Half Tour du Mont Blanc, 2024

Our Mountain Drop-Offs van arrived early in the morning after a final fantastic buffet breakfast at the hotel, and it was interesting to see the drive this time, since we (or at least Mark and I) weren't asleep (Miles dozed off almost immediately, which may have been for the best, as I was worried the winding village roads in the Chamonix valley as we picked up the other passengers would make him carsick). We had enough time in the Geneva airport to do a bit of final souvenir shopping - Miles picked out some Swiss chocolates to bring home for his friends. It was so much nicer to not fly overnight, and we all enjoyed watching movies and tv shows or reading books on the plane. We had a leisurely dinner on our 2-hour Montreal stop-over. Oddly, our luggage didn't make the transfer, but it was delivered to our house the next afternoon. Far better to have it delayed at the end than at the beginning. This trip was judged a success by everyone, and Miles is already angling for us to do...

Breakfast was yogurt, cereal, bread, and jam. Then we had a relatively short, although steep, climb to the Nature Reserve Chalet of Des Aiguilles Rouges . There were interesting, interactive exhibits about the local environment, which everyone enjoyed. It started to rain as we hiked back, but we had our picnic lunch (couscous, sausage, cheese, bread, and apples) under the shelter of the overhanging patio that we'd enjoyed the day before, so we stayed dry. Our taxi arrived to take us from Tour to Chamonix - the driver kindly offered to drop us off right at our hotel when we heard we weren't taking the bus to Courmayeur with the others. We said our good-byes to everyone, then returned to the Hotel Folies Douces, where our suitcase with clean clothing awaited, and our room was ready early. Unfortunately, it continued to be quite rainy, so no chance to take the Aguille du Midi gondola, and the final departure for the Monenvers glacier had already passed at 3:00 pm. But, it gave us ...

The morning was spent going up, up, and up - 900 m, our longest one-day and single stretch ascent, which is like walking up the CN Tower twice in a row! It was steeper and forested at the outset, then more gradual, sunny and hot (25 Celsius), but with a cool breeze. I was lagging behind very slow as we neared the summit of the Col de Balme mountain pass (the border between Switzerland and France), questioning why I had chosen this as my 50th birthday wish, but I made it, and it was worth it.   We picnicked on the grass at the summit, by the border between Switzerland and France, looking back over our path from Switzerland, and the Refuge du Col de Balme hut. There was a steep, snowy hillside that the kids slid down before we departed - Miles regretted not having more time to sled.  Then we crossed the border. The view of Mont Blanc was incredible - it was a dazzling, sunny day. We then had a long descent to Chalet Alpin du Tour , out last stay of the hike. At one point, one of...

Breakfast was yogurt with muesli and toppings, and bread and jam.  We started out going down through the forest. After a couple of hours, we started up, with some fairly steep sections where the donkeys went slowly. It was probably our clearest, sunniest day yet, but not too warm - low 20s, and not humid. We finally stopped for a late lunch on the hillside above Alpage de Bovine, a hut in an area of Valais known for its Hérens cattle, one of the smallest cattle breeds. They all wore traditional cowbells, which created a musical cacophony, especially when two of the females would fight to be "queen" of the herd - the females are known for their aggression.  Our picnic lunch was bread, sausages, carrot and corn salad, and not quite enough of a tasty sheep's cheese. It's remarkable how the same pattern of lunch (bread, cheese, meat, salad) varied each day, particularly the variety of salads. The variety of cheese did not, of course, surprise us - we would need to stay ma...

Breakfast was bread, cheese, homemade jam, yogurt from the gîte's cows, and cereal. We set off on a long, but gentle descent to the village of La Fouly so that Sébastien could restock with groceries for our daily picnics, then further descent through a park with lush forests and rapid rivers and cascades. It is amusing walking with the donkeys, as they are like celebrities - so many hikers would stop to take photos and videos of them (we never saw another group hiking with donkeys on our whole trip). We had lunch at a picnic area playground with a zipline - the boys competed to see who could rebound the farthest. Mark started launching them, which really upped the game. But eventually we had to start hiking again, as today was our longest stretch to cover (although not the steepest elevation changes at least). We continued through a village (I think it was Praz-de-Fort) that had some houses built into and around large boulders that must have been deposited by past glacial action. T...