Oopsie-daisy

Day 6.

We left Fouly and all I can remember was climbing too much and too high and just wanting to be arrived. Our arriving point was at Champex-Lac, a nice town at 1466m.

Actually, we just descended the whole way. And then we climbed at the very end.

I can just remember bitching and whining the whole trot to the camping site, at the faaaaar end of the town.

We waited for an hour for the camping to open, checked in, installed our tent and went for a swim in the huge lake. It was scorching hot and the water was sooooo COLD. But it still felt good.

We wrote post cards that we sent the same day but which found their way to their addresses a week after. Talk about snail mail.

After that we went to eat at a restaurant and paid way too much for melted cheese and bread (fondue and croûte). Cost too much too. Was yummy tho :)

Sleep came easily afterwards.

Day 7.

We packed the tent and left for Trient.

It was pretty hard, it climbed a lot and it was really really hot.

The trail went through a few small Swiss towns. One which had a small house with it's lawn filled with garden elves. Horrid.

Our trail ended at Trient at 1310m

, in a cosy, very cheap shelter.

Of course, that too was at the very end of the town.

It was perfect with a kitchen, a big wash room and bunk beds.

We left our stuff and went to have ice-cream in a near-by "bar" to congratulate ourselves on our terrible day.

It felt nice to sleep in a room filled with people we had already seen plenty a-time during our tour.

Day 8.

We started to day walking with an israelien group of 4 people.

They were nice, we had met them the very first day at Col du Bonhomme, so we had started chatting along the way.

All I can say about the day that it was scorching hot AGAIN and that I had a bad day that day.

I felt gutted and even more so when we had climbed to Col de Balme at 2191m at taken pictures where we jumped.

I hated seeing myself in them, I felt so ugly and fat. So I was very very gutted, my feet hurt, my knees were fucked and I was insanely tired.

I had a lot of trouble walking that day, I kept crying and bitching and stopping for breath.

I guess I had a panic/angst attack. I couldn't breathe.

And to make things worse, while descending very narrow man-made wooden steps, I finally twisted my left ankle that had tried suicide for a few days now.

My ankle did an "L" with a nice big dull sound.

Tears swelled in my eyes, and I had the scare of my life. Bizarrely, it did not hurt.

I just picked my sniveling self up and kept going. 2 hours to go.

We finally stopped at Argentière, at a nice gite that served really good food at 1380m.

We toured the nearby town a bit but just went to buy a few apples. They were not very good tho...

Day 9.

We had breakfast and left for La Flégère at 1857m. Before arriving, we had climbed Le Lac Blanc at 2352m.

It was really fun because we climbed ladders a bit of the way, it changed for all the boring walking :D And we saw a mountain goat with its baby. Hihih.

Refreshing.

Upon arriving at La Flégère, it was 11.30 am. Early.

I looked at Olivier, who looked at me then looked at the map and looked me again.

I told him that I preferred continuing walking since it was still early. 5 more hours, and we'd have to climb till Le Brévent 2152m.

Easy peasy japaneasy.

It was horrible.

My GOD it was horrible. The sun in our backs, the weight on our shoulders.

We suffered.

When we finally arrived at the shelter we were camping next to, on the road descending to Les Houches, I was over joyed. Not only because we finally STOPPED, but also because we had a magnificent view of the Mont Blanc. Royal.

Dinner was soupe, spaghetti, omelette and apple pie crumble without the pie or the crumble. Just a silly biscuit.

This was our last night on the trip. HEHEEEE!!!

Day 9.

The descent was quite rude.

Very steep and difficult on the already broken knees.

After 2 hours we finally arrived at the town of Les Houches at 908m where we stopped to eat breakfast. Bread, cheese and pastries for later, bought at a boulangerie.

Our trail passed through Le Col de Voza at 1653m to descend to les Contamines-Montjoie at 1164m.

We passed by a mountain slope where we had gone to toast with Olivier's parents on Saturday upon our arrival on the 13th of August.

So we sat down on the exact rock we had sat on 10 days earlier and took a picture of us toasting with our water bottles.

We even called his dad to tell him we had almost finished. First he didn't believe him but once he did, he insisted on talking to me.

He wanted to congratulate me from the bottom of his heart because frankly, he never would've thought I could actually pull through and finish the trail.

....

Umm.. gee, thanks. I guess?

Anyways, we still had a long way to walk so away we fled.

The sun felt hotter than ever on the cloudless sky and walking on a cement road did not help. We raced to every shadow we could see on our trail.

After a looooong climb it descended. And kept going downwards. And just kept going.

GAH.

At 10 hours of walking, I had really had enough.

I was aching all around, my foot was killing me, slashing me with pain at every step and my knees felt like buckling at any second.

I wept. While walking, I wept.

Out of frustration, out of pain, of fatigue, I wept.

For one more hour we walked before arriving at our starting point, Olivier's parents' summer house.

Throw the bag down.

Kick off the shoes.

Collapse on the sofa.

Tear yourself up from the sofa and take a shower.

A long, hot shower.

Tend to your smelly decaying feet.

Rest.

Go eat a huge raclette at the nearest restaurant.

Switch off the alarm, collapse in your bed and SLEEP.

Aaah....

The next day we drove back home, took us 7½ hours, thanks to the traffic jams near Paris.

It was good to be home and to be able to sleep in our spanking brand new huge blue loft bed !!!!

AAAAAAA!!!!!!!!!

The End.

Oopsie - la suite

So. Day 3.

It was supposed to be an easy day. Walking 3-4 hours, sleeping at a camping site and visiting the town of Courmayeur for some notion of a vacation.

We walked +7 hours and were DEAD before arriving to the camping site.

It started out great, walking slowly at my pace, getting excited and weirdly proud of myself because I didn't need to stop to catch my breath and all that crap.

It was a beautiful day and we even took endless pictures trying to catch us jumping in the air with the mountains in our backs. Took us a while and a lot of thigh muscle.After having walked for like 4½ hours, we started to wonder why we hadn't arrived yet.

When we arrived at the small shelter called Maison-Vieille at Col de Chécrouit at 1956m hence on top of a ski cliff, we saw the camping site La Sorgente on the left side and Courmayeur on the right side. There was just a couple of hundred meters altitude in the way.

Climbing down took more than an hour, even tho it was really really steep. And we even got lost before finding the right path down.

And to boot, the camping site was like the one farthest away, at 1510m.

7½ hours in total. I did not stop grumbling.

We were dead. We checked in, took a quick beer, left our bags in the camping site and took the bus to Courmayeur.

Since Olivier had sworn never to step into our tent EVER again - truth be told, he wanted to slice it, burn it, jump on it's ashes and bury it under a huge pile of shite.

So a new tent had

to be bought.

Of course, we set the budget to 100€, no need to get a fancy one, something basic and solid.

There were quite a few shops specialized in mountaineering pass times, but only one that sold tents. So we asked the kind vendor to show us a nice tent that was waterproof, not too heavy and easy to assemble.

230€.

I had to stop his explications to ask him whether he had anything cheaper.

Nope.

I guess my shock, disappointment and puppy dog-pity-me filled stare did the trick because he gave us a 15% discount, lowering the price to 195€.

We still needed to go drink beer before having the courage to hear the ka-ching of his till.

At least we had a spanking new tent. A La Fuma tent. A very very good tent. I made everything easier. Now we have to go camping again, can't leave an expensive piece of tissue to rot away in a corner.

I didn't even get to eat a real Italian gelato. I was so disappointed. Even today I can't stop thinking about it. Sigh.

Day 4.

Weird, I don't even remember what day 4 was like... Wait !

So we had to pass by Courmayeur to start the day. I climbed up reeeeaaalll high, luckily in a forest because the sun was blazing away.

We met the English couple again, actually we had met them the day before at Courmayeur too, it was pleasant :)

They stopped at a shelter called Bonatti I think.. at 2050m. We continued for another 3 hours, first straight, then a steep descent to Lavachey at 1642m and then climbing up to the shelter Elena at 2062m.

Death was not far. I was so broken I had a hard time taking a shower. I ached everywhere.

My knees had already started to ache because of the steep descents and my right foot that has a deformation + a toe that broke in 2 places 2 years ago was decidedly NOT happy with all the stress it was put under.

We ate and went to sleep.

We slept in a big hall of a room filled with bunk beds amidst to some Swiss who managed to wake us all up in the morning. Gah. I showed them tho the next day. I deliberately put more speed into my legs when I saw them approach to gain in distance. HOHOHOHOH.

Yes, I'm not a good loser. Gave me a good reason to give me the right to buy Swiss choco tho once we stopped at one of their too-expensive towns.

Day 5.

I honestly have trouble remembering the route.. I remember there was a fairly long climb, and that's it.

Ah right, that's it.

We entered the Swiss territory, passing by Le Col de Ferret at like 2550m. That was the highest point of our trip.

From that point on, it just went down hill. Just the trail, everything was fine besides :D

It was a really easy day, we walked like 4 hours and I was surprised that it was over for the day when we "suddenly" stopped at the camping site of Les Glaciers at La Fouly at 1660m.

We took the opportunity to go eat at a fancy restaurant (well kinda the only one in that small excuse for a village) and do some "grocery shopping" (a bag of mixed nuts&dried fruit, chocolate and some more chocolate). Olivier was the only one that ate at the restaurant because the restaurant obviously didn't want me to eat.

We ordered and 2 minutes after they came to tell me that they were out of my order.

Ok, I ordered something else, and again they came to tell me that it wasn't possible. So I stared blankly at the nervous young waiter and told him that I guess I wasn't eating then.

Olivier ordered this thing called Croûte Valaisienne, a mix of cheese, meat, fruit and berries. We stared at it in wonder. It cost too much to boot.

See, that's him staring at it.

Back at the camping site, we checked our mails and surfed the internet a bit for the moderate price of 2€/h.

We ate a later dinner of miso soup mixed with rice noodles and coconut milk powder with a side dish of dried sausage. It was reeeaaallly good.

The night was calm and the dreams pleasant.

Oops.

This is me being insanely lazy.

The right moment has never arrived for updating (yeah right, I have plenty of time to sleaze around, playing video games or reading or eating or just being me a doing nothing) but I decided that today was the day !!

I might cut this update in 2 parts, we'll see how much crap I can muster out of my useless memory and write down. I make everything up as I go.

So here we go !

VACATION:

It was great. Couldn't have been better. I've never had so much fun on a vacation ! So relaxing, easy peasy ! Would do it all again in a heartbeat ! Yay for Mont Blanc! A Breeeeeze!

.....

All of that was a LIE.

It was horrible.

I suffered until I was afraid to die.

Then when I continued to suffer, I was getting afraid of not being able to die.

Ok, maybe that's exaggerating it a wee bit. But it was pretty horrid.

The scenery was magnificent tho. It was worth the pain.

Ok, our initial plan was to walk 5-6 hours a day, have only the strict minimum weight (me 8kg, he 12) and enjoy it.

In truth we walked 6-8 hours per day, and carried 14 and 17kgs. Oh and don't forget the water.

Day 1:

It rained a bit. We left, bright and early, being sent off by Olivier's parents, all smiles and bubbling with excitement. I walked 10 meters in my hiking boots - that I HAD walked with on several occasions - and had to stop because they were hurting my right heel too much.

I had to cut up a foam insert to pad up me heel with the help of medical tape.

And off we went.

I kept taking pictures of the mountains because well, I had never seen mountains before arriving to Les Contamines from where we started our tour.

So it rained. And we started climbing this really steep hill. That kept going and going and going.

And finally, it became less steeper. But then it climbed again.

I was out of breath so easily that it was depressing. Olivier just kept on going, it didn't really seem to faze him.

After 6½ hours of climbing, we finally arrived at the shelter house that marked the end of walking for day 1. We started out at 1200 metres and stopped at 2500m. Do the math.

So the first night we ate at the shelter but slept in our tent. The grub was good and there was plenty of it. The night was cold and humid (we slept in the clouds) and our tent sucked ass.

It was too small, too crowded with our bags in it, too cold and too damn non-waterproof. It rained inside the tent.

And Olivier had high altitude sickness which made him have trouble breathing thus making him move around all the time, panic and keep me awake. Poor baby. I did hate him for it tho :D

After a horrible first night, we were glad to wake up and continue our journey. Anything but staying in that tent. The sun rose to light up the valley where we had to descend.

Day 2.

This is the day I cracked and wanted to call it quits.

We had been walking quite some time with the blazing sun in our backs (funny thing really, the sun was ALWAYS behind us. ALWAYS) and climbing down and up the mountain hills.

We had been climbing this one specific road that snaked up as far as the eye could see when I couldn't take it anymore and I started crying.

I felt so weak, so disappointed in myself for not being able to follow at Olivier's pace.

I told him how bad it made me feel to see him run way far in front of me, not stopping to wait, and thinking that this wasn't something we were doing together but completely separately. I guess he understood because he put himself behind me and let me decide the proper pace for me. He kept telling me to slow down, to breathe deep and calm my eager to walk faster.

And it helped.

I no longer needed to stop for a breather every 5 minutes and I was finally finding it fun and pleasant. YAY! I felt happy about doing it with him not next to him.

For the second night, we stayed at the shelter Elizabetta which was on the side of Italy !

We met a nice English couple whom we saw every day after that. It felt nice to be able to say hi and compare the suffering with people going thru the exact same thing.

The night was spent in the same room as everyone else, there was just these looooong wide wooden boards on the side of the walls where everyone slept next to their neighbors. It was funny. What wasn't funny was the big group of Asians on the other side of the room that wouldn't shut up. Or stop opening the balcony door to let the freezing air in. GAH.

And in the morning when THEY woke up, they just switched to lights on when everyone else was still sleeping. I think they were hated by many.

I'll write more when I come back from watching a rugby match.