Today was another "cheating" day. Due to the fact that the regular refuge at Flegere is closed for renovations this summer we decided to stay in Tres le Champs, which is another good 2 hours walk from there. So we took the bus to Chamonix and two cable cars to La Brevent (~2500m). This way we saved ourselves about 5-6 hours of 1400 meters of ascent. As I said, we cheated 🙈 The cable cars were full of climbers and paragliders. It was a beautiful clear morning with not a cloud in sight. The peak of Mont Blanc was staring at us from across the valley. After making some pictures we started our descent.
Soon after we started we came across three goats. They came very close and seemed to be asking for food. They have very fluffy coats which I guess they need as it gets pretty cold in the mountains, even in summer. Almost immediately after that the path became scrambly and quite exposed. There were two ladders to climb down and a few scary open patches of rock. And a few of my favourite snow patches, which I came to fall half in again. "Not a graceful mountain goat you are" (add Yoda's voice). Eh, there are worse things in life.
It took us just under an hour to reach Plan Praz (~2000m). There were a lot of paragliders taking off from a patch of grass there. It seemed to have been a good day for it, because many of them were catching warm streams of air and rising very high above the valley.
We headed off north towards Flegere. This took a good 2 hours through fairly steep and exposed mountainside terrain. At Flegere serious construction work was going on with cranes and cement trucks. We stopped for lunch and after that descended further to our destination of Tres le Champs. This path was beautiful and ran through a pine forest. At one stage I was in front and a little black snake startled me as it made its way across the path just in front of me. After my immediate shock I quickly managed to get myself together to continue. I think slowly I'm getting over my phobia.
Just before 5pm we arrived in our dorm. We don't have to share the room with anyone else, but it's not really a room that we got, but space under the roof that only fits the two beds that we'll be sleeping on. There isn't even room to stand up straight there. But it's kinda cute (see last photo), and made me think of Harry Potter. Oh yeah, and cold showers this evening. Refreshing 😁
Highlight of the day : having a gorgeous direct view of Mont Blanc this morning from La Brevent 🤩
Lowlight of the day : a very steep and scrambling path just underneath the peak of La Brevent. Made me feel somewhat unsafe.
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