Trient to Col des Montets and to Tre le Champ

Day 13 - Trient (1290 meters or 4234 feet) to Col des Montets (1465 meters or 4800 feet) and to Tre le Champ, France : 14.8 km

Trient is picturesque little village with the church as the center point. The area receives plenty of rain – you see moss growing on all roofs.

Starting out we left Trient and walked straight to the end of the neighbor village Le Peuty where the trail and climb started.

We had a long climb and at the top of the pass we reached to Col de Balme (2195 meters or 7200 feet), which is the border between Switzerland and France. 

At the col there is a refuge, Refuge du Col de Balme, where you can get a bite to eat or drink. One nasty old lady was running it, the coffee was lousy and the sandwich hardly had any cheese in it. Later we read that “The Guardian” at the Col de Balme refuge has a reputation of being very grumpy. Nevertheless the views were incredible. 

Farther down the mountain at Col des Posettes there was a restaurant, Alpage de Balme that had great coffee and blueberry pie! There were mountain bikes all over the place. Quite a task to ride a bike up the mountain!

At one place we came upon a guy sitting in a blueberry patch eating as fast as he could pick the berries.

When we reached Col de Montets we learned the bus no longer came that far out of Chamonix. After asking people that wanted to help but had no idea we walked to Tre le Champs and then to Montroc and soon the Chamonix bus came along.

Champex Lac to Trient

Day 12 – Champex Lac (1470 meters or 4822 feet) to Trient (1290 meters or 4234 feet) : 16.76 km

This was a hard day of mountain trail and climbing. 

We started to walk along the lake then on or along the asphalt roads on our way out of town. In the land of the St Bernard the only one we saw was painted on the side of a bus leaving Champex Lac. 

We walked through some pleasant Alpine meadows. Then we started to ascend into the woods. The trail climbs steeply for what we felt like a very long time. Eventually, we finished the climbing and made it to the Alp Bovine. A highlight was the refuge in a dairy farm at the top of one long hill overlooking the valley. 

It was named Refuge and farm Bovine and it lived up to it’s name – cows all around. For some reason they think they need to put a bell on each cow – a big bell with a wide leather collar. The past 3 days we have rarely been where we didn’t hear bong, bong. The cattle breeds are generally different than in the US.

After we left the refuge we had some further ascent with spectacular views and then mostly downhill woodland walk started. 

At one location there was a big block of stone with a good sized tree growing out of it – doubt many roots penetrated that rock. Shortly afterward we saw an old cattle trough made of hollowed out logs.

Finally Trient appeared down below.

As we descended into the village we saw a beautiful pedestrian flyover. People coming down the hill seem to drive a bit like maniacs so it was appreciated.

Just as we arrived at the hotel it began to rain. We had a private room in this hotel/dorm but bathrooms were common. Room was very comfortable and common bathrooms are very clean and spacious. It was a very good stay. (http://www.la-grande-ourse.ch) 

La Fouly to Champex Lac

11 Sept – La Fouly (1600 meters or 5250 feet) to Champex Lac (1470 meters or 4822 feet) : 16.26 km

We bought sandwiches for lunch at the one and only local Super Marche in La Foully – not bad at all.

Today’s trail has mostly gone through woody areas and small farm villages. All day is spent more or less parallel to the road though you are high above it. Nice countryside and forest views. Not too many mountain views today and no passes to cross.

The first section of the trail was almost flat following a wide forest road. Some sections of the trail had a very steep drop off – one photo shows Ferda on part of the trail where a chain was available to hold on to. In dry weather it wasn’t needed but if raining it would have been nice.

Then asphalt narrow winding streets through several tiny, pretty Swiss villages. We sat down on a bench and ate our lunch in one of those. Doesn’t seem like many people work – the owners are either retired or wealthy.

Eventually we came to woodlands and started to ascend modestly. On one section of the trail the local mushroom society had placed information signs around and various mushroom and wildlife figures were carved in tree trunks. Quite a work! It made our hike quite interesting. There is one picture of Ferda petting a carved goat and another of me.

Lac Champex is a beautiful, picturesque little place on a glacial lake and surrounded by forest. 

 We booked a private room in a house through Airbnb. (www.airbnb.com/rooms/13929555). For a small room just big enough for a double bed with shared facilities the charge was 93 Euros. Half board was another 40 Euros each. The food was good but not like that. The view out over the lake was great though. 

One other guest was a French kid (maybe 30) who was going around the mountain in 3 days. He had to make three more stages the next day and try to catch the evening train back to Paris. That is another 45 to 50 km day for him!

We saw one red squirrel today – wildlife is almost non-existent.   

Refuge Bonatti to La Fouly

10 September Refuge Bonatti, Italy (2025 meters or 6644 feet) to La Fouly, Switzerland (1600 meters or 5250 feet) : 20.95 km

After leaving the refuge, we climbed for a while and then the trail headed downward into the valley. Then it climbed steeply from the valley floor continuing to Refuge Elena where we stopped for a break.

Here we had good coffee with a great view. Refuge Elena faces a beautiful glacier across the valley and the moraine walls look like a construction company is working there.

Then we climbed steeply more and more like 2 hours to reach Grand Col du Ferret. (It seems you can always see people on the trail far above you.) Crossing the Grand Col du Ferret (2584 meters or 8478 feet) we passed from Italy into Switzerland.

From the Col it was a fairly gentle descent for an hour or so and we arrived to another refuge and a dairy farm, Alpage de La Peule where we had coffee and snacks.

From there it was a long decent towards La Fouly, on a mixture of paths, tracks and roads. (One road sign showing traffic bumps had been modified for a good laugh.)

In Switzerland everything is much more costly. On top of that they love to allow you to pay in Euros at par – 10% gain for them and they just laugh about it as they know they have a captive audience.

As we reached the hotel the evening thunderstorm started. Hotel Edelweiss was good, food was really good. (http://albergo-edelweiss.it/en/) Our room at the hotel  was OK – Russ had to duck going through the door but it was “only” 100 euros per night per person with half board.