Title: Summer News in Chamonix
Date: 17/08/2011
I'm half way through a great week of climbing guiding with Roger Birch, who snowboarded Mont Blanc with us in 2010. The plan was to climb the Matterhorn but due to the mixed weather this summer the conditions aren't so good and the mountain is still covered in a lot of snow which makes for tricky climbing and so instead we've been out climbing for the fun of it which is always better in my book!
So far we attempted the Papillons ridge on the Aiguille du Peigne but got stormed off so retreated for some valley sport climbing and a bit of rope work training. @nd day we had rain all day in Chamonix and so headed down the Aosta Valley to the macaby slabs where we climbed a 9 pitch 300m sport route in glorious sunshine!
Yesterday we climbed up to the big ledge below the Dent du Geant, which we were going to climb but it was very busy and so we opted to return to the valley and got up early this morning to climb the Cosmique Arrete on the Aiguille du Midi, which was perfect!
We'll head back up high again tomorrow, either a traverse of the Aiguille d'Entreve or the Midi Plan traverse, either will be good!
Conditions out here have been pretty mixed, lots of bad weather and snow up high, although when it does clear up its so hot that things are drying out and melting fast and so there's quite a lot of rock fall in the mountains this week as the ice melts out and releases blocks and stones.
I've been on top of Mont Blanc a few times already this summer and have 2 more trips to go over the next couple of weeks. I was riding my bike a lot, like everyday, but I'm busy up in the mountains for the next few weeks and so haven't had the energy to get out training this week and fear I'll lose my cycling form a little over the next few weeks, just in time for when I start working with GPM10 again as a cycling guide mid September, great!
I did a couple of regional 'Up Hill only' hill climb cycling races the last few weeks (mainly because there 'are' only hills around here) and kind of did ok finishing mid pack. The Haute Savoie region is one of the strongest in the department of hill climbing, no surprises there considering the terrain and the number of insanely fit people out here and I pretty much got my ass kicked by skinny youths with massive legs most days which gave me the incentive to either train harder, quit or obviously cheat!
In the end I opted to train harder which didn't really make that much difference as I'm guessing they are all also training harder too (unless of course they're all cheating) but I suspect they're just training hard! I started riding with a friend who is very strong and follows a very strict training and dieting program, my training rides equal to his rest day rides but slowly I started to get a little better and to feel stronger, there's no way I'm stopping eating though, there's obviously limits to how far you push this thing!
All in all things are good out here in Chamonix, at least they are when the sun is out and hopefully we'll get a bit of an Indian summer through the Autumn after all this bad weather.
Next winters courses are booking up fast so I'll have to update the course bookings page soon. I'm really looking forward to next season and especially the Splitboarding courses already and the Norway trip which should be amazing! Here's hoping we're going to get the snow this year, although for the most part last winter was great even with the conditions we had, it would be quite nice to not have to go through the MB tunnel to Italy everyday though!
I'm betting on a good one!
All is good!
Neil.
So far we attempted the Papillons ridge on the Aiguille du Peigne but got stormed off so retreated for some valley sport climbing and a bit of rope work training. @nd day we had rain all day in Chamonix and so headed down the Aosta Valley to the macaby slabs where we climbed a 9 pitch 300m sport route in glorious sunshine!
Yesterday we climbed up to the big ledge below the Dent du Geant, which we were going to climb but it was very busy and so we opted to return to the valley and got up early this morning to climb the Cosmique Arrete on the Aiguille du Midi, which was perfect!
We'll head back up high again tomorrow, either a traverse of the Aiguille d'Entreve or the Midi Plan traverse, either will be good!
Conditions out here have been pretty mixed, lots of bad weather and snow up high, although when it does clear up its so hot that things are drying out and melting fast and so there's quite a lot of rock fall in the mountains this week as the ice melts out and releases blocks and stones.
I've been on top of Mont Blanc a few times already this summer and have 2 more trips to go over the next couple of weeks. I was riding my bike a lot, like everyday, but I'm busy up in the mountains for the next few weeks and so haven't had the energy to get out training this week and fear I'll lose my cycling form a little over the next few weeks, just in time for when I start working with GPM10 again as a cycling guide mid September, great!
I did a couple of regional 'Up Hill only' hill climb cycling races the last few weeks (mainly because there 'are' only hills around here) and kind of did ok finishing mid pack. The Haute Savoie region is one of the strongest in the department of hill climbing, no surprises there considering the terrain and the number of insanely fit people out here and I pretty much got my ass kicked by skinny youths with massive legs most days which gave me the incentive to either train harder, quit or obviously cheat!
In the end I opted to train harder which didn't really make that much difference as I'm guessing they are all also training harder too (unless of course they're all cheating) but I suspect they're just training hard! I started riding with a friend who is very strong and follows a very strict training and dieting program, my training rides equal to his rest day rides but slowly I started to get a little better and to feel stronger, there's no way I'm stopping eating though, there's obviously limits to how far you push this thing!
All in all things are good out here in Chamonix, at least they are when the sun is out and hopefully we'll get a bit of an Indian summer through the Autumn after all this bad weather.
Next winters courses are booking up fast so I'll have to update the course bookings page soon. I'm really looking forward to next season and especially the Splitboarding courses already and the Norway trip which should be amazing! Here's hoping we're going to get the snow this year, although for the most part last winter was great even with the conditions we had, it would be quite nice to not have to go through the MB tunnel to Italy everyday though!
I'm betting on a good one!
All is good!
Neil.
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