Ascent of the Schilthorn

Monday I climbed the Schilthorn, 10,000-something feet, partly for nostalgia (I had done it in 1979 or 1986, can't remember), partly for the view of the Berner Oberland. I took the cable-car from Lauterbrunnen to Murren, from 2,600 to 5,300 feet, then walked the rest of the way, via the PanoramaWeg. It was the most walking/climbing I have done in a while, but entirely worth it. Vicki spent several hours walking the valley.

The night before, alpenglow on the Breithorn

On the trail the next morning, in cow

country; international language for

electrified fence

Alpine flowers in full riot-gear

Lunch-time view from the trail: the three amigos, Eiger,

Monch, and Jungfrau

Another thousand feet, Piz Gloria, the Schilthorn

Setting for an early Bond movie, On Her Majesty's Secret

Service; George Lazenby as Bond, not Indiana Jones' dad

UNESCO-approved view of the three, from Schilthorn,

and the "village" of Murren below

Breithorn from Schilthorn

Famous sign on the razor-edge trail

Justified, too

Big mountains make their own weather: all

afternoon a killer cloud had clung to the north

face of the Eiger

On To Switzerland

After grocery shopping Saturday in Sallanches and a quiet, drizzly, evening at the Aire de la Fontaigne, near Les Houches, we drove on up the Chamonix valley, bidding reluctant farewell to France and the Pays du Mont Blanc. We stopped at the Col du Forclasz, where we spent one of the more memorable evenings on the TMB in 2005. It had been a long day, starting in Champex, Switzerland, involved picking bilberries, stopping at a mountainside cafe for refreshments, a very long walk, marveling at how far Martigny was below us (a very deep canyon it sits in), another mountainside stop at Bovine, Switzerland, for more refreshments, and then, as heavy rain began falling, the stop at the campground at Col du Forclasz. A couple from Burgundy we had been leap-frogging (nyuk-nyuk-nyuk) all through the TMB helped us set up our tent and shared their hot water for our delicious freeze-dried trekker meal. The next morning--3 days' rain were forecast--we followed them and their advice, hopping a train to the French border, then a French train on down the valley, stopping at Les Houches for a motel night, then moving back to Chamonix as our base for drying out, and then continuing the trek. Kindness of strangers. We ran into them again at Praz Plan a couple days later, back on the TMB, and returned the favor, giving them all our water...they were tenting up high, and dry, and we were heading back down. Speak, Memory.

Col du Forclasz; the campground, such as it was, is just

behind the restaurant

Vicki by the TMB signpost at Col du

Forclasz

The old fortress in Martigny; not one of Switzerland's

prettiest towns

We stopped to walk through a Sunday market at Col du

Mosses...

And drove through much charming Swiss countryside

before landing finally at a campground in Lauterbrunnen;

that's the Breithorn behind the camper

Val du Ferret

On Friday (Thursday was a domestic day, another bus ride into Courmayeur), we drove up the Val du Ferret to piece together the bad-weather day we had in 2005 between Rifugio Bertone and Rifugio Bonatti. This I did on the middle corniche, so to speak, from Arvenin to Bonatti, following a 6200 foot contour mostly, and then back down to the valley. The weather was decent, though a bit hazy.

Monte Bianco and the Aiguilles Noire, from Val du Ferret

Closer up of the summit

Italian side of Grandes Jorasses

And its glaciers

Rifugio Walter Bonatti, the best of all the TMB refuges;

Bonatti was a famous Italian climber

Dining room in the Rifugio Bonatti

Table with a view

Back down in the valley, a trout pond

And, in a clear stream by the path, a fugitive trout

After resting up (Vicki hiked the valley, again favoring her knee), we Tunneled back to Chamonix and our spot at the Aire Grepon.

Val Veny

When we did the Tour du Mont Blanc in 2005, we tented near the Rifugio Elisabetta Soldini, just down from the Col du Seigne, the French/Italian border. The Elisabetta lies at the base of three glaciers, the Petit Mont Blanc, the Estellita, and the Lex Blanche, and even during a wild Alpine thunderstorm that night, we could hear the ice calving, the rocks falling. Or so we thought. Then, about midnight, we were attacked by the red fox, first a jab at the foot of the tent, then a terrible rip at the head, and our food bag being pulled away. (Hey, it's not grizzly country). I held on to the food bag, and we suffered the rest of the night with a 3 foot tear in our little tent. We resolved the next morning to head straight into Courmayeur, for repairs and relief. Ultimately, we repaired the tent with "American tape" purchased at the hardware store. But we took the low road into Courmayeur and missed some of the more spectalcular scenery of the higher "official" TMB route. Tuesday I hiked back up nearly to the Elisabetta, then climbed up to the high route, and followed it back to our campground, via the Rifugio Maison Vielle and the Rifugio Monte Bianco.

Looking up the Val Veny toward the Col de Seigne and

France; the Rifugio Elisabetta Soldini is right center

Other people have been here...

Monte Bianco from Val Veny

Looking up to the Innominata Face of Monte Bianco

Glacier Miage, I think

Blue gentians; flowers all around

Miage Glacier and its huge moraine

Monte Bianco and the Aiguille Noire

The Grandes Jorasses through the trees, and

some of the trail

Dining room of the Rifugio Monte Bianco; time for a cold

Birra Moretti

Courmayeur

Courmayeur is sometimes called the "Italian" Chamonix--in many ways, however, we prefer it. It is more compact, less developed, less touristy. The Chamonix valley on the north side of the massif is broader, longer, the slopes less steep. On the south side of the massif, in Italy, there are two valleys, the Val Veny (west) and the Val du Ferret (east), meeting at Courmayeur. The slopes are much steeper, precipices mostly. And, from the Val du Ferret, Mont Blanc looks like the the monarch it is and not merely the super-sized snow hill one sees from Chamonix. Plus, the cuisine in Courmayeur is fontina cheese-based, which is lovely, if possibly not very good for your health, except in moderation, which is ridiculous. The only draw-back we observed is that the retail shops all take a 4 hour lunch break, noon to 4. Seriously.

After negotiating the one-lane mountain road

of Vicki's worst nightmares, we arrived at the

Campeggio Aiguille Noire, where we stayed

3 nights; the Aiguille Noire is sort of the

Italian Aiguille du Midi, except far more

steep and no cable-car; maybe two miles

from Courmayeur

Our camp-site; 15 euros a night

In Courmayeur, the Penzione Venezia, where

we stayed three nights in 2005; after a week

in refuges and the tent, horribly cold and

windy and wet weather, the incident with

the red fox, we thought the Venezia was

paradise; price for a double has increased

from 42 to 50 euros

I have a favorite liquor store in Courmayeur: it is the one

that sells the wine in bottles with little historical vignettes

--dozens of them--the owner avers there is nothing political

going on here; apparently all the FDRs, Trumans,

Wilsons, et al., have sold out; not to worry, however,

plenty of Mussolini, Hitler, Lenin, Stalin, Mao, Che, and

others remain

I wonder what Churchill would have thought of being

displayed with Lenin and Che

We also have a favorite restaurant in Courmayeur, the

Viele Pommier, which features fontina extravaganzas

View from our table, gazing up at the

massif, the Dent du Geant, and the

Grandes Jorasses

First course, for me, the crepes du Monte Bianco (crepes

in fontina cheese, cream, ham); for Vicki, the canneloni

with wonderful red meat sauce; the second (veal, ham,

fontina; frites) and third (myrtille mousse for Vicki,

lemon gelato for me) courses are not pictured because

we were too far into gluttony for photography

On the Piazza del Monte Bianco in

Courmayeur

Breuil/Monte Cervino

When we did the Tour du Mont Blanc (the 110 mile trek around the massif) in 2005, bad weather on the Italian side and some other circumstances prevented us from seeing some of the most remarkable Alpine sights. So we resolved to fix this by returning to beautiful Courmayeur, camping there for a few days, and piecing together what we had missed in 2005.

Alas, emerging from the Tunnel on the Italian side, we missed the Courmayeur/Val Veny/Val du Ferret signs, and continued along on the autostrada, 30k through more tunnels and bridges until the next exit. By that time we had decided to continue on another score of kilometers or so, well into the Val d'Aosta and through Aosta itself, to the Valtouranche, and up, up, up, to its end, the village of Breuil.

In mountainering history Breuil is as storied as Zermatt. It was from Breuil that the earliest attempts on the Matterhorn were made, including, I think, four of Whymper's seven attempts. Breuil sits at the very foot of Monte Cervino--what the Italians call the Matterhorn--and from the town one can examine the difficulties of the routes and appreciate why the mountain is so seldom climbed from the Italian side. On the Swiss side, one parks at Tasch, rides the train to Zermatt, and then is still some distance from the mountain and its relatively easy Hornli Ridge.

For me, it was a bit of a fulfilling experience. We've been to Zermatt two or three times, even climbed most of the Matterhorn, but I never thought I'd see Monte Cervino.

At the motorhome aire in Breuil

One for Roadtrek

The skateboard track, just below the nearly as famous

Dent d'Herens

And golf

Glacier below Dent d'Herens

Orange cat-fight

View from the beautiful little village of

Breuil, now a ski resort

Looking toward the summit

Driving back to Courmayeur, one of the 70 castles in the

Val d'Aosta

Chamonix Miscellany

I spent two days in Chamonix working on the %$#@ "Shurflo" water pump and macerator--some success on the former, none on the latter--and then another day being sick, all of which enabled us to visit the marche once more, and enjoy yet another poulet roti repast. Then we were off to Italy.

"Ye Ice-falls! ye that from the mountain’s brow

Adown enormous ravines slope amain—

Torrents, methinks, that heard a mighty voice,

And stopped at once amid their maddest plunge!

Motionless torrents! silent cataracts!"

--Coleridge,

"Hymn upon Sunrise in the Vale of Chamouni"

Mssr. Paccard, first to climb Mont Blanc,

always seems surprised to be sitting in a

main square in Chamonix

The repast (second)

And then, Sunday, we're off to Italy through the Tunnel

(to be explained)