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Europe, friends, hiking, travel

A hike in the Alps – Col de Malatra

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A slightly longer and higher hike was planned than that of two weeks before. Also promised were good views of Monte Bianco (Mont Blanc) for most of the day if the weather was good. Eight of us set off for the day out – it started with an hour or so driving up the Aosta Valley to Courmayeur and then turning north-east to the trail-head. The weather was proving sufficiently good to get nice views of Monte Bianco as the highway wound through villages, under and over the autostrada and railway, loosely following the Dora Baltea upstream. Clearly we were getting into popular ski country as large cable-cars and smaller chairlifts stretched up the valley walls and sometimes across the valley.

Off the highway and out of Courmayeur, the road climbed steeply and we were loosely paralleling the French border, which in this part is the watershed of a ridge towering above the valley we were in with some quite impressive peaks. Starting to walk at around half-nine it was at first a little bit near the road to get to a bridge that crossed the river that drained the valley we were to walk up to the pass. I only mention that as the bridge was wooden planks and every time a car crossed it, the sound would reverberate around the valley – I was hearing that annoying bridge quite a lot. The climb began in earnest as we left the road again; with a mixed group the pace was also mixed – so there was frequent stopping to wait, take photos, eat wild blueberries, admire the views and snack.

A very dirty glacier way off in the distance.

Down the valley from which we started – Monte Bianco hiding briefly behind clouds.

The first milestone for the climb was the refugio (a day-hut) at about 1900 m. For some of us, this was the limit of the day’s walking – I couldn’t quite understand being up in such beautiful mountains on a sunny day and wanting to sit at a day-hut waiting for the rest of us to return. I later found out that there was a pretty good bar in the refugio, so that made a bit more sense. Six of carried on, five of us together and the sixth at a steady pace much more suited to her. The valley was quite wide and our climbing would have levelled off quite a bit – if we had taken the correct path up the centre of the valley, not up the (/our) right hand side. It didn’t matter though as it was easy to traverse around to the trail when our mistake was realised.

Traversing near the top of the valley.

Monte Bianco on the left.

Back on the trail, we were onto the steepest climbing of the day as we climbed out of the grassy valley and eventually traversed a rocky scree slope to the pass. Just as we got out of the grass we were passed by two mountain-bikers coming down – not sure how they would go on the descent of what we’d just climbed (I’d have had to walk a fair bit) the rest of the day’s trail looked fantastic and I was slightly envious.

There’s the trail heading up to the pass – which is the narrow gap on the right. There wasn’t a lot of room to have lunch.

I for one started to notice a shortness of breath, plus maybe a little tiredness from the previous thousand metres of climbing, as we went through the last two hundred metres. At the pass, 2925 m, there was a bit of a traffic jam of various groups (some had walked up from the other side) but once one group moved off we had enough room to perch ourselves and tuck in to all the cheese, proscuitto, bread and chocolate that had been hauled up. The view that opened up on the other side of the pass was towards Great St Bernard Pass – but this was obscured by a couple of other peaks in the way.

Various attempts at group photos ensued before we descended.

A fantastic walk up with great views all around in excellent company – the most surreal thing was trying to teach Zuza, a Polish girl studying languages and translation, how to count in Maori while walking in the Italian Alps. As we got off the scree on the way down I was impressed to see Mary still making her way up. We continued down together for a while, but our pace was a bit too much on the steep part – rather we all spread out as I took it pretty slowly too so as not to have sore knees for days to come.

I really wanted a bike as we got back into this valley – the trail was sublime.

We found Eliza and Rachel back at the refugio enjoying the sun and the views. I was hungry again and they had even more proscuitto. Jokingly, I mentioned that a drink a bit stronger than the mountain-side water I’d just filled my bottle with would be nice. When some of the Italian part of our group returned with a bottle of red and glasses, I realised that there was actually a bar – sitting in the sun staring out at the Alps and Monte Bianco drinking wine, playing cards, and probably eating still, was pretty damn good.

We all spread out again on the final descent to the road, before regrouping and heading off for gelato – of course.

bikepacking, bikes, Europe, friends, GPS, travel

A return

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With a big pizza, a beer, a chat to family back home and a good sleep under my belt I awoke Friday morning much happier and, although a possibility, I didn’t even really consider heading out east to tour Italy. Heading back to Les Granges was what I wanted to do, but I first I had a couple of hours before having to check out of my hotel in which I could wander around Ivrea without a bike.

Most famous last century as the headquarters of Olivetti, the thing about the city that intrigued me the most from my brief research was the Battle of the Oranges – the largest food fight in Italy. Throwing oranges (the only figure I could find was a quarter of a million kilograms) sounds rather vicious – and a little nuts, as oranges don’t grow around here and have to be imported from Sicily. Still, for some reason, on the last three days before Lent thousands of people form into various teams and throw oranges at each other.

I missed that, being quite some months after Shrove Tuesday – so took a slightly more dignified walk around town.

The ride back to the Aosta Valley was fairly uneventful. This time I had the wind at my back and I did an even better job of avoiding the highway and taking small paths and roads. For the first part of the day this was on the Via Francigena again – although it could be a bit of fun trying to spot the trailmarkers. This was for two reasons – every so often they’d completely change, and the trail is really for going to Rome, not the other way as I was headed. I met a nice elderly couple fairly well loaded up going towards Rome; from Trieste and Trento (both places I’d hoped to get to, sigh), they are doing the Via Francigena in sections and had come over Great St Bernard Pass the previous week in snowfall. Such encounters are one of the things I’ll miss of touring – but trying to choose off-road routes rather limits them and they are fleeting.

The pictogram of a pilgrim that often was the trailmarker daubed on posts.

Still managing to keep off the highway, with the odd dead-end sending me backtracking, I wanted to get closer to Forte di Bard than I did passing it in the other direction. Little did I know that that would send me up the steepest pitch of road I’ve dragged my bike up on the whole trip. With the sun beating down, those few minutes to struggle forward only a hundred and fifty metres, but at over twenty percent gradient, were some of the hardest earned for quite sometime – possibly since having to push my rig up muddy slopes in the Ardennes. Bard is the smallest commune in all of Aosta Valley, so it didn’t take long to roll down its narrow streets, avoiding those struggling to walk up, back to the river. I thought I deserved lunch and found a bar, a beer and a delicious panini (more of a big toasted bun) filled with salami, cheese and artichoke hearts.

The remaining distance was fairly uneventful – there was the big climb up to Saint Vincent on the highway, more gelato at Saint Vincent and then very familiar mountains coming back into view before the last climb off the valley floor to Les Granges. Generally, I’m probably a bit too predictable – but I must say, it is quite fun completely surprising people. Rather hot and sweaty, I stowed my bike in the garage and wandered back into the house to see who was around. The mixture of surprise, excitement, and moderate amounts of disbelief were more than I was expecting (I’d only been gone about thirty hours) and enough to let me know that I’d definitely made a good choice.

With the fun of surprising people over, it was time to get back to work – making red wine. Apparently I’d missed two big days of harvesting (that was well timed) and everyone was pretty tired. The first stage of red wine production is much quicker and simpler than that of white wine. Of what is harvested, the only thing that doesn’t go in the vat is the stalks. The grapes, skins and pips included, are removed from the stalks by a rotating shaft with paddles attached and then pumped into the vat. There’s a lot less waiting around and the cleaning is easier. Saturday was also another big harvest day with many friends and family turning up again – I got reasonably good at explaining in Italian that I left and then it was no good touring alone, so I returned. People I can hardly hold a conversation with seemed a lot more pleased by this turn of events than I expected – everyone is so friendly here. The lunch crowd was much bigger this time, so a couple of big trestle table were set up and the salamis, cheeses, large rice salads, kilograms of potatoes and large jugs of red wine straight from somewhere in the winery flowed.

Europe, friends, hiking, travel

A hike – Mont Corquet

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With over 2000 km of cycling clocked in the three weeks before, and a 2000 m climb the day before, I thought my legs deserved a rest. However, while they may have got a rest from cycling on Sunday there was a reasonably steep hike involved. When it was mentioned slightly after my arrival that a group was hiking up a peak on the other side of the valley the next day – I could hardly turn down the opportunity to be outside exploring new places with new friends. In fact, the whole situation reminded me of my arrival to live in the Bow Valley – a long valley surrounded by large peaks and then going to climb up one of the peaks almost immediately with many new faces.

What I initially understood to be a departure time of seven o’clock graciously turned into half past eight, so I did manage a good rest beforehand. Before long, five of us were squeezed in what can be most generously described as a classic early-nineties Fiat Panda careening around narrow Italian roads as we dropped to the valley floor, crossed it and then began the tortuous steep climb up to the trail-head through tiny hillside villages.

The walk started at around 1600 m while the morning was still misty and cool. The whole affair was pretty steep, but first followed double-track up through forest, passing small farm-holdings along the way. A cacophony of clanging cow-bells told us we were approaching a herd – accompanied by their herdsman they were slowly being driven down the hill eating as they went. While the herdsman sat mending a bell collar, it was funny to see the varying sizes of bells. The calves had tiny bells, the yearlings slightly bigger and the cows the normal full-size bells.

We stopped to snack, look across the valley and refill bottles from the mountain sourced water fountain.

As we left the double-track and then the trees heading into the alpine the trail became less well defined and quite challenging to find and then negotiate. There were plenty of small wild flowers about, at times the wild thyme filled the mountain air with its distinctive smell. We passed ruined mountain shacks, their slate roofs collapsed while the walls still stand. With two hours of walking behind us we ascended the last and were on the summit plateau – about 2500 m. While it had gotten a little warmer, a lot of the surrounding area was still covered in cloud.

Settling down to picnic lunch of grand amounts of proscuitto and fontina (a cheese of the Aosta Valley – quite famous, protected and delicious), the clouds thwarting our views at various times dispersed so that we could see quite a bit.

The Aosta Valley running centre to bottom left, and the valley I rode down off GSB Pass the day before, above that just right of centre. Mont Blanc is left most peak.

Mont Blanc

The village nearest to where I’m staying, Nus, down on the valley floor.

Admiring the view (Jose’s photo).

With an hour of eating and then lazing in the sun done, we headed down – which is never as enjoyable for me as walking up; but my legs and knees didn’t scream too much. Hiking downhill always seems anti-climatic – I don’t remember much of note of the return to the car. Oh, there were a few stops to pick flowers and leaves – which quite possibly has been what I’ve had in my tea each morning.

Over a slate roof to the Aosta Valley.

Also one of Jose’s photos.

Dinner attendance that night got a big bigger with a cousin and neighbour also around – ten in total. My distinct memory will be of the cousin, Francesco, continually pulling more and more dried meats from a bag and proceeding to cut them all up. First there a big piece of beef hind-quarters – the air-cured type that you see hanging by the dozen at various shops and bars (also Bologna Airport, if I recall correctly). And then scores of sausages of dried meat – although one variety had a fair bit of blood and potato in the mix, so wasn’t quite as dry. With another huge piece of fontina cheese also present, we didn’t lack for food that night (it must be said, the whole time I’ve been here we’ve not lacked for delicious locally-produced food). Also sampled were a couple of bottles of the vineyard’s efforts – very good. After being forced some-what, my protestations weren’t that loud, to have a third piece of walnut cake the locally made spirits came out – mostly grappa with various plants and flavours (liquorice, wild flowers etc.) infused, some liquorice & mint spirit (quite tasty) and some green concoction of horribleness. Thankfully I don’t remember much of that last one.

city, family, friends, hiking, history, roadtrip, travel, UK

Glasgow & Highlands Walking

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The seven hour drive north from London to Glasgow Sunday evening was uneventful; but, considering it was mostly motorway, strangely beautiful in the evening light. Arriving just before one o’clock Monday morning, there was not much else to do apart from briefly say hi to Fi and then sleep.

The purple patch of weather of the weekend in London continued with us and after a late brunch (it’s easy to justify a full Scottish breakfast when it’s noon & it really is breakfast and lunch) Fi took us on a very nice walking tour of Glasgow. Through the university, large sun-soaked parks and down to the side of the Clyde I was impressed and after the little I’ve heard about Glasgow, pleasantly surprised to be so.

On the walk back to Fi’s (recently acquired & nice) flat it was decided by consensus that it was definitely above the threshold temperature for gelato – starting a week of high ice cream consumption. Now that I think of it, that started a fortnight of regular ice cream eating. Adele & I weren’t really sure what Fi had planned for the week, so had packed the car for many eventualities. As the forecast was best earlier in the week, we soon had a chalet booked near Fort William (I tried not to miss having a bike too much) and drove north into the highlands planning a bit of walking the next day. The town itself proved quite a frustrating one in which to find a decent place to eat in the shoulder season; the huge chicken skewers were definitely memorable, but (in an unrelated way) that night started a strange week-long run of extremely broken sleep & I still don’t know why.

Tips Fi had gleaned from others suggested we should take a less trodden and defined route around the back of Ben Nevis and along a shoulder to avoid the easy route up. Some unplanned reconnaissance (we missed the turn for the trailhead) showed a lot of snow still up that way, so I was beginning to have doubts. Even with the detour we were walking shortly after eight o’clock on a beautiful morning with good views up and down the glen and of the surrounding hills. It certainly is a big wide path up to the top of the UK’s highest peak, but there are enough big rocks and steps mixed with switchbacks and, in such weather, good views that it is definitely not boring climbing – I quite enjoyed it, but then I usually much prefer hiking up over hiking down , when I just think of bikes.

It flattened out a lot briefly before we reached the junction in our path. Still undecided about which route, we walked north to check out the more difficult one. Getting under the north face we could see that there was a substantial amounts of snow and wind up further along the route; with none of us really knowing the route or having more suitable equipment, common sense prevailed and we headed back to the main trail. At the junction we met the frontrunners of a large group of Edinburgh bus-drivers out on a charity walk before we started hauling in those walkers we’d already passed earlier on.

We steadily, actually it was pretty quick – Fi sets quite a pace – continued to climb – enjoying the switchbacks that took us away from a strong headwind. For the last few hundred metres of ascent it was a choice of hard packed snow or getting well off route and clambering over the rocks – I found the rocks an easier route for climbing. Unfortunately it clouded over pretty well as we neared the summit and the wind was fierce – we were quite glad we took this route up for our little outing. There were occasional breaks in the cloud to give views around. The most memorable part of the top of the UK was when one of the vanguard of bus-drivers (there were three about the same pace as us) pulled out a full bottle of Scotch, still in its box, and numerous shot glasses and offered us a wee dram. I’m not much of a whisky drinker, but it was pretty good – & possibly Adele’s first, which in the inclement conditions led to surprised comments of the warming qualities of such drinks.

Walking and running down on the snow was much quicker and quite good fun. We sat out of the wind and enjoyed a long lunch while we watched the rest of the (un-fitter) bus-drivers struggle on up – along with a large collection of people in all sorts of strange and, bordering on, unsuitable attire. Just as well the views were good as the trip down was the usual tedium of walking in zig-zags to try and stop my knees hurting for days afterwards – two walking poles between three doesn’t go so well, but my knees seemed to hold up better than expected.

It turned out to be only just over a six-hour outing – that’s including our half-hour detour and half-hour leisurely lunch; so plenty of time for more ice cream in the sun as we gave up on the Information Centre and headed back to the chalet for WiFi to research the next day’s outing. I say that, but after planning the rest of the three week holiday for Adele, I was more than happy to sit in the back seat – literally & figuratively. Pre-dinner drinks on the balcony overlooking Loch Linnhe were followed by a meal that is best remembered for the waitress continually apologising for the meltdown the chef was apparently having – “lucky we didn’t say anything about the dirty knife”.

Wednesday wasn’t quite as sunny in the morning, but that worked well to head to Glenfinnan to see the easily recognised viaduct.  Quite a spectacular setting and we timed it well to see the train from Fort William steam across – if that was the Hogwarts Express, we missed getting on it, so went back to do more muggle oriented activities.

The sound and smell of a steam train is very good indeed

Looking out over Loch Shiel near the Glenfinnan monument

That afternoon we went on a couple of pleasant strolls through various woods & forests that the girls had found somehow. The first was most noteworthy for my legs being destroyed by the notorious Scottish midges (after two weeks the bites have finally almost completely faded) during lunch, rickety bridges over a pond & half the intended trail being closed due to logging. The second walk was through quite pleasant woods with randomly spaced carvings made out of dead tree-stumps, a pond with ducklings, more bluebells (we’d seen many previously) and the picturesque River Spean. More ice creams.

Our drive north continued with a bit of Nessie spotting as we went up the west edge of Loch Ness to Drumnadrochit. We didn’t see Nessie, but it was still quite light and we obviously hadn’t had enough to drink. The local ale at the brew pub was pretty good – Adele even enjoyed her first real ale. The pint was substantially better than the greeting one must assume is only given to locals at the bar – “are you going to order or just sit there making the place ugly?”. Other peculiarities included novelty-onesie clad horse-riders wandering through the bar (horses left in the middle of the car park).

Adele by this stage in this trip had developed a fascination for castles, so that got a bit of a fix Thursday morning as we visited the nearby Urquhart Castle on the shores of Loch Ness. With an interesting role in the Scottish Wars of Independence, it was a good visit – although most of the signs posted gave the impression that they had no idea what different parts of the castle were used for.

Time to head back to Glasgow, we drove the short distance north to Inverness (sights seen included the castle from a distance and a fascinating multi-story car park, before we had lunch sheltering from the rain overlooking Beauly Firth) and then south on the notorious A9. It would have been rude to not break the journey up for Fi (I was still pleased to not be driving) with an ice cream – so a local dairy (in the British, not NZ, sense of the word) was found.

When I discovered Doune Castle was not much of a detour from the fastest route, I just had to go & see where so much of the Grail was filmed.

No large mammals or assorted poultry were thrown over the walls at us, which was most useful

It was almost closing time, so we had a brief wander around to satisfy my curiosity before we continued on towards Fi’s parents’ house for dinner. Looking back that was a rather surreal evening: Cally, the dog, had an injured paw & spent most of the night trying to chew off the dressing to the concern of all; people repeatedly seemed to lock themselves in the bathroom, or not; an endless parade of soft-toys; constant talk of power pylons; the story of two lost fishermen who thought it prudent to wave a red ball at a passing boat to indicate something was wrong; and somehow Jude knew that I’d been instructed to raise my BMI – she seemed determined that I should put on five pounds in the space of two hours, I have not eaten so much in a long time & that’s saying something. I ramble – it was a wonderful evening and a fitting end to a fantastic week in Scotland. I’m a little miffed that I’ve not managed to spend more time in such a beautiful part of the world. Not quite sure I’ll be able to rectify that now, but it would be nice to.