The year our family traveled the world: Chamonix

We reluctantly left the nice weather of the French Riveria at Cote D'Azur and headed past Monaco and into Italy before heading North up to Chamonix. We went through Savona, Turino, Aosta and Courmeyer and into the famous 10km tunnel through Mont Blanc and popped out above Chamonix-Mont Blanc (there is another Chamonix in Paris so this one is really called Chamonix-Mont Blanc although everyone knows it as the "real" Chamonix).

Italy was quite pretty but as with the last time you could see that they weren't quite as fascidious as the French (or the Swiss) when it comes to looking after their homes. They weren't nicely freshly painted and such but we sure enjoyed looking at them nevertheless!

Chamonix hasn't grown much since I was there with my parents on a ski holiday when I was about 14 (36 years ago!) but the buildings have all been refreshed so I didn't recognize much of the town other than the layout of the streets. It is as pretty as ever with the mountains framing it on both sides. We headed to my favorite skiing spot (which had closed 3 days earlier - sniff, sniff) at Argentieres and then hunted around for some accomodations. We had more difficulty with than that we had thought we would as most of the places board up for a few weeks between seasons.

The weather was typically French... sometimes sunny, sometimes cloudy and sometimes rainy. But we did get some good looks at the peaks of the mountains on either side before dark. The next morning, the cloud was right down to the village and it was raining hard. We were hoping to go up the gondola to Aguile du Midi (1000m from the top of Mont Blanc) but the weather didn't seem to be cooperating... but it occurred to me that the view up there might be above the thick black clouds so we went to the tourist information booth where they showed us a web cam of spectacular clear skies so we ransomed the children to pay for the gondola fees and up we went.

Wow! The village is at about 1000 metres (say 3300 feet) and the top of Mont Blanc is at 4804 metres. Our cable car plus the walk up the stairs to the highest observation platform put us at 3842 metres (12,604 feet) above sea level. At 5,000 feet above sea level the atmosphere is only 75|% as thick. At 18,000' it is half. We could notice climbing those stairs!

Aguile-du-Midi is also the starting point of the very famous Vallee Blanche ski run. It winds around the mountain for about 20kms and depending upon the route is high intermediate to advanced expert (and certifiably nuts). The launching point is right at the top of a VERY steep ridge with 60-70 degree slopes on either side if you slipped off. Most people walked down the ridge roped together.

We also saw a couple of guys with parachutes... they skiied a very steep bit (with the chutes behind them) and then launched over a 1000m cliff and floated down to another valley with very steep runs... looked like great fun but man, you'd have to have a real adrenaline addiction to attempt that!

Here are some of our shots from Chamonix... Shawn and Rachel both begged me to take them back in ski season so I hope this won't be our last trip here (and it is very unlikely I can do this in another 36 years!).

Outside Aosta in Italy on our way north

NOT the famous Mont-Blanc tunnel

The gondola that goes up the Italian "back" side of Mont-Blanc from Courmeyer

Courmeyer... I remember having a nice pasta lunch here with Gina, Mom and Dad 36 years ago!

And we're out of the tunnel!

A glacier on Mont-Blanc

The town of Chamonix below

Looking up towards Switzerland and Argentieres

Escargot anyone? He was almost 4" long so about this actual size.

One minute cloudy... the next minute....

Wow!

The main square in Chamonix

They were having a wedding in this little church

I believe this is where we stayed 36 years ago... but at over 200 Euro's a night, it was out of our budget! I remember the roof top swimming pool well!

The Mer-du-Glace (Sea of Ice) Glacier at Argentieres... we spent many days skiing on that (not right there)

The gondola at Argentieres

And the very bottom of the mountain. I skiied over 120,000 vertical feet one day there (which according to Guiness at the time was a new world record.... I had legs of steel then. I'd be lucky to make it down without stopping now!)

So many good memories of that run.

The river flows right through the village... it was at full flood. We had a similar view from our hotel room window. Made for interesting sleeping!

Chamonix at dusk is even prettier

But at dark, you'd miss that!

The next am, at the start of our journey up Mont-Blanc. This is the bottom gondola station for Aguile-du-Midi. Note that I wasn't kidding when I said the cloud deck was right to the ground!

Our trusty steed

And 3000 meters later.... WOW!!!!

Where the gondola comes in....

No shortage of snow here!

The stairway to heaven!

Note how steep those gondola wires are... you go nearly straight up/down.

And down is a LONG way down!

A couple of enterprising skiiers walking down the ridge to start the Vallee Blanche ski run. Once slip and you are off either side of that ridge and its 3000 metres down this side and about 500m down the other. Nerves of steel required!

The paraskiers getting ready to go... I'd love to try that if I knew I could survive the attempt!

As I said, that cable goes nearly straight up (and that's the Vallee Blanche ridge in the background... you walk down that with ski boots on before starting on a more reasonable pitch).

There is the ridge and the "reasonable pitch". Those paraskiers were just a bit to the left of dead centre and skiied/chuted to the LEFT! Then they landed about as far left as you could go in this picture and skiied down that slope!