Saturday 5 September 2020
| Distance (km) | 18 kms | |||
| Distance (time) | 6.5 hrs | |||
| Climb / Descent | 1030 / 850m | |||
| Hard / Soft surface | 80% / 20% | |||
| Landscape |
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| Weather |
 26° 2 Bft
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We had a resting day for the recovery of ankles and knees after the descent to Les Houches, but now we will start with renewed energy our next walking day. Especially because the trail seems to be reasonably easy. Relatively easy of course. We park the car at the railway station of St.Gervais-les-Bains-Le Fayet and we take the bus (there is still no train) to Les Houches. The bus driver forgets to let us step out though we pressed the Stop button. Fortunately the bus has to turn here so I can sprint to the front of the bus for the driver to let us out before he takes off again. Today we only have daypacks with some water and food so that should make the walk even easier. We enter the village and walk quite long through the village along the main road. When we finally turn left away from the road we get long stairs steeply up, turning into a gravel road. This is one of the few sections today that is not a road (either gravel or tarmac). And indeed, in Les Crêtes we reach another tarmac road that keep following uphill for a while. Just before La Maison Neuve the path steeply shortcuts a curve in the road and a bit further at the lower station of a skilift the tarmac road ends. We are already on the road for a while so it's time for a snack. We sit on the platform of the skilift while walkers keep going up. From here a steep gravel road goes up to Col Voza. A really steep gravel road. Until the small bar "Ö 1600" the road corkscrews up before finally having some flatter parts. The last part to Col Voza is easier. It feels strange to arrive at a col and see a large hotel and a tramway station. But there are also picknick tables and that means lunch time. While we sit there hikers one after the other keep arriving at the col, about every 30s we see them arrive. That may sound nice but for us it's just too much walkers on the trail. One pair greets us while passing while we're packing to continue and we tell them they can use the table we were sitting. We have a talk starting in French moving into English when we find out she's Mexican from Guadalajara.....so Lupita is not the only Mexican climbing mountains with a back pack. And the conversation now moves into Spanish, why not. We take a few picturs of the tramway that just arrives and decide to start descending. Until Bionnassay it's just a road; first gravel and later tarmac. In Bionnassay we leave the road towards the chapel where we have to go through the fence into a pasture. Here we descend to the river and climb again on the other side. We're happy we are climbing this part and not descending because it\s quite steep with switchbacks and rather slippery as the soil is still wet. But finally we get to the top again at a forest road that slowly descends to Le Champel. From here it is getting less exciting. We descend to La Vilette and then climb again to La Gruvaz. It's seriously warm here without the sligthest wind and so we feel like to little cakes in the oven. After the parking area in La Gruvaz there is a small section of trail to Tresse where we cross both the main road from St.Gervais to Les Contamines as well as the Bon Nant stream. After crossing the bridge we climb again through Le Quy to Les Hoches. From here we follow the river upstream and that climbs more than we expected. We finally leave the GR5 to enter Les Contamines. It's 15:10 and the next bus to St.Gervais won't leave until 17:00 so we have plenty of time for a Panaché and a pancake before finding our way back to the car. |
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Download track HouCon.gpx