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Published: September 13th 2007
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The Summit of Mont Blanc 4808m
After climbing since 03:00 in the morning we finally made it at 10:30!! Great feeling to be at the highest point of western Europe Just back from Africa and the Next trip was about to start!!
When traveling in Australia, me and my travelmate, Job, promised each other to climb the mont blanc one day!!
Nice plan but no climbing experience except for a bit of rockclimbing.
A couple months ago we started to get a bit of information about climbing and our conclusion was to let go of the plan......no money for a guide so probably a plan for later!!!
We would start of in Swiss and climb an 'easy'4000 peak!! then go to Chamonix anyways to hike and climb around the Mont 'Blanc (and hopefully meet a guide that could take us up for cheap)
Arriving in Zermatt (CH) to start of hiking for a day to get some good views of the amazing Matterhorn!! Nice day, but at 16:00 o'clock we were back in town, rented some crampons and head of to start hiking up!!
We would climb the Breithorn (4164 meters)
Sleeping the first night in our tent at a nice place 2000m, continuing the next day to the hut at 300o meters we got a lot of rain!! Ofcourse we pitched our tent next to the
hut cause we are cheap bastards!!
Next day was beautiful, first a long hike along the glaciar (under the ski lifts) the last bit we walked a bit slower cause it was quite steep!!
At the summit we got some great views and first part walking down was quite nice over a ridge!!
At the end of the day we found our lovely campspot at 2000m again and had a good feeling of the day!!
Then we drove of to Chamonix......some beautiful mountains around us so it meant good weather.
Got some information about the mountain, bought some hiking poles and got ready to hike around the mont blanc for 5 days........but we just missed the last train up!!!
We thought we were well aclimatized by climbing the Breithorn so we had to find a place to sleep a bit at altitude.....found a nice road up....but din't made it higher than 1600m
Ok next day finally the train up to 2300m, the starting point of the Normal Route of the mont Blanc!! The beautiful weather had changed and we hiked up to Tete Rouge, at 3100 meters.
We looked around to find a good spot in the
sunrise at the mont blanc
Freezing cold, with the wind in our faces....luckily we could take a shelter in the bivouac at 4300 snow and piched our tent!!! No water at the hut so we had to find a stream at the edge of the glacier to get some water!!
Next day it started to snow heavily....got bored of reading and playing games so we went out to practice some rope and resque techniques!! Then another night in the snow!!
At night we both woke up breating heavily....almost no oxigen left in our tent!!
The problem was that our whole tent got covered in snow......so no ventilation was possible.....opened the zipper...and we could breath again!
In the moring we asked again for the weather forcast.....it din't cheer us up.....and we would sleep another night here!!!
Bored of the hut we would climb to the next without our backpack...just to be busy and to aclimatize a bit!! Nice trip and on our way down we could slide down in the snow....great fun!!
After three nights at Tete Rouge we finally went up to Dome the Gouter.....the hut where you start to climb to the summit!!
Almost no sleep, wake up call at 02:00 and at this time breakfast didn't taste nice!!!
We had no hurry to gear up.....didn't want to be the
Mont Blanc at 4600 meters
Almost at the summit, Great views of the mountains covered with snow firt one's climbing up since it snowed to much to see the trail.......
With a rope atatched to eachother we started hiking up...soon we passed some groups until only 2 others were in front of us.......hiking is harder since you have to walk in fresh snow, it was a lot easier when the groups were in front of us!!!
But taking some pictures would work for us and we could walk a bit easier again.
On our way we got a bit of snow but later the wind start to pick up!!
Not the best conditions to walk because it was still dark and freezing!!
We were happy that we could hide in the refuge at 4300 meteres......We spend more than one hour to get warm feet again!!! A lot of people decided to go down but since the other half would continue we wanted to give it a try too!!
The next part was beautiful!! conditions got better cause the sun was shining....slowely we got back the feeling in our toes!! Now we could enjoy it a bit more!!!
The best part was not the summit but about an hour before.....Then I knew we would
make it....it was quite close and conditions seemed great! we left our big pack in the snow and with just some water, a camera and some food we continued to the summit!!!!
We made it, great feeling, nice place with some awesome views but still damn cold....about 10 minutes was enough.....walking back was a lot easier and after a long day hiking about 14 hours straigh we made it back to the train at 2300meters
Dreaming of the shower that would come and our deserved beer and pizza we counted down the 90 minutes that it would take to get back with the train!!
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Joerik
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Wauw!
Wauw thijn! echt weer ongelooflijk jij! de mooiste fotos ooit daar vanuit afrika! echt ongelooflijk. en dan opeens zo impulsief een bergje beklimmen! supervett! ik praat je snel bij over mijn verblijf hier in in BR. maar ga er aar vanuit dat ik elke dag aan het genieten ben! succes met het nieuwe schooljaar! tot snel! groetjes jOEK