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Destination: Italy

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The Tour du Mont Blanc: Some Tips I Learned Along the Way

 

At 66, I felt a bit like the father of the hiking community when I hiked around Mont Blanc earlier this fall. But the Tour du Mont Blanc is doable for any reasonably fit hiker, and there were plenty of people on the trail who were older than me.

For total novices like Shelley and me, it’s wise to be proactive about health and safety. Here are some tips I learned along the way:

Good boots, liner socks, slippery powder, and moleskin for tender skin are essential. We kind of became gear geeks — investing in good day bags (Osprey), woolen clothes (socks, underwear, shirts), and great hiking shoes. I was never so thankful for a wool cap in Europe.

 

I was skeptical about a lot of “good ideas,” but two things I eventually appreciated were a daily baggie of trail mix and my metal water bottle. (I complained about its steep $40 price tag…but soon came to recognize it was a great value).

 

I must say, if the weather turned bad and it rained hard, I think much of the trail would become no fun at all. In fact, it would be dangerous. Hiking poles are essential, and even in perfect weather, I would have been worried about a stumble without my own trusty set.

Eat a solid breakfast. The one day we had breakfast with no protein, climbing was tougher.

Put on sunscreen, even if the weather’s bad.

After learning my lesson on other long hikes, I decided to be religious about stretching on the Tour du Mont Blanc from the start. I had a routine of six stretches and spent time throughout the day making sure I didn’t tighten up. Very important!

 

Don’t be a hero. If skin is getting hot, wrap it up. I did the entire TMB hike without a blister — and then just got one on purpose in the last two hours.

 

Good gear, smart and proactive ways to stay healthy, stretching, and taking it easy… it all worked just great.

I’ll be sharing more photos, stories, and tips from Mont Blanc on the Nov. 29 edition of Monday Night Travel. Want to come along? Register now for this fun — and free! — event.

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Taking it Easy on the Tour du Mont Blanc

While the Tour du Mont Blanc is demanding, it’s not a particularly difficult hike. It’s just long, with lots of altitude gain and loss, and always scenic. On my recent trek around the mountain with three friends, it seemed each of us had a weak spot: knees, toes, or lungs. For some, the challenge was the uphill part, and for others (with weak knees), it was going downhill. We just took it easy, with lots of little breaks.

David, Sue, Shelley, and I shared the entire hike on Mont Blanc. But to be free to go our own pace, we generally found it best to hike as couples rather than as a foursome. It’s really important to be able to stop and rest with no concern for what the others want or need. Our mantra was, “We’re here to hike — to enjoy the moment, the trail, the mountains — not to race to the hotel.”

For long climbs, steady, smaller steps are best. The trail could be really rocky, and I can’t imagine doing it without hiking poles. The trail signs were great, and apps made staying on the trail easy: Just follow the blue dot. And I got good use out of a top-quality printed map. (I’d spend time the night before reading up on the hike and familiarizing myself with the trail on the map.)

 

While the weather forecast looked threatening, we hiked six days (in September, during the last week of the season) and, thankfully, had only one hour of rain. Still, each day we’d pack rain gear, and we’d add on and take off layers as we gained and lost altitude. After four days, we had it sorted out, and it occurred to us rank beginners, “We’re getting good at this.”

As we were hiking in a big circle around a big clump of mountains and sleeping in charming towns each night, every day seemed to be up and over a daunting mountain pass. A nightly treat was a stroll under a milky blanket of stars.

 

I’ll be sharing more photos, stories, and tips from Mont Blanc on the Nov. 29 edition of Monday Night Travel. Want to come along? Register now for this fun — and free! — event. 

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The Mont Blanc Esprit de Corps

 

Hiking Europe’s Tour du Mont Blanc was a totally different slice of European culture for me: Coming upon a remote farmhouse-turned-thriving-cafe serving wonderful lunches…flowers and cows (with classic bells) scenically sprinkled throughout…and an esprit de corps where everyone is like family.

 

Our trail went through three countries — France, Italy, and Switzerland — before returning to our starting point in France. This cow is totally Swiss.
One of the delights of the TMB is coming upon an old farmhouse on a mountain alp (or pasture) that, these days, is a thriving little restaurant for hungry and thirsty hikers. Prices are reasonable, service is friendly, the food is great, and the vibe is one of joy.

As nearly everyone hikes in the same direction (counter-clockwise), you become friends with fellow hikers. It seemed like half the people on the trail were from the US, and I met lots of Seattleites.

It was easy to pass long stretches of the hike immersed in deep conversation with people we met along the way.
I enjoyed meeting this fan of my books and TV shows, who was celebrating his 60th birthday by hiking the TMB with his son.

And in the interest of hiking light, lunches were very simple — just a sandwich from the hotel, maybe a carrot, a piece of fruit, and water. But upon reaching the mid-day summit, lunch was a marmot’s banquet. (Speaking of marmots, we saw no wildlife except a couple of mice that had been squished under hiking boots on the trail.)

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The Best Hike of my Life: The Tour du Mont Blanc

Earlier this fall, four of us — total novices at long-distance treks — hiked around Europe’s highest mountain. (On the first day, big birds of prey circled high overhead. My hunch: They were vultures just waiting for one of us to drop.)

The Tour du Mont Blanc is a 100-mile, ten-day hike — but we cheated a bit, hiking the best 60 miles in six days from mountain lodge to mountain lodge, catching local buses through the less exciting parts, and letting a “sherpa service” shuttle our bags each day through France, Italy, and Switzerland, from Chamonix to Chamonix.

The Tour du Mont Blanc is a 160 km (100 mile) circle around Europe’s tallest mountain. We did the most rewarding 100 km (60 miles) connecting the segments with public buses.
I love the sherpa service offered on Mont Blanc: You leave your big bag in the hotel lobby or at your mountain refuge and trust the shuttle bus to pick it up and deliver it safe and sound to your next accommodations. Every day, our bags were waiting happily for us at check-in.
An array of buses and mountain lifts are available to hikers to help them along, as they choose, on the Tour du Mont Blanc. But the season is short, and most of the lifts and buses were shutting down by mid-September.

This was the first time I’d enjoyed a slice of Europe with my girlfriend Shelley, and we were joined by Sue and David from Minnesota. (I’ve worked with David Preston for 20 years at TPT – Twin Cities PBS. In the public television world, he’s considered the “pledge drive guru.”)

It seems everyone hikes the Tour du Mont Blanc in a counter-clockwise direction, starting from the ceremonial start point in the village of Les Houches, just outside Chamonix. And this arch is always good for a happy, pre-blister group shot.

Each day, we’d hike what the trail signs said would be a five-hour hike — that took us six or seven.  Our mantra: “Take our time. This is why we’re here.” Generally, the day would start at a 3,000-foot climb to a pass (or “col”) 8,000 feet above sea level. Each col was a little triumph, with its cairn of rocks arranged in a pile, dramatic weather blowing across, commanding views, and congratulatory selfies.

Part of our pre-trip training was taking steep hikes closer to home. As a typical day’s climb on the TMB is a thousand meters (or roughly 3,000 feet), I’d recommend choosing a practice hike with a 3,000-foot elevation gain so you can use it as a reference point. Ours in Washington State was the Mount Si trail. We even had a term for a 3,000-foot altitude gain: “a Mount Si.”

Every morning on Mont Blanc, we’d do our hard work, generally climbing a 3,000-foot elevation gain. It seemed to last forever…but it didn’t. And reaching the pass (generally around 8,000 feet above sea level) was always a lunchtime celebration.
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Siena: Italy’s Medieval Soul

I believe a regular dose of travel dreaming can be good for the soul. Stow away with me to Siena, Italy, in this excerpt from my book For the Love of Europe, a collection of 100 of my favorite places, people, and stories from a lifetime of European travels. 

Stretched across a Tuscan hill, Siena offers perhaps Italy’s best medieval experience. Courtyards sport flower-decked wells, churches modestly share their art, and alleys dead-end into red-tiled rooftop panoramas. This is a city made for strolling. With its stony skyline and rustic brick lanes tumbling every which way, the town is an architectural time warp, where pedestrians rule and the present feels like the past.  

Today, the self-assured Sienese remember their centuries-old accomplishments with pride. In the 1300s, Siena was one of Europe’s largest cities and a major military force, in a class with Florence, Venice, and Genoa. But weakened by a disastrous plague and conquered by its Florentine rivals, Siena became a backwater — and it’s been one ever since. Siena’s loss became the traveler’s gain as its political and economic irrelevance preserved its Gothic identity.  

This is most notable in Il Campo, where I begin my stroll. At the center of town, this great shell-shaped piazza, featuring a sloped red-brick floor fanning out from the City Hall tower, is designed for people, offering the perfect invitation to loiter. Il Campo immerses you in a world where troubadours stroke guitars, lovers stroke one another’s hair, and bellies become pillows. It gets my vote for the finest piazza in all of Europe.  

Most Italian cities have a church on their main square, but Il Campo gathers Siena’s citizenry around its City Hall with its skyscraping municipal tower. Catching my breath after climbing to the dizzy top of the 100-yard-tall bell tower, I survey the view and think of the statement this campanile made. In Siena, kings and popes took a back seat to the people, as it was all about secular government, civic society, and humanism. 

The public is welcome inside the City Hall where, for seven centuries, instructive frescoes have reminded all of the effects of good and bad government. One fresco shows a utopian republic, blissfully at peace; the other fresco depicts a city in ruins, overrun by greed and tyranny. 

But the Church still has its place. If Il Campo is the heart of Siena, the Duomo is its soul — and my next destination. A few blocks off the main square, sitting atop Siena’s highest point and visible for miles around, this white- and dark-green-striped cathedral is as ornate as Gothic gets. Inside and out, it’s lavished with statues and mosaics. The stony heads of nearly 2,000 years of popes — that’s over 170 so far — ring the interior, peering down from high above on all those who enter. 

Great art, including statues carved by Michelangelo and Bernini, fills the church interior. Nicola Pisano carved the exquisite marble pulpit in 1268. It’s crowded with delicate Gothic storytelling. I get up close to study the scenes from the life of Christ and the Last Judgment. 

Trying to escape the crowds in the cathedral and on the main square, I venture away from the city center. I get lost on purpose in Siena’s intriguing back streets, studded with iron rings for tethering horses and lined with colorful flags. Those flags represent the city’s contrade (neighborhoods), whose fierce loyalties are on vivid display twice each summer during the Palio, a wild bareback horse race that turns Il Campo into a thrilling and people-packed racetrack. 

Wandering further into the far reaches of the city, I’m tempted by Sienese specialties in the shops along the way: gourmet pasta, vintage Chianti, boar prosciutto, and the city’s favorite treat: panforte. 

Panforte is Siena’s claim to caloric fame. This rich, chewy concoction of nuts, honey, and candied fruits impresses even fruitcake haters. Local bakeries claim their recipe dates back to the 13th century. Some even force employees to sign nondisclosure agreements to ensure they won’t reveal the special spice blend that flavors their version of this beloved — and very dense — cake. 

A key to enjoying Siena is to imagine it in its 14th-century heyday while taking advantage of today’s modern scene. After chewing on a chunk of that panforte, I decide to linger here into the evening, after the tour groups have boarded their buses and left town. I duck into a bar for aperitivo (happy hour), which includes a free buffet and now I’m primed and ready to join the passeggiata — an evening stroll. I time my arrival back at Il Campo to savor that beautiful twilight moment when the sky is a rich blue dome, no brighter than the proud Siena towers that seem to hold it high.