Argentiere - Le Tour - Col de Balme - L'Arolette - Le Peuty
- Distance: 15km
- Duration: (with breaks): 7h 00min
- Elevation gain/loss: 1000m/975m
Our first morning on the trail was slow. I bet that in a few days we’ll pack as a synchronised machine, but now like complete newbies we had hard time remembering how to (de)assemble the tent and pack all the stuff in the best way. I ended up removing all my things from the backpack and repacking again.
We went to Argentiere last year while hiking Tour du Mont Blanc, so it was a must to come back to the best bakery in the town (if not region) – Le Fourlin Chamoniard. Mind you, this place often has queues and now with Covid-19 restrictions it was even busier due to the limited number of people allowed inside.
We ordered not only great pastries for breakfast, but also got some pain for lunch – Nutella and peanut butter will not go well without a delicious French bread! Did I mention that we had a slow start? 🙂
Once out of Argentiere, we entered a forest and started steadily climbing up. The path was very peaceful as we met only a few people and so we enjoyed the quiet and occasional opening views to the mountains until Le Tour village.
From there you have an option to take the lift almost all the way to Col de Balme (2204m), but we went ahead to a path towards the pass. I’d say that this pass is one of the easier ones to reach on foot: it’s a moderately gradual climb up on a path which is so well maintained, that it feels more like a stroll in the valley than a climb to alpine highs.
I remember last year a storm was approaching the pass when we made it up and so we were greeted by a crazy wind. This year the weather was perfect and on the pass it was… still super windy. I’d say the same kind of windy as in pre-storm conditions… This pass should be renamed to Col de Wind.. Seriously, none of the other passes were as windy as this one. You get the point – it’s windy out there!
As you can imagine we did not linger there too long. After grabbing a soup in Refuge Col de Balme, we headed towards the saddle of L’Arolette. Last year we reached the pass via Refuge Les Grands so this year we wanted to explore the other side and this alternative is supposed to be more interesting than the regular route to La Peuty/Trient.
While I haven’t walked the regular path, I definitely recommend the alternative one. After you reach the saddle, the views are simply amazing – a different mountain range opens up with Emosson dam in the distance (dams in the mountains still impress me), layers of mountains as far as the eye can see and SO quiet.
Almost all the time we had the trail all to ourselves. We met only a few hikers, among them three 70+ year old ladies. Respect, I wanna be like them when I’m 70!
After ~1h going down, the path turned towards the side of Trient and the magnificent Glacier du Trient came into full view. There are quite a few spots where you can comfortably chill with this view straight in front of you and that’s what we did before descending to the valley. And what a decent it was! We were zigzagging on steep forest hills for what felt like ages.
I think we spent a good hour on this crazy path before being almost literally spit to La Peuty, which was our camping place for tonight. It’s a basic camping with a toilet and a sink, so if you want more comfort, you can stay in a nearby Refuge du Peuty.
Just before dinner I noticed that I was missing my sunglasses. After a thorough search I had to conclude that I left them somewhere on top of the hill. Probably I could have gone up to look for them and be back before the sun went down, but no way I was going down that horror zigzag hill again. Little did I know that this was not my last loss…
Day 2 tips
- Keep in mind that La Peuty is basically a few houses with no refreshments, ATM or other facilities, only the refuge has a few facilities to offer. Col de la Forclaz (30-40min) has a small store for essential groceries if you're really in need.
- We had one of the best dinners of this trip in Refuge du Peuty (vegetarian rusti and a burger), which is next to the camping place. If you want to try this awesome dinner we had, come to the refuge before 18:00. After 18:00 they do not serve customers that are not their guests.