So the day started at 8am on the bus from Chamonix to Courmayuer where we caught a connection to Val Veny. We hoped to climb the Tournette. It would be my first time summiting Mont Blanc and Ash's third alpine route and first time above 4000m.
Now, us being us, we got off the bus way too early. Ended up walking a good few extra km with an extra 300m of elevation to do! But the walk in is nice and pretty.
We got to Lac du Miage pretty soon. The place is stunning, even if the water is very low.
From the Lac du Miage its a good few km of boulder hopping along the Miage Glacier up to the Mont Blanc glacier.
We soon realised that it would be quicker to go on the right hand side of the glacier, which was a bit more straightforward with large patches of snow. But it is more exposed to rockfall.
All the way to the route there are little bits of plane wreckage from the 1950 plane crash at the top of the tournette spur.
Once at the foot of the Mont Blanc glacier you're immediately met by some quite serious climbing. 80/90 degree ice for several pitches. This is only the first two pitches.
We couldn't see a way to traverse left to the grass couloir and the rocky ridge, so we carried on up the Mont Blanc glacier to the snowy couloir. Don't think you're nearly there. This couloir gains 1000m of elevation before you double back on a rocky ridge to gain the hut.
We woke up early the next day to very high winds and decided we'd try to wait the winds out for a day before we carried on.
We spent the day checking out the route forward.
As well as what looks like it may be a new hut being built next to the Quinto Sella.
And we were marmot watching! Right outside the hut.
After two hours sleep, we set off at 11pm to head for the route. The approach consists of some very steep, bullet hard glacier ice. You have to stick to the left where it's less steep, but stick to the left too far and you'll end up climbing a couloir then on a rocky ridge climbing about 300m higher than you need to, which you then need to descend again. Easy mistake to make in the dark.
This didn't help our speed.
The route goes up a heavily crevassed glacier with some interesting climbing and a lovely mixed pitch about scottish 4. Then you're on the route proper. We started climbing the snow slopes and making good time, but about 11am the snow turned to slush. We traversed left onto the furthest rocky ridge at about the limit of the photo above.
The climbing probably maxed out at about severe 4a but is mostly easy scrambling. There is no need to remove crampons.
Soon enough, we were topping out on the route onto the bosses ridge. We basically carried on following the ridge on its right hand side, until we could see the final rock island, then traversed across the couloir to just below the rock island and headed up an easy, short snow slope to the top.
The windcrust was amazing!
After slogging up the ridge, the summit was ours! Approximately 17 hours after we set off.
We slogged down the Trois Monts route, never ever ever again. To arrive at the lift station and try and gain some kip before the first lift!
Things have changed since the last time I had to sleep in the lift station, they now lock the door to the heated toilets!
Below are some images of the route we took to the summit.
Details for anybody wanting to do this route:
- In current conditions, two axes are definitely needed.
- Ice gets vertical on the start of the Mont Blanc glacier. People may also notice we seemed to take a long route from the hut. Thats because the normal approach was completely bullet hard, overhanging glacier ice.
- Route finding on the approach is quite hard due to unreal amounts of crevasses. They are everywhere. They are huge. We had to cross several "Vertical Limit Style" by jumping with ice axes out. They start at the bottom of the Mont Blanc glacier and literally don't stop until the Bergeshrund on the route. The approach from the hut to the route took 10 hours because of the crevasses and our little routefinding error. The route took 8.
- For a competent (VS) climber, no point on the route should need pitching. A fair amount of the approach might though.
- The Quintino Sella hut is an absolute amazing place. Amazing location, well stocked, even with its own gas stove and large pans! There are, however, mice, marmots and some sort of reptile (according to Ash, the reptile fecal expert apparently) living in and around there. Don't leave food laying around.
- It's very remote. Once we left the Lac du Miage until we summitted, we didn't see any people at all, not even in the distance.
We probably should have been fitter. Ash is training to join the forces currently and I can hit a 20 mile cross country run no problem.
We probably (read definitely) should have been better acclimatised. I'd suggest this needs much more accurate acclimatisation than the normal Mont Blanc routes due to the increased time at altitude. We had 2 days at around 3900m before we did the route.
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