Haute Route Hiking in the Alps: From Chamonix

Over ten days in early August 2022, we hiked about 95 miles through the Alps, climbing up and over at least one mountain pass every day. The trip was planned by Wilderness Travel, with fourteen hikers, eight of whom were a group of friends linked by our distant past at Rice University in Houston, Texas. Wilderness Travel rated the trip a 5+, and there were days we climbed over 5000 vertical feet, or were out on the trail for nine and a half hours, but it was all worth it for the camaraderie and the views. 

Our first day was a checkout hike from Chamonix up the opposite side of the valley from Mont Blanc, which meant we could return to the our hotel in Chamonix after the hike. The views up and down the valley toward Mont Blanc and surrounding mountains were great. It was warmer than usual, but clear and sunny. 

After less than an hour, we were up out of the trees. We were spread out on the trail, with some sprinting ahead, and others taking their time enjoying the views. 

A short while later, we found out there were steel ladders on this hike. Climbing a ladder focuses the mind a bit.  Don't want to mess up the rest of the trip with a fall on the first day! Only one person in this photo is from our group. The rest are other hikers. This was the busiest hike of the trip, as you could do it as a day trip from Chamonix.  

There were multiple sets of ladders along this stretch of the hike. Notice the woman standing at the very top of the photo, in amongst the trees. 

The rocky valley behind Jennifer is the Mer de Glace, i.e., "the sea of ice." After years of melting, it's more like the sea of boulders. The glacier used to reach down to the valley.  The grinding action of billions of tons of glacier slowly sliding down the valley gouged out the valley down to the bedrock, so nothing grows there, yet.  The white mountain to the right is Dent du Geant (Giant's Tooth). Many, many Alps are named "something tooth."  

The peaks were just visible through the clouds. The glaciers are still thick at the highest altitudes, because they are deepest there, and have the lowest temperatures and the most snow. 

These peaks are part of the Mont Blanc massif, just to the north of it. As the air flows up the sides of the mountains, it cools down and the moisture condenses into clouds.  You can see the tree line in the lower right, where the green plants stop, leaving nothing but rock and ice and snow above.

The crazy thing about this checkout hike was that the soles of my boots started to detach at the toe. After a lot of hand-wringing, and discussion with the guides, I decided I had to buy new boots.  I thought this was a recipe for disaster, but the assured me that, if you get synthetic boots instead of leather, you won't have a break in period and it will be fine. I got the new boots at one of the many hiking equipment shops in Chamonix, and it all turned out fine in the end. 

The next day, we headed out of this valley and over the Col de Balme. A col means a mountain pass in French. This pass would take us over the Swiss border. This path was to the left (north) of the peaks in the photos above.  Here we are rising up out of the valley. The path was very steep for the first hour and a half or so. On the far right side of the photo, you can see a similarly steep path zigzagging up the far side of the valley.  

This is a view of the same Mont Blanc massif from the north, standing not far from where the photo above was taken.  The tree line is even more obvious in the lower left of this one. I guess it should really be called the plant line, flora line, or tree line.  A few plants survive quite a bit above the trees.  

As we neared the Col de Balme, a last look back over the valley below Mont Blanc, with a surprisingly large amount of development near Chamonix.  Again, we had a warmish but clear and sunny day. This was one of the hottest European summers in the last hundred years. The cool mountain air we'd been hoping for was warmer and more humid than usual, but still pleasant. 

The funny thing is, another guy on the trip had his boots fail on his way up this mountain, so he had to run back to town and buy new boots just like I did the night before!  

We had a great lunch stop at the Refuge de Col de Balme.  This was the view to the east from our picnic table. That's Switzerland, as we were practically sitting on the border.  The next couple of hours, we hiked around the bend, and all the way down that valley. 

Here's the view as we headed down the valley toward Forclaz. 

That night, we had dinner on the patio of our little mountain hotel. It was basic, but had good food and showers in the rooms. We appreciated showers in the rooms more and more as the days passed and we got to more basic accommodations deeper in the mountains. After dinner, we watched the sun set on the Triente Glacier. Another glacier that our guides had seen much further down the valley twenty years ago.  

The next day, we would be hiking up that valley to the altitude of the bulk of that glacier, then take a sharp left to cross the Fenetre d'Arpette, a pass with very steep and rough terrain on both sides. My next post is all about that hiking over that "fenetre" (French for "window"). It's called that because it's a narrow opening between two valleys.  

Click here to check out the photos from that hike. 

Click here to see the hike after that, from the Mont Fort mountain hut to the Prafleury mountain hut.

Click here to see our hike past Lac de Dix, over the Pas de Chevres, and into Arolla.