyday from one hotel to the next, their luggage was being carried by a couple of mules. The guide also drove the mules and was slightly ahead of us at one point where we came to an area where there was a large herd of cows being milked, blocking the road.
What’s interesting about how they milk cows in this part of the world is the cows go into a type of trailer, two of them side by side. It appears there’s room for 6 or 8 cows in the trailer, they get milked and then they go out the front end of the trailer and back into the pasture.
Unfortunately in this case, the cows were on the road, in the way, and there are barriers to direct the cows into the milking trailer. Of course the guide was extremely unhappy because he couldn’t figure out how to get his two mules through this herd of cows. He asked me to go ahead and check it out, in the meantime he tied up his mules, walked around this process and was able to find a way around the milking setup and take an alternate trail to get around the herd of cows.
Of course, Won-Hee was scared stiff going through the herd of cows, however, cows are cows, not very bright, very docile, only interested in eating grass or getting milked, so I lead the way, they parted for us, and along we went.
The refuge de Mottets was extensively refurbished in 2010 and it maintains a wonderful atmosphere, the original farm buildings and new sleeping accommodations include dormitoriea and private rooms while meals are served in the very atmospheric main building.
Won-Hee and I had paid the supplement and we got our own room with ensuite washroom. There were a number of these rooms, I don’t know how many, most of the people slept in the dorms.
Dinner was superb, it was beef stew with a lot of wine and beer available. After dinner, one of the owners brought out an interesting music box, started turning the handle and it played all sorts of French songs. There was one table where there were eight or ten French people sitting, they started to sing along and created a wonderful atmosphere where about 100 people had dined. At one point some of these old Frenchmen started to dance and one of them came along and got Won Hee to dance with him for a while.
The following day we were told that this was the first time that anyone had danced in the dining room following dinner.
This was our longest day, as far as time went, it took us 8 ½ hours to do 24 kilometers. Our total ascent that day was 1650 meters, our net ascent was 1465 meters and our high point was 2,665 meters.
Day 3, September 8, 2017:
This was also a long day but not as grueling as day 2. This was the day we went from the Mottets refuge over the French-Italian border at the top of the Col de la Seigne and headed into the lovely Italian town of Courmayeur.
We left a little earlier that morning because breakfast in the refuge was at 7:00 am, so before 8 am we were already on the trail which started immediately with the ascent of the Col de la Seigne. This ascent took us approximately an hour and half, we rose 635 meters to our high point , which was the border between France and Italy, and then we had a fairly steep downhill on the Italian side.
This was our first sunny day (we did not get rain on days one or two, however this was our first sunny day). Fortunately there was a little bit of haze in the air such that the sun was not extremely strong but this also gave us the opportunity to see the tops of many mountains, including the first time we got to see the summit of Mont Blanc at 4,810 meters, the highest mountain in western Europe. The only higher mountain in Europe is Mount Elbrus in Russia.
On the way down the Italian side, we came to a building called La Casermetta, essentially a small mountaineering museum in a quite modern building. We stopped there for a few minutes and then continued down the mountain where we came to a very flat area which appears to be essentially a swamp but through which a gravel road has been built. This road was approximately 2 kilometers long and as we came to the east end, we had two choices: the first was to continue on a road in a large wide circle that went around some mountains and eventually came into the town of Courmayeur, or we could head up another mountain and go to Courmayeur by the trail over the mountains, and back down the other side.
Fortunately at this point we met a group of about 10 people and the guide told us that the route along the road was shorter but very boring, whereas going over the mountain was maybe an hour longer but much more spectacular. There was a lady from Utah who strongly suggested that we take the route over the mountain, so that’s what we decided to do. The climb up to the summit took us about two hours but it was well worth the time and the effort. There were spectacular views of mountains cirques, abandoned slate houses and of course, as this was a sunny day, the views were spectacular. One feature was signs very similar to the signs we see along the Squamish highway warning cyclist of the danger of falling over the cliff, the main difference here being that the person going over the cliff was not on a bicycle, although going down head first.
Very near the summit we stopped and had our lunch and then found ourselves on a gentle descent for about an hour to a place called Col Chécrouf, the summit of ski slopes just above Courmayeur. At this point there was another one of those great little hostels with a restaurant where we stopped for coffee, and, in my case, orange juice.
We enjoyed a bit of a chat with people from Seattle who apologized for Donald Trump, to which we answered that we were not trading leaders. In this area we also noticed some larches very similar to the Western Larches we see in Manning Park and in the Rockies. Some of them were even starting to turn yellow (larches are deciduous conifers, such that the unwaxed needles turn gold and eventually fall off in the Fall).
The Route down from the Col Chécrouf to Courmayeur, which is at approximately 1225 meters, was somewhat dusty and, in areas, very steep. This took us about an hour and half and we came into the northern suburb, if I can call it, of Courmayeur called Dolonne and found ourselves in very narrow winding streets. Fortunately we were able to get instructions and find signs that led us across the small river to Courmayeur where we arrived at our hotel right near the center of town. The hotel was called the Bouton d’Or, translated, the Golden Button, which is a flower in the area. This was the hotel where we were going to spend two nights as our plan called for Sunday the 10th of September to be a rest day in Courmayeur.
Statistics for this day were 25.7 kilometers, over eight hours, with gross ascent of 1,214 meters, net ascent of approximately 1100 meters and our high point at the Col de la Seigne being 2516 meters elevation.
Going back to our first day, we bumped into a couple from Sedona, Arizona, David and Susan and chatted with them from time to time. They seemed to walk faster than us and got ahead.
On the second day as we walked into the dining room at the la refuge des Mottets here they were and greeted us. Tables at the refuge de Mottets were assigned based on groups and we wound up sitting with David and Susan for dinner.
We happened to be in the same hotel in Courmayeur where we bumped into each other again, and went out for dinner in a restaurant in town.
After two very long days, we called it a day fairly early.
Day 4, September 9, 2017:
This was our day of rest in Courmayeur and we were very happy that we took this day off because it rained all day. Had it been a clear day we would have taken a gondola way up the mountain but that was not possible so we decided to do our laundry and headed out for a 20 minute walk to the local laundromat. This turned out to be a quite interesting experience because of course, there were more people wanting to use the 3 washing machines than there were machines available to, so we had to wait our turn. Fortunately, we didn’t have to wait much more than ten minutes to get a machine but even after that it was still 40 to 45 minutes for the wash. During that period of time we started chatting with 2 couples from Australia, one from North Carolina and we all called it “bonding at the launderette in Courmayeur ». These are people that we exchanged information with and had a great time with for an hour or two in the launderette.
On our way back to our hotel, we walked by a restaurant and as this was our wedding anniversary, this was the restaurant Won-Hee chose for us to have dinner in. We took a chance that David and Susan might want to join us, so I reserved a table for four for seven o’clock and when we got back to the hotel, we confirmed with them that they would be joining us.
Won-Hee and I then walked around town to do a bit of shopping. After about twenty minutes of that, we realized that this was now lunch hour and all the shops were closing until about 3:30. Fortunately, not all the restaurants closed and we found a tiny little crêperie where we had wonderful crêpes for lunch.
Following that we headed back to our hotel room, had a nap and at approximately 3:30-3:45 we headed back to the shopping street where I picked up a t-shirt for myself and one for my son, Alain, and did a little more various window shopping. Once again, headed back to the hotel and at approximately 6:30, met David and Susan in the lobby of our hotel, walked up to this restaurant we had chosen and had an even better meal than the previous night. It also cost us a little less, about 5E less, but it was wonderful dinner.
Day 5, September 10, 2017:
Day 5 turned out to be a bonus weather wise. We were expecting clouds with showers and got up to clear skies. We also started our day with a half hour, 20 kilometer bus ride to an area called Apnourva, is the end of the bus line. From there, about 30 people got off the bus and we all started heading once again northeast, towards our next stop, Champex in Switzerland.
The ascent started very quickly after getting off the bus and we gained a few hundred meters to another refuge where some people would stay overnight, but we simply stopped for a short break and a few photos. From then on, we had to hike up to the Col du Ferret, the border between Italy and Switzerland. This was the coldest moment of our hiking trip to date, with temperatures below 5 degrees for most of the climb up. At the summit it was very windy and the temperature there was 1.8C. It was probably minus 10 – 12 Celsius with the wind chill factor.
Because of the cold weather, the night before it snowed a bit, such that the peaks when we could see them were covered with a dusting of snow, and as we got up above 2000 meters, there was some snow on the ground. There wasn’t really snow on the trail itself, but the trail was quite muddy and slippery for a while.
We went over the pass, crossed the Swiss border and headed down towards another refuge or restaurant where we stopped for lunch at 1 pm.
From there we kept walking down and eventually came to a little town which was the end of the bus line on the Swiss side. Fortunately we were approximately half an hour before the departure of the bus, which was already there and from that point we rode the bus a total of 35 kilometers or so, with a half hour stop after about 15 kilometers, in the town of Osnieres. At that point, although we were getting on the same bus to continue our trip, because of the break, most of us wound up in the little restaurant, some having tea, some having coffee and the real guys drinking beer.
The trip from Osnieres to Champex was on a very winding, rising mountain road with very narrow points where, if we met cars, they would have to pull over for the bus. It had a number of very sharp hairpin turns. Won-Hee kept her eyes closed for most of the trip.
We arrived in the beautiful small lakefront town of Champex approximately 5:00 pm and checked into the hotel Glacier, which has been owned by same family over 100 years. The hotel enjoys lovely views from the terrace and garden.
So today, from a hiking point of view, was fairly short, it was only 14.5 kilometers, we figure 4 to 5 hours with an elevation gain of 910 meters and a maximum point at the very cold Col du Ferret of 2,570 meters.
Coming down the col was a bit treacherous for the first half hour or so because of the snow having caused muddy slippery trails. On this side we met a group of 10 women from Quebec, and of course I had a fair amount of fun chatting them up.
Day 6, September 11, 2017:
Champex to Trient, also in Switzerland
Monday morning September 11, 2017 we wake up to another sunny but very fresh morning in Champex. When Vincent looks out the window at approximately 7:20 am, he sees mist covering the lake.
After packing and breakfast we head out and backtrack first 200 to 300 meters to the lake to take a few photos and then turn west to head up towards Trient. There are two routes to Trient. The official route goes via Alp Bovine, a splendid walk through pine and larch forest interspersed with alpine meadows and wonderful views down the Rhone Valley. Alternatively, the demanding variant goes via the spectacular Fenetre d’Arpette to the Trient valley. Climbing to 2,665 meters, it’s a challenging and exposed route but apparently worth every step.
Being old timers we take the easier, although slightly longer Alp Bovine route which has an advertised ascent of 742 meters and a descent of 900 meters, which should take us 5.5 hours.
We do walk a couple of kilometers in the valley heading west out of Champex and eventually come to a quite narrower trail, which leads to a steep uphill until we get to these alpine meadows that have pine and larch trees. As we get to the 1900 meter elevation we start to find cows along the trail, adding music to the hike. By this time the ascent is very gentle through these alpine meadows and we come a café which is quite busy. Although it is noon, we are not hungry yet, so we decide to simply march on. There are a few more cows along the trail until we reach our summit at 2,057 meters called L’Arjete .
We then start our descent to the Col de la Forclaz at 1,527 meters. We’ve come down 500 meters over approximately an hour and half. Although this is a col, it is really a col for the road as the cars drive up to this point and then back down the other side. At this point, there is a store and a restaurant, it’s about 1:30, we are now hungry, and we sit on the patio outside the restaurant, order tea for Won-Hee, coke for Vincent, have brie and ham that we had bought the previous day, and enjoy our lunch, although by now it’s very windy.
After a break of approximately a half hour, we head towards Trient, which is apparently just a 30 minute walk. It has however become quite cold and clouded over to the point where we fear it might rain, such that we put on our rain jackets, cover our packsacks and start heading down to Trient.
Fortunately we had read in the instructions that we should pay attention for the sharp, right-hand turn off the TMB trail down to Trient, we see it after 10 or 15 minute walk, turn right and then head down the 225 meters or so to Trient. This is a very small town that we can see from above near the Col de la Forclaz. The building that really stands out is the pink church which we see from way above and which we walk by when get in town. After asking directions from a nice old Swiss lady we find our accommodation, another refuge like the one at Mottets. This one is called the Auberge de l’ourse, which appears to be an old convent or hostel which was all renovated five or six years ago according to the lady at the front desk.
It is a place as in Mottets, we had reserved a double room and to our surprise we walk into the largest room we’ve drawn on the whole trip. The drawback is that it does not have an ensuite washroom, although the washrooms are right next door to our room.
We check in at about 2:45, gather our luggage, go up to our room, shower, Vincent goes to the bar and has a beer and chips with Americans from Ashville North Carolina and then we are back in the room for a read and a nap. Dinner is at 7pm.
This day turned out to be about 5.5 hours including our lunch break. We walked 18.5 kilometers, had elevation gain of 923 meters and our maximum elevation today was 2,054 meters. Overall, days four and five have been much easier than days 1 to 3. Next day will be our last day and after a walk of a dozen kilometers or so we will wind up in a town called Argentiere where we are to catch the local shuttle bus to Chamonix, the center of French and indeed Alpine mountaineering, where we will come to the end of our hiking but not the end of our holiday. In fact, we will spending an extra day in Chamonix before heading off to Aix-en-Provence.
Day 7: Wednesday, September 12, 2017, day six of hiking, Trient to Chamonix.
This is a morning when we get up and notice the ground is wet and in fact it is still lightly raining. It is our last day on the TMB.
We pack all our stuff and head down for breakfast, and by 7:45 we are nearly ready to go.
By the time we do step outside the rain has essentially stopped although it is still cloudy and misty.
We head northwest towards the Col de Balme which takes us approximately two hours to reach with an elevation gain of 1025 m. As we approach the summit of the pass at 2,214 meters, there is more and more snow on the ground, the wind is blowing harder and it is getting colder and colder. In fact, when we get to the summit, this is our coldest temperature at 1.1 degrees Celsius, and we suspect that with the wind chill factor is probably more like minus 10 or minus 12. We head over the pass and, with a number of other people, take the wrong trail down which however, is parallel to main trail. We are told about after 15 minutes by two men that we meet going up that it only about “a half hour away”. I ask him what he means by « a half hour » and he indicates that it is approximately a half hour away to the top of the gondola. Consequently for the next half hour or so, Won-Hee and I debate whether we should take the gondola down or walk down the 800 or 900 meters to the level of Argentiere.
In fact, after approximately a half hour, we come to the top of the gondola where there is also a restaurant that serves warm food. We do have some of our own food but we order hot drinks which we have with our lunch. After lunch, we look out and note that there is not much more visibility out there than there was before we reached the restaurant, so we shell out the 28E and take the gondola down.
The gondola ride takes about 15 minutes and shortly after it starts we note that the weather has cleared at that level and several people are hiking down. We keep our resolve and decide that regardless, we have done the right thing. One of the benefits is that we see a shepherd walk by across a ski slope with probably 150 sheep. We get down to the bottom of the gondola and we are at a location called Le Tour. It is the name at the base of the gondola. We notice a crowd of a dozen or so people, ask what they are waiting for and we are told that they are waiting for the bus to go down to Argentiere. As it is still early, approximately 12:30 PM, Won-Hee and I decide to walk along the road for a while, subject to catching the bus at a bus stop down the road.
After we walk approximately a half hour, we come to a sharp left turn where there is a bus stop. It has also started to rain again, so Won-Hee sits in the bus shelter saying that she wants to wait for the bus. I notice two things across the road, an outhouse and a train station. I go first to the outhouse and then walk into the train station, check the schedule and note that in 10 minutes, a train which can take us from this point called Montroc all the way to Chamonix arrives, which means we don’t have to stop in Argentiere where we would either get on a train at that point or switch busses.
We wait our 10 minutes, the train does in fact show up, we shell out a whole 3.80 E for both, sit down in the warm relaxing train and glide all the way down to Chamonix, a 20 minute train ride. We arrive in Chamonix at approximately 1:30, check in at the car rental agency right across from the train station to make sure that our car will be there on Thursday morning, which is confirmed, and then start walking into the pedestrian only part of town all the way to the tourism office. At that point, we are told about the various things that can be done in the Chamonix area, are given directions to our hotel which we literally walked by on the way up to the tourism office, and check out a few gifts for the grandchildren.
We head down to our hotel, check into our room, shower, relax, and then head out to explore the town.
We’ve made arrangements with people we’ve met on the trail to meet in our hotel lobby at 6:45 to go dinner, there appears to be an excellent restaurant across the street from our restaurant, go there and have a wonderful meal of local cuisine.
So, for this day, we have in fact walked and gondola »ed » 13K to the Montroc train station, have gained 1025 meters, our high point was 2214 meters and we arrived in Chamonix where the elevation is about 1050 meters.
Day 8
This is our day in Chamonix and we do two things in particular:
One, we take the gondolas at 8 am (to beat the crowds) to take us up from the base at 1050 meters to the highest point available, L’Aiguille du Midi, at 3,850 meters. At this level, it is minus 2 degrees, but there is also snow and a lot of wind. There is not much visibility, but we’ve decided to take the gondola up because we might never get back to this place in the future. As indicated, despite the fact that there isn’t much visibility, it is quite an adventure. The one thing we note in particular is that we are easily out of breath and a bit spinny. Upon reading the literature posted on the walls, we discover that the oxygen level at this elevation is only 65% of the oxygen level available at sea level. That explains why we are easily out breath and not feeling all that great.
On the way down, we get off the gondola at the mid station at 2200 meters, and do a short hike of approximately a half hour at that elevation. It takes us in particular to a spot 1200 meters above Chamonix and from which we take photos of this wonderful town. We’re back in the valley by 10:30 am.
We walk back to our hotel, shed some clothes, grab some food, and then head off for the Montenvers cog train which will take us up to the Montenvers ice field. The cog train of course is very interesting because it rises very steeply, about 800 meters over a distance of 7 ½ kilometers. That is over 100 meters per kilometer, which is steep, even for hikers, let alone a train. No regular train would be able to rise at that rate, but a cog train is able to do so. Needless to say it is not going very fast, but is definitely going up. The whole ride takes about 20 minutes. When we get to the top at approximately 1900 meters, we then take a gondola down a few hundred meters, then take a total of 488 steps down to the actual glacier that we can walk into.
The most stunning part of all this is that all of this is a north facing glacier, that is, melts much slower than south facing glaciers, but it has lost an immense amount of its mass and length over the last 30 years, even over the last 2 years. There are signs along the stairs as we go down the stairs towards the glacier indicating its level in various years, starting in 1985.
We then ride the cog train back down to the valley, go to our hotel to shower and rest, and at approximately 4:00 pm, walk back out on the town, do a fair amount of window shopping, buy gifts for our children and grandchildren, and have dinner in a great little pizza place.
Tomorrow: Provence, for 2 weeks, where we join my brother Bernard and his charming wife, Lucie, who have flown from Ottawa t spend our 2 weeks in Provence with. Poor them;-)
Vincent and Won-Hee
September, 2017.