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We started day 2 of our Tour du Mont Blanc with a huge breakfast at the buffet of Les Campanules Chalet Hotel. I went back for seconds, and possibly a third time. Outside the hotel, we walked down to the bridge over the River l'Arve and entered the town of les Houches. By coincidence, we happened to meet the couple from Philadelphia that we had talked to the day before. They told us that they were going to ride the cable car up to Col de Voza, but that seemed like cheating to me. I wanted to hike every step of the TMB. I thought we followed the signs correctly leaving les Houches, and indeed we saw a sign pointing uphill that had the green TMB marker and said "Col de Voza", but some how we ended up veering too far to the right as we were climbing up the steep ridge. Fortunately, in addition to the two hiking guides that I carried, we also had the topo maps, and they proved to be invaluable here. Although we were not on the official track, we saw that we were on a path that took us up to Col de Voza, so we just had continue forward. The climb to Col de Voza was one of the tougher parts of this hike. I think we were still tired from that epic 1500 meter descent from Le Brévent the day before. James' knee was bothering him. Melanie asked me three or four times why didn't we ride the cable car up to Col de Voza like the Philadelphia couple - I didn't have a good answer for that, but I offered to carry her pack as we staggered up the steep hillside. Melanie decided to carry her pack the whole way, but at one point Stephen took James' pack a short distance up the hill. I don't know how Stephen had enough energy to go charging up that steep hill. I think what made the hike up Col de Voza so difficult was the humidity. I was sweating profusely as we climbed. The sky was thickly overcast, and the forecast called for afternoon rain. It made for some tough hiking. Eventually we came to a big cairn by the side of the trail. We didn't know it at the time, but the cairn marked the end of the steep ascent. We walked out of the forest and found our way to Col de Voza. We rested at the Col for a bit, refilling our water bottles and looking at the mountains and glaciers. I was in much better spirits as we began the descent. At first, the downhill section of the TMB followed a roadway that was quite steep. I tried Melanie's trick of walking backwards - this puts pressure on the calf muscles, but saves the knees. It started to sprinkle a few drops of rain, and we quickly put the waterproof covers over our packet - this mollified the rain gods, and no further drops fell on us the rest of the day. After the initial drop, the rest of this stage involved a gradual hike down through a whole series of tiny French villages. Sometimes we walked on the roads between the village, and sometimes we followed paths through the forest. The Trailblazer guide to Tour of Mont Blanc was invaluable on this stretch, the turn-by-turn maps in that book saved us from a couple of wrong turns. We passed the town of Bionnassay, le Champel and reached la Villette at about 2 P.M. There was a fountain (for watering livestock) in the center of la Villette, so we sat there for a nice lunch stop. This part of the hike was fun - more French villages ahead: la Gruvaz, Tresse, le Quy and les Meuniers. Meuniers has the distinction of the being the birthplace of the Alexis Bouvard, the astronomer who discovered Neptune. Since Melanie first saw the sign commemorating Bouvard, she got to pick a reward, and she chose ice cream! Smart choice. We had now entered the second valley of the TMB: La Vallée de Montjoie. The route of the TMB follows the banks of the river that flows down the valley, the Bon Nant Torrent. We walked into les Contamines and found our lodging for the night: it was a bed and breakfast called La Ferme de Bon-Papa. This was a unique place - the owner rents out three rooms on the ground floor of her house. The rooms are furnished like bedrooms rather than sterile hotel rooms, with nice quilts on the bed and books on the shelves. La Ferme de Bon-Papa is located right in the center of les Contamines, so after our showers we walked into the center of town and stopped at the first pizza place we found. Melanie and I split a chicken, ham and pineapple pizza and some diet coke. Meals always taste better when you are hungry from a full day of hiking. After dinner, we stopped at the market and bought a container of chocolate ice cream. Back at La Ferme de Bon-Papa, the four of us sat outside and served up the ice cream. It was a nice way to end the day, enjoying chocolate ice cream and conversing in comfortable chairs. Stage 2 was complete! Panorama Photos
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Click on any thumbnail to begin the slide show at that photograph TMB Stage 2
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