Tuesday 2nd September: Stunning blue skies all day: 0°C for 1hr in morning rising to 18°C in afternoon
Cabane du Moiry to La Sage: 14.5K: 8.15am to 3.00pm: 6hrs 45 mins
More great views at 8am
It's 0°C on leaving Cabane du Moiry
Blue skies and snow on Alps
Great head wall of Glacier du Moiry
Glacier du Moiry with Cabane du Moiry half way up rocks on left
Brief glimpse of Lac de Moiry again
Still trying to warm up
Working hard to get to the top
Ian's great photo of an Ibex
Col du Tsate at 2868 metres
Jan's not there yet still climbing!
Magic views from the Col du Tsate
What a great backdrop
Too good to leave out
Another lunch another view
Val d'Herens on a blue sky day
Another stunning day! Blue skies, snow on the Alps, and not a cloud to be seen. It should be a shorter day of 10k, but this is all relatively speaking now, as even Kev Reynolds is very out with his distances, and it turned out to be 14.5k. Perhaps these guide books were written before GPS. First we had to backtrack down 500 metres from the Cabane du Moiry before climbing the Col du Tsate where we had more magnificent views all around, and saw Ibex prancing through the rocks. Then there was a 1200metre descent into La Sage, making a toe crunching, knee shattering descent of more than 1700 metres!
Breakfast at 7am is simple but at least the tea is hot. It's blue skies in every direction We're packed and ready to leave at 8.15am, all rugged up as we know it's 0°C outside and in the shade. We have to descend 300 metres down the same steep track that we came up yesterday for 3.5k and it's icy slippery. The ground in so frozen we can't poke our trekking poles into anything. I slip backwards several times, landing flat on my back pack. It takes us an hour to descend and my fingers are burning with the cold.
At last we arrive at the sunny car park, cross the glacial stream and head up the other side of the mountain to climb the Col de Tsate. I have to wait 10 minutes until my fingers thaw. There's breathtaking views everywhere as we climb and we can look back to teh Cabane du Moiry perched high on the rocky outcrop over the glacier. It's only a 500 metre ascent as we're already high up but it's rocky shale and very steep. We meet 3 Australians on the way down; we've not encountered too many. Time for a coffee break before the last hour's climb to the top.
On to the Col du Tsate. At least the hard climb warms the body and being in the sun, the temperature jumps to 10°C. Ian takes a great photo of an Ibex balancing on a rock high above, set perfectly against a clear blue sky. We see lots of them prancing over the rocks.
From the top of the Col de Tsate at 2868 metres, the views are just as stunning on the other side looking across to the Alps and down into the Val d'Herens. It's a 1200 metres descent. Going down is easy on the heart but hard on the body. Ian's knees are squealing, my toes are sandpapered. Half way down at 1.30pm, it's time for a lunch break. The views and the day are so perfect that anywhere will do for lunch with a view. Our lunch bread with tomatoes and meat and greens is our favourite, even if it's all 2 days old.
La Sage appears to the right of us, and Arolla, where we're headed tomorrow is up the valley to the left - it should be another short day tomorrow before our 2 very long days to the Cabane du Plafeuri and Mont Fort. We'll see. The Hotel de la Sage has great views across to the Alps, but because we've booked with booking.com. we get a dingy back room. The floor slants uphill so our feet are higher than our head, and the two doorways are only 5 foot 7inches high - I squeeze in by a hair's breadth - but Ian has already bumped his head twice. Time for a shower and do our washing. It's not going to dry in our room, but there's an outside clothes line that will be in the sun all afternoon til 8pm.
The internet doesn't work here. Some hotels advertise Free WiFi and then apologise profusely when it doesn't work. We don't thing some of them ever work. But there is a very sunny lounge with views across to the Alps and it's easy to sit in the sun and blog, and dose until dinner. We have heard rave reviews about the meals here and considering there's no shop in this little village of La Sage, a meal at the hotel is a good option. There's a group of Americans staying here. We know because we heard them.
At 7pm, time to drag in our almost-dry washing, and go for a drink in the dining room before dinner is served. But the beer is warm and the red wine very vinegary - that's not a good start. But they do have a marvellous French chef so we'll reserve our judgement. The dinner arrives and the service is fantastic. The only problem is that the while the food presentation is ten out of ten, the quality is only 4. First course is thick pumpkin soup (a bit gluey), followed by mildly curried pork that's on the tough side, plus rice, ten cents worth of diced apple and twenty cents worth of cucumber and fifty cents worth of diced tomato. Dessert is chestnut slice with creamy ice cream - the nicest course. So Hotel La Sage didn't really live up to expectations, but at least we got our washing done and dried. The restaurant is completely full, mostly with two large groups doing sections of the Walkers High Route.
It's too early to go to bed, the internet doesn't work, we don't need any more to drink, so we sit rugged up in bed and read up on the next few days walks.