With our trusty guidebook in hand, we boarded the bus in Chamonix, France for our first day of hiking. The doors of the bus opened in Argentière, we stepped off and our adventure began. To find the trail the guidebook gave directions from the center of town – we had no idea where that was. It also mentioned we were supposed to pass a post office and office of tourism, of which we could only find one. We found what we thought was the trail. The guidebook said to go forward but the only options were left and right. After an hour of walking in circles, we finally asked a local. He pointed us in the right direction, we took a deep breath, and our first uphill climb started.
As the trail winded up into the woods, we began to contemplate whether we should have brought less camera equipment. Exhausted, we stopped to catch our breath and a man who appeared to be in his eighties whizzed right on past us with ease. So, there we were, lost all morning, out of breath and being outrun by an eighty-year-old man. Determined, we stayed the course and continued on to the next small town.
Le Tour is a sleepy town with only two restaurants and a ski lift. Each house was well-kept and had a vibrant vegetable garden. The trail went through the center of town and winded steeply up the hill following the ski lift. When we got to the top of the ski lift, the halfway point of our climb up, we stopped to eat lunch. We had a baguette with local cheeses and cured meats. So European of us, right?
Mount Blanc towering over Chamonix in the valley
Chalet-Refuge Col de Balme
Church in Trient
Doing laundry in Trient
After hanging our clothes outside to dry, it was dinnertime. We were expecting a self-serve dinner of low quality but
