Tuesday 16th September: Sunny but vary hazy and humid: 15°C to 22°C
Bernex to Thonon-Les-Baines: 32.7k: 9.25am to 6.25pm: 9hrs
10/10 for Hotel Le Cro Bidou
Leaving the Alps behind
Down through pine forests
Across the gorge to Chevenoz
Coffee at bottom of Dranse Gorge
The Dranse Torrent
Lunch on the run
Mor pine forests and gravel trails
Thonon Les Baines down below
Lake Geneva and Jura Mountains
Coffee in the shade at Armoy
My ne best friends
More pine forests
Getting close to Thonon les Baines
On the outskirts of Thonon
Finally at the end/start of the Gr5
Lake Geneva from the enbankment near our hotel
A big big day today. Our furthest yet at almost 33k, with a total ascent and descent of 1920 metres. Mostly through the pine forests with glimpses of Lake Geneva, it was a warmish day as we left the Alps behind and completed a leg of the GR5 from Chamonix to Thonon-Les-Bains on Lake Geneva. We still have 3 days to walk around the lake to Geneva but it will be fairly flat. Today we reached the 600k mark after 29 days, an average of just over 20k per day. It had been planned to do only 15k per day, but some guide books got the distances seriously wrong. Lucky we're young and healthy, says she flaked on the bed!!
Our washing all dried with such a warm night. The WiFi is good, so time to publish my blog for the first time in 3 days. Breakfast is just magnificent. There's everything from fresh bread and croissants to hams and cheeses, meuslies and fruits, homemade jams and yoghurts and hot tea. We'd rate this hotel 10/10 on booking.com. Not totally luxurious, but perfect for us and great value for money at 92Euro including breakfast. We leave like stuffed pigs. We'd eaten so much so late last night we weren't even hungry at breakfast.
It's 9.25am when we leave, knowing we have at least 25k today but thinking it's mostly flat. The early morning is coolish at 15°C but it soon warms up walking through the small villages along mostly secondary roads. At Vinzier, there's a Super U Supermarket. Why eat stale bread when you can buy a French stick for 1 Euro. A few k up the track at Les Clouz, we rejoin the GR% from which we detoured yesterday to find accommodation at Le Cro Bidou that was not on the track. Soon after, we're descending down and down through pine forests into the Gorge of the Dranse Torrent. There's a descent of 500 metres into the gorge along a wide track scattered with small rocks and pebbles that have been strewn there to stabilise the muddy track. It's hard work.
At midday we're at the bottom and see our first walking sign to Thonon - 5hrs 10 minutes - and that doesn't allow for stops. We're in for a long afternoon but it's such a beautiful warm hazy day now, and we have a Hotel booked ahead, so it's very relaxing. Time for a quick coffee and half a small quiche tart Ian bought yesterday. Then up and up. Going up on gravelly roads is easier than coming down so we make good time going up the other side of the Gorge. Through the villages of Bioge and Reyvroz, we ascend 500 metres through old apple orchards, picking the overhanging apples for lunch on the run.
At the top, the track runs along a contour through pine forests, with glimpses of Lake Geneva and the mountains we have left behind. More forest tracks and at the village of Armoy we stop for a quick cup of tea. We've not had lunch today, but we had enough breakfast to last 2 days. Our final descent into Thonon Les Baines is through the Forest of Thonon. These wide trails are well graded and soon we're into the back streets of Thonon-Les Baines, trying to find the little red and white stripes painted on obscure places, which indicate the GR5.
At 6pm we reach the Railway station, the official start/end of the long distance route the GR5 running from Lake Geneva to Nice. Another leg of our journey completed. But we've yet to find our Hotel La Rennovation. 30 minutes later we're there. It's in a great location and our room has views over Lake Geneva - well kinda - if you lean over the balcony. There's even a kitchenette. So we're off to the local Carrefour supermarket to buy a piece of meat to cook. The pork fillet which we love in France, only comes in 1kg packs so we buy a small slice of steak - entrecote, warm beers and a bottle of red wine.
By the time we've had a shower, the beers that we had put in the freezer are cold. The steak cooks in 1 minute on the small induction cooktop, and together with our left over salad, we're ready to celebrate 600k of magnificent trekking.