Mileage: 19 miles
Elevation gain: 5750 ft
Camping: Hotel in Courmayeur
We knew we had a huge day ahead of us on day 3, with 19 miles of hiking. A lot of people take the bus from Les Chapieux to Les Mottets, which cuts off about three miles. We decided we would walk it and it really was not that bad. There is a small section of road walking, but I am not sure why people complain about this section. There are other sections I would rather skip than this section.
We left Les Chapieux at 7:00 am knowing we were if for a long day. This ended up being one of my favorite days of the trip.
Leaving Les Chapieux bright and early headed toward Les Mottets.
A little uphill road walking to start the day.
We heard of a lot of people skipping this section and taking a bus, but it really was not bad at all. We saw some great scenery and pretty much had the trail to ourselves.
It was a gorgeous morning
Mont Blanc and me
We were so excited about being on our way to Italy
We found a few cow friends just before arriving at Les Mottets.
The view from Les Mottets was beautiful. I was obviously a huge fan of the white horse and the donkey.
When we left Les Mottets, it was a pretty steep climb. It seemed like it was just up and up until we finally reached the top of the col.
Climbing with some amazing views
I wish I could have kept track of the number of waterfalls we encountered on this hike. There were too many to count.
We were so worried about having bad weather on the ay we were hiking 19 miles, but as you can see, it was an amazing day for this long of a hike.
If you zoom in on this picture, you will see the rifugio, Robert Blanc. It is in one of the snow passes. To get to this rifugio, it is a very dangerous and scary hike. I watched a video of a group hiking to this rifugio and my heart was pounding. I am sure it is a great place to visit, but it looks terrifying to get there!
The view at the top of the col, looking into Italy. We made it to Italy!!! Ciao, Ciao, Ciao!!!!
France was behind us and Italy is straight ahead
Welcome to Italy! Ciao, Ciao!!!
Views for days
We hiked to rifugio Elisabetta and stopped for lunch. We both had pasta and it was so good! It was so interesting that once we crossed into Italy that people were speaking Italian. I was expecting there to still be a lot of French since we were so close to the border but Italian it was!
The funniest thing that happed this entire day was when we were at Elisabetta and I thought I was grabbing parmesan cheese for my pasta. As I was shaking a shit ton of it onto my pasta, I realized it was salt, or so I thought! I laughed and started to eat my pasta when I realized it was sugar. I shook a ton of sugar onto my pasta. It really did not make it taste bad. I was so hungry, so I would have eaten anything! We had a good laugh about this for the remainder of the day.
Looking back at rifugio Elisabetta.
After the descent from Elisabetta, we had a pretty easy hike across the valley. It felt nice to walk on flat terrain for a bit.
We still had blue skies!
Ken was so grateful for the easy terrain
The flat terrain was short-lived and soon, we were hiking back up. Straight up. The views were so beautiful and right along a stream, so it was difficult to be too mad that we were going up hill yet again.
I hiked up ahead of Ken for a bit and saw a beautiful waterfall. I knew Ken would love it. I waited for Ken and got a picture of him. It was so beautiful. I cannot believe all of the beauty we were able to see during this hike.
Ken enjoying another waterfall
We were leapfrogging with some guys and we stopped at the waterfall together and took pictures for each other. We continued meeting these guys, that we later learned were from Israel. We ended up spending a lot of time with them and really liked them.
The wildflowers were my favorite. I kept looking for Edelweiss.
You could literally take pictures nonstop. The scenery was so beautiful at every single turn.
We made it to the top of the col and it was windy. We did not stay long and started a very steep and somewhat dangerous decent. There was a lot of loose rock and some pretty steep drop-offs. We came upon a snow pass and I was really not looking forward to crossing it, but Italian food awaited us in Courmayeur!
We received the best Buongiorno of the trip on our decent. The guy even rolled the R. It was amazing. When he saw me, he said "Bon Dee" which I thought was slang for Buongiorno, but Ken said the guy was calling me Blondie. Oh well, it was pretty funny!
Looking back at one of the scarier snow passes that we crossed. There was a pretty steep dropoff on the left and I told myself not to look. Thank goodness for trekking poles!
We got to a section that was a ski area. I have to say, I do not think I will ever be a skier. There are so many areas with extremely steep dropoffs.
Interpretation: Don't be a dumbass
There was an area of artsy things once we got closer to Maison Vieille. You could love through frames and see the glaciers and see different rifugios. It really cool to see. And then, we saw one of my favorite things of the entire trip.
I had been singing Edelweiss all-day and just before we arrived at Rifugio Maison Vieille, we came across an Edelweiss mirror for a mirror selfie. This was one of the best parts of the day. I did not get to see any real Edelweiss, but in my heart, they were there.
There is no other person that I would want to hike 110 miles through the Alps with than Ken.
We stopped at Maison Vieille for a coke and a snack before making the long-terrible trek down to Courmayeur. It was terrible. If we would have known how terrible, we may have called a cab. It was straight down and I am sure the fact that we were on mile 16 was not helping. We made the best of it and finally arrived in Courmayeur. We found our hotel, showered, and went out to find Italian food.
We both had pasta and Aperol Spritz. I am not sure that dinner could have been any better.
Aperol Spritz at dinner makes the long day worth it.
We finished the night with a bottle of red wine and some dessert and quickly fell asleep. We were pretty worn out from our 19-mile day. It was such a fun day trekking from France to Italy.
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