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Climbing, Riding, Sightseeing Midnight on Mont Blanc continue… July 2, 2008

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Bernie pulled on the rope and cursed me for stopping; I plodded on. My feet hurt.

Four days later, the train heaved its way out of the valley towards the end of the Bionnassay Glacier. Through the glass I stared at the pine trees and the brilliant meadow flowers. The carriage filled with the perfume of tourists, up for the day, and the sweat of climbers, rucksacks balanced on their knees, all heading for the Blanc. When the track wound alongside a cliff the small girl sitting opposite looked out in disbelief as the trees gave way to nothing. She pulled her eyes away in fear and looked around the train — the view there was worse, rucksacks, hairy knees, ice-axes, unshaven climbers lost in contemplation of the weather.

We arrived at the top station and the train disgorged. Tourists wandered slowly across to the cafe or to the viewing platform from which they could look up at the great bleak sweep of the mountain opposite. Down the valley the world became more sane, as the stone desert below the glacier gave way to meadows and woodland.

The climbers had no time for niceties. A hundred packs were shouldered and a long queue of people marched purposefully up the track which, like a motorway, led uphill from the station. I looked in horror — was this the beautiful isolation of the mountains about which I had been told for years? Heavy boots crushed the life out of any remaining plants and sent small showers of stones down onto the people below. Walkers jockeyed for position on the network of tracks which zigzagged up the first slope. The hillside crumbled visibly under the onslaught, and I couldn’t help but think of the devastation which has been wrought on British mountains by a similar recreational assaults.

Travel GuidebookBeside the path was a small hut, a shelter for hunters, and standing around it was a group of chamoix waiting, like the sheep on Helvellyn, for the tourists who would photograph and feed them. The climbers pressed on oblivious. Bernie stopped me and pointed forwards. Ahead, a long long way ahead, and at the top of a seemingly vertical rock face, was a silver blob. “The Gautier,” he panted, “about four and a half thousand feet above us. Three and a half thousand vertically from there to the summit.” I nodded and we walked on in the heat as the sun grew higher in the sky. “Mad dogs and Englishmen,” I thought, but I couldn’t see the dogs.

The but appeared to get no closer. We walked and scrambled, gradually passing most of the others who had come up with us on the train. Our chances of getting a sleeping space seemed remote even without the crowds who were following us, and I had no wish to sleep outside on the ground. In the early afternoon we came to the foot of the final climb to the hut. Below us to the right, across the glacier, was another hut, the Tete Sauvage. Someone there was playing a flute and the sound blended beautifully with the superb landscape. Some of the walkers began to go that way, not lured by the Pied Piper, but to spend the night at a lower altitude and to use the Tête Sauvage as the springboard for their attempt on the summit the following morning.

As we climbed upward, the cloud began to close in and I wondered if the following day would be too bad for the attempt — the summit can be swept by winds of 100mph. Bernie had tried this route twice before and each time the weather had forced him back. We passed a rusty iron cross, a memorial to a dead climber, and finally reached the hut, a metal-skinned structure perched on the cliff edge. Already people were staking claims to places on the ground, and when I opened the door I knew why. A waft of hot sweaty air hit me and a pile of rucksacks threatened to follow. I edged my way inside.

Tony and Mick were perched on a bench at the back of the room surveying a sea of humanity. “There are no bunks and no food,” said Mick with a smile. “I’ve booked places on the floor; same price.” The but was mayhem. I wondered how the staff retained their sanity, let alone their obvious good humour. We ate sardines and I scrounged a bowl of coffee. At nine, the floor was swept and people bedded down on tables, on benches, even in the sink. I tried to sleep but only dozed. The room was full of mumbles and curses, scratching, and a restless anticipation of the morning.

At midnight we got up and weaved our way out between the bodies. In one place hands were held up for me to walk on — there was no floor space. Bernie had to go back to get Mike, who had failed to wake up, and his passage was marked by a sequence of incredulous French swearing. We fixed crampons, turned on torches and set off. The path was obvious, a yard deep trench in the snow behind the hut.

But soon we were spread out on the huge slope of the Dome de Gautier.

I plodded up, pausing for a rest at each turn. Snow glittered beneath my feet in the torchlight. Down in the valley the roads looked like lava flows, ribbons of red and orange fire. The sky above was deep black and the stars brilliant; for a moment I felt that I was on a slope between heaven and hell. Far below me a cluster of torches marked the progress of the 1 am starters and beyond them lights around the but showed the next group were getting ready. I carried on upward.

Gradually the pure black of the night lightened and the bulk of the mountain became visible. It daunted me. Mick and Tony were already far ahead; Bernie’s torch was a few hundred yards above and Mike and Sue were just behind. Life became a matter of placing one foot in front of another, of concentrating on moving forward. I remember thinking that this was one of the easiest routes in the Alps and feeling momentarily depressed. But then I knew it didn’t matter —I was doing as much as I was able and enjoying the experience, that’s what really counts.

A lone Japanese climber passed me and we grunted greetings. Bernie held a one-sided conversation with him for an hour before realising that the figure wasn’t me; so much for his opinion of my conversation. The three of us reached the summit close together, shook hands and hugged each other. The summit was ours, the roof of Europe spread out before us, rows of peaks silhouetted against the orange streak of the sky. We pulled on down jackets and sat on our ropes to wait for the dawn.

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Climbing, Riding, Sightseeing Midnight on Mont Blanc continue…

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