I don’t think that we could have fitted much more into our penultimate day in the valley. We started off with a 350m long route up the slabs at Le Mottets. It’s been a while since Clare and I climbed a long route together and it was great fun swinging leads and getting high up… Read more

Did a few routes at Les Gaillands in the morning as rain was forecast to arrived by midday. We had a few spots, but nothing major materialised.  However, I soon discovered that my body was way too tired to be hauling itself up steep, busy cliffs, so we beat a retreat to a nearby bakery… Read more

In our tired state last night, we had made an unrealistic plan, which only came clear once we’d walked out of the cable car station at Plan Praz. We needed a new objective, so chose to climb the only route left in the area that I’d not done yet. It was frustrating, but sitting at… Read more

I last crossed the enormous Emmoson Dam, on skis during the winter of 2004/5 and have a photo similar to this one in the Office at The Cottage. In the winter shot, I’m sitting on the railings, casually drinking from a thermos flask, with snow covering half the railings. Older and wiser, I had no… Read more

With a showery day forecast and feeling somewhat fatigued after yesterdays endurance event, we drove down the valley to go for a swim in the lake. The rain didn’t look like it was going to materialise, so we decided to take a leisurely trip along the Via Ferrata at Passy. The brochure that we’d seen… Read more

The exit from the ice tunnel top of the Aiguille du Midi station onto the famous snow arete, never fails to impress. This morning at 7am was no exception. Once down on the main glacier, we left the world behind and hiked off across the crevassed plateau, towards the Rock Pyramide of Mt Blanc du… Read more