Tour de Mont Blanc - Day 7
Day 7 _ Tuesday 16 July
Walk from La Fouly to Champex
15kms 5 Hours Ascent/Descent: 499m/632m (1637 ft / 2073 ft)
Gite Bon Abri - Champex - Switzerland
Walking through the Val Ferret (not up hill now) of patchwork and peaceful forests the green pastures are balm for the body and soul as this is the easiest stage of the TMB. On the way to Champex we walked on some of the quietest (which was meant to be the quietest trails) trails in the Mont Blanc Massif.
● not sure if “quietest” was really real for us as there seemed to be chat the whole way - quiet would have been nice sometimes 🤐.
The village of Les Arlaches, was made up of traditional wooden Swiss Chalets, which seemed to leap from a postcard and was the highlight of the day.
Walking through these villages of Swiss Chalets were so incredible the house looked like they were about to fall down. All lop sided and clearly used for cattle or just houses that weren’t maintain. Flowers garden in the wine press.
While we thought our day walking was easy compared to what we had done, we were very much mistaken when we had to climb up to the end and find the village of Champex in the middle of mountains.
Lunch was on a bench half way up the hill to Champex on a wooden seat looking over the valley. R&R carried on walking and we met them swimming in the lake.
Our overnight stop wasn't by the lakeside town of the glisty village of Champex but 20 mins walk into the forest. However we did have a swim in this very swankey little ski town on the way through.
We made sure we bought our lunch for the next day consisting of tuna, fruit, baguette, salad, and energy bars purchased from the local supermarket. Sometimes it is cheaper just to buy a pre-made baguette/lunch from the hostel 🙃. But I say not as much fun and some of the lunches were pretty bad. We also loved going into the local supermarkets and finding our way around making sense of what was what.
This was an epic stay, very rustic. Our host Zsaba was so kind and obliging. We had our own bedroom which was very simple but worth every penny as the dorms look hideous sleeping side by side with a stranger.
Looks basic but it seemed very luxurious having our own bathroom and bedroom.
Very authentic Gite. Only 50 beds made this gorgeous stay fun and one to remember. We “upgraded” to our own room which we shared our shower with Catherine and Connie. The home cooked food was absolutely delicious.
Our lovely little Gite didn't open for two hours, lucky we had bought beers. Again very much finding the the European day is made up of work hours in the morning close for 2 hours then open until 6. Not sure if these rules should have applied here as we had all been hiking that day and some people had arrived and been waiting for longer that us. We got tipped off about the entry around the back and got in and shower and relax first.
It was like being at school camp and a very well kept fun place to stay and very authentic. The food was so genuine starting with a broth soup, lettuce salad then spinach, potatoes and eeeeggg. They rang a bell (cow bell) and said “help yourself to a bowl of soup”. So funny! The broth was so good for our souls and I'm sure was full of goodness.
Thoughts of the day:
● very cruisy day until the end
● learning about cow bells
● cows are deaf, the bigger the bells the more wealthy the owner
● wees in the bush
● game of two halves cruise down hill then the slog up up
● each day is different
● Switzerland was very much a fav