Agile Trekker: Tour Du Mont Blanc Day 1

Date	Distance	Time	Elevation Gain	Average Moving Time	Year to Date Miles
8/21/2019	8.8	7 hours 10 minutes	1,673' gain, 5,092' descent	1.2 mph	331.5

The Tour du Mont Blanc is a circular route around Mont Blanc, of approximately 110 miles with around 30,000' elevation gain. It can be hiked clockwise or counterclockwise, with counterclockwise being the more common option. Popular starting locations are Chamonix (where we started) and Les Houches, but of course you can start anywhere along the loop. Glen and I used a company, Mont Blanc Treks, to help us organize our hike. Our hike was self-guided, i.e. we went by ourselves, not with a guided group. However, the company booked all of our accommodations - we stay at a different hotel or refugio each night. Booking accommodations can be challenging, so it was a pleasure to let the company do it for us. We also paid for all of our accommodations up front, which means we had to carry very little cash with us. This also was really nice. I've heard horror stories of people who had booked rooms, but showed up late, and lost their rooms. If your accommodations are in the mountains with no other accommodations around, this could be a big problem. We did the hike with 10 days of hiking and a rest day in Courmayeur. I think if I did it again, doing the hike in 11 or 12 days would have been better. There were a couple of back to back long days where I was really tired. The company we used also organized luggage transfer for us, so we didn't have to carry everything we needed on our backs. This was a wise move, considering how hard this hike was for us. If I did it again, I would have trained a lot more! I started training only 1 month before the hike, which was not sufficient!

Today is the big day! We ate breakfast at 7am, and took the gondola to Plan Praz at 8:20 am. We arrived early for the gondola, to get there when it opened. We always tried to start our days as early as possible. Most people waiting for the gondola were climbers, not hikers. You can hike from Chamonix to Plan Praz, but its a steep switchbacked route. Today's mileage was not big, but our inclines and declines were steep. This was pretty much how every day was. The number of miles was never important - it was always about how much elevation gain (or loss!) a day had. At the top of the telepherique (gondola), many people went a different way than us. So it's important not to follow people. Some may have been doing a clockwise route (we were going counter clockwise), or some may have been there for day hikes. Or an alternate route. The Tour Du Mont Blanc has many route options called "variants". So each day, it's important to choose your route and study the details of your route, so you know which signs to follow. The company that did our bookings provided guide sheets - basically instructions for each day, sometimes with a variant option.

At the top of the gondola, we hiked up to Col du Brevent. From there we headed to Brevent. Today we had a metal ladder section. Glen does get vertigo, but we looked at photos ahead of time, and he decided to try them. There is an alternate route you can take if you don't want to do the ladders, but you really need to decide ahead of time, since it's an alternate trail that splits off early. We both did fine. The rungs of the ladders were very cold - he went up them wearing gloves. The hike up to Brevent summit was great - we had really nice views and hiked above the clouds. At the top, I heard a man tell his son to soak it in, because this would probably be the best view he ever saw in his life. This made me want to cry (I swear I always feel like crying in the alps, lol). I so get it. I love the alps - to me they are the most beautiful place in the world. But then I thought, wait, don't limit your son. He's young, he has his whole life ahead of him to adventure! There are many more views in the alps!

From Brevent, it is 5,000 feet downhill. Glen wore a knee brace he bought for the trip. I didn't (which ended up being a mistake). My knees felt fine all day. We passed by the Refuge Bel Lachat. Lots of people stopped to eat there, but we continued on. We aren't fast hikers, and we're out of shape. It took a few days before I felt comfortable knowing if we'd have time to stop at a refugio for something to eat. There was a rocky path most of the way down. Trekking poles are very important to have on this trip, to save your knees on the downhills. We passed by a park on the way down. We went left around Parc Merlet, but I think the official trail goes right around it. We walked down a paved park road. We tried to give directions to some French speakers who were lost. Neither of us speak French. But we must look like we know what we're doing. On the trail, everyone greets each other - we all share a common bond of hiking this trail. In France, we say Bon jour to everyone. When we say merci, people say "you're welcome." They recognize our poor accents and realize we're American most of the time, lol. By the time we got to Les Houches, my muscles were shot and I was low blood sugar from not eating enough. The hotel dinner was not until 6:30 pm. Dinner was always late at night - usually at 7pm. The hotel didn't know we were vegan & vegetarian - which the guide company was supposed to tell them. But it turns out this was the only place which wasn't prepared for us. So they did figure out something to serve us - rice & vegetables, which we had a few times at hotels. On almost all of our nights (except for Chamonix and Courmayeur which are big towns with lots of restaurant options), dinner came with our hotel (half board). The hotels usually had a couple of options, unless you had a special diet where they gave you something else. I took a bath that night, hoping it would help my tight muscles. We thought about going to a grocery store, but the store was closed by the time dinner was over.

Leaving our hotel

Center of Chamonix

Too foggy this morning to see which mountain they are pointing to

Walking uphill to the gondola station

View just below the gondola

Heading up

At the top of the gondola station, we headed to this sign to figure out which path was our route. In general the trail was well marked. I didn't end up practicing any map/compass navigation this trip, though we did need to pull out our maps sometimes to check which way to go.