My friend, Catalina, arrived yesterday. We had planned to start hiking around Mont-Blanc today. That did not happen. I was not looking healthy; limping, swollen ankle. So we have delayed our departure by a day. We will try tomorrow. I’m already feeling better, but I still get tired easily. Hopefully that will go away.
It is fairly good that we didn’t depart today. It is wet and miserable here. Not ideal for hiking. We have equipment to deal with that, but let’s be honest, it is nicer to hike in good weather.
We hit the ground running yesterday. As soon as she had gotten in, we set out for Chamonix. The hostel had given us a pass for the tourist attractions, so we took the cable car to Aiguille de Midi. This is way up on Mont-Blanc, and if you were so motivated, you could take all the way to Italy. We didn’t go that far, because it was late, but we got to hang out on top of a mountain. Not the highest point in the Mont-Blanc massif, but still two miles up from Chamonix.
Today we didn’t rush either and took an old train, train du Montenvers, up the mountain and visited a glacier, la Mer de Glacé. The rain made it a bit depressing, but it was still nice. There was an ice cave with a bunch of ice furniture. They had a crystal museum that displayed all the crystals that have been found in the area. Which after careful research, seems to consist entirely of Quartz. That was a let down.
The plan tonight is to go to bed early and be ready for the hike tomorrow. We will be cheating a bit and taking a train to a good starting point, and then a cable car up. But after that, we hike.
On a personal note, I am feeling a little more down about my run. I keep thinking what would have happened if I had ignored the helpful people and just walked from there on. I probably could have gotten to the aid station and gotten cooled down, then just a downhill run to the end. But, at the time, I didn’t have the energy to put up a fight. But it is what it is, and you can’t change the past. I don’t think I’ll be doing any more ultras. I’ve done enough of them.
2015-9-1 19:00