From Les Houches to Auberge Le Truc
I'm an early riser. It's a joke among people who know me. I'm the person who leisurely drinks coffee at 07:00 on a weekday. I don't use an alarm clock to wake up. I'm THAT person.
I wake up at 05:30, and continue lounging in bed. On the list this morning: going to the supermarket to get some basic groceries (vegetables, fruit, and because we are in Europe: cheese and sausages), and drinking coffee with a baguette before heading out to the start of the trail. I wander into the town centre, only to find myself cheering for the runners finishing their various UTMBs. It's strangely emotional, as children are joining their moms or dads in the last few meters of the race as the announcer bellows the runner's name and nationality. Crazy people. But then, some people might think that hiking 170 for your 40th birthday is crazy. To each their own.
After months of prep and looking at maps and schedules, I somehow manage to misunderstand the French bus timetable, and I make it to that start point of the trail only after 09:00. I'm a bit stressed. It's a known rule in the Alps that you should head out early in the morning. Rain and thunderstorms are often an afternoon thing, and while it gets dark late, you don't want to be stranded out there alone. Plus, i'm not the kind of person who makes this kind of a mistake. If this is how I start the first day, what does it mean about the rest of the trip (nothing, as it turns out. Absolutely nothing).
I decide to skip the first few hours of ascent by taking the Bellevue cable car up. Smart decision. Cheating, some people might say. To make up for that, I'm taking the more challenging variant. When preparing for this trip I saw it includes a hanging bridge, and i'm a sucker for these.
These signs will be with me for the next 10 days. I take a picture at every junction so I'll have something to compare my own pace with. On those slow first few days, for every 2 to 2:15 hours on a sign, I need to add a whole hour (!) to my own time
The trail starts off easy, with a bunch of people, including myself, looking confused as to what to do about the Mont Blanc Tramway tracks (easy - cross them and take a left). I'm all good - the sun is shining, it's beautiful, i'm not completely by myself but I can forget about the people around me, my backpack sits comfortably on my back.
It doesn't take long to descent down into the hanging bridge. What the photos missed is the water raging below in a massive impressive gorge. And this is the end of the season, I can't imagine what this must be like at the height of the snow melting.
In all my haze I forgot to take a picture of the bridge itself :-(
And then the climb starts. And my body betrays me completely. My feet are just fine. My muscles don't ache. Nothing hurts. But I feel terrible fatigue all over, and I cannot take more than 2-3 steps before I have to stop. It's not a hyperbole. 1, 2, 3 - stop. I want to cry, but I don't have the energy for it. The mountain pass is waiting for me, and i'm so addled with confusion and hurt over what is happening to my body, that I don't even stop to reassess. People pass me, some struggling, some not, looking at me with a questioning look. Or maybe i'm imagining things.
I make it to the mountain pass - Col de Tricot. It's beautiful - lush green, with lots of people having their lunch looking the Miage Glacier. I take a few steps into an open spot and collapse. I take my food out and look at it in disgust. I can't eat, not even the slice of apple pie I bought as a treat at the bakery this morning. Strangely enough, still nothing hurts.
Onwards and downwards, I take a winding road down with no difficulty other than my hatred towards descents, and make a pit stop at Refuge de Miage. I consider staying there for the night, rather than in Les Contamines, but I push on to conquer the next ascent of the day. It's a beautiful hike out of the valley, should be short but it takes me what feels like hours. Finally at 16:00 I arrive at Auberge le Truc, and I decide to stay. The owner is very nice, the dorms have no lights and there's no shower, but I don't care. I stretch my body, finding small comfort in the fact that still nothing actually hurts other than my pride and my mental state. I chat with two lovely young women who are carrying camping equipment. They will each separately walk past me the next day and I will never see them again.
It's beautiful here. Peaceful.
Towards sunset they are bringing in the cows, and the noise from their bells is INSANE. All night long there will be one restless cow who keeps moving, and I wonder if it's the same one, or are they taking turns to keep me awake.
Pro tip: Distances The element that will most impact your progress is ascents and descents, not the distances themselves. That is why signage will always be in hours, rather than KM. You might think that the times on the signs were done by giants. You might think the times are there to mock you. Neither is true. They were measured by people who hike the mountains for a living or as a serious hobby. They are not averagely-fit people, carrying a big backpack and stopping to take pictures. Figure out what the delta is between your speed and the signs, and use it as your base. In the first two days, I would take a photo of each sign, so I will have the numbers as well as the time when I started, and used that to calculate the delta. I started with 1 whole hour for every 2 hours on the sign, and ended the tour with just 30 minutes more for every 2 hours. And if you are one of those people who's speed is aligned with the signs - good for you! I just don't want to know.
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