Day 3 - June 30, 2024 (Italy; Courmayeur to Berthone Refuge, 4.5 km, +800 m)

After a nice hotel breakfast buffet, we walked back to the nearby bus station to meet our group. There was some confusion - a man who was waiting asked me, in French, if I was with Cairn, and I didn't realize that was the name of the local tour group that UTracks (from whom we had purchased the trip) had contracted. But looking over our papers, I figured it out, and we met our fellow travellers, and then finally our guide: Karim and his son Marius (age 10), Florence and her sons Oscar (age 11) and Victor (age 13), our guide Sébastien and his son Xian (age 12). Our guide said that he would repeat all important information for us in English, but we could see that the trip would be an exercise in French immersion, as the other guests were all French-speaking (Karim and his son from Paris, and Florence and her sons from Brussels). 

We walked around the corner where the 3 donkeys were waiting: François, Rhubarb, and Élisa. Our bags were weighed (we came in just under the maximum weight of 7 kg on all 3 - phew!), then put on our lightened backpacks and walked to a farm (with Mark, Karim, and Sébastien leading the donkeys) at the edge of town for a delicious picnic lunch of salad, ham, cheese and bread.

Then we headed uphill! It was not as hard as we had feared, since the donkeys went slowly, with frequent breaks to munch on the surrounding greenery. At the outset, the landscape unexpectedly almost felt like BC - a lush evergreen forest. Although the weather report had been threatening rain, we had mostly sun all day, although it was very humid. There were many other people hiking the route up to the hut; approximately 20,000 people complete the full Tour du Mont Blanc every year. One older man who chatted with us on the way told us that they were staying at the same hut as us that night, but the next night would have to take a bus back down to stay in Courmayeur, as the second hut was fully booked. I was relieved we had been able to leave these logistics to the expertise of our guide.

Eventually we came to the edge of the tree line and our hut for the night - Refuge Berthone. The view from the hut was incredible, and after settling in, Mark and I wandered about, then had a drink on the patio while Miles played with the boys (the bunk beds set-up in the dormitory provided lots of fun). 

Dinner was at 7:30 pm: Penne pasta with delicious tomato sauce, polenta, cranberry beans, sausages in an even more delicious sauce, and a chocolate pudding for desert. Sébastien told us a bit of the history of the small, family-owned refuge, whose founder was a well-known alpinist; there is no road access, so all food supplies are helicoptered in, and it looked like the electricity was all solar (so no recharging phones that night). We got into bed right after dinner, with lights out by 9:15 pm.

Loading the donkeys (François is the dark brown donkey, the other two grey donkeys are Élisa and Rhubarb)

Mark helps lead a donkey through town

Sébastien points out our route on the map

Our half-Tour route

The daily elevation changes

Engineered waterfall steps of a tributary of the Dora Baltea river as it descends to Courmayeur

The boys: Xian, Oscar, Victor, Marius, and Miles

Ascending through the forest

Sébastien leading the donkeys to their overnight pasture at Refuge Berthone

A lizard basking on the warm wood

The first of many bunkbeds

Getting to know Rhubarb

Rolling green hills above the refuge

Flowers on the rocky hillside (Cobweb Houseleek)

View of a glacier across the valley from the refuge






























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