Courmayeur to Tronchey
Mileage: 6.8 miles
Elevation gain: 2900 ft
Camping: Camping Tronchey
When we woke up, I took a few pictures of the mountain where we started our hike down to Courmayeur the day prior. I wanted a picture to look back and remember how steep it was.
We started at the green grass patch on the middle right of the picture, just below the cloud. Yeah, we had a steeeeppp hike down that mountain.
We slept in a bit and then enjoyed a little breakfast at our hotel. We knew we had a pretty short day in comparison to the others, so we were in no rush to leave. We finally left around 11:00 am and were off to find an ATM.
The ATM we originally found, was clearly out of money, as it was not working. We were a little panicked, thinking that maybe the ATM's did not work on Sundays? We found another one and thank goodness it worked. We got cash and started towards the trailhead.
The club in Courmayeur. Courmayeur seemed like such a charming mountain city. We almost had a rest day here, but also wanted to keep on hiking so we could enjoy Annecy at the end of our hike.\
Courmayeur was surrounded by mountains.
When we arrived at the trailhead, we saw our friends from Sweden, Magnus and Linnea. Looking back now, if that first ATM had worked, we would not have gotten to see them. It is funny how things work out sometimes.
We ended up hiking with them up to the next rifugio. Ken had a moment during the hike up the mountain where he did not feel the greatest. I think he got a little overheated since we were tucked away in the trees climbing straight up. It was short-lived and we arrived at rifugio Bertone and stopped to enjoy a drink with Magnus and Linnea.
The trees finally opened up and we stopped for a picture with Courmayeur below us.
We had another beautiful day. At this point, we were really pinching ourselves about the weather. Could it be that we go the entire hike without clouds or rain???
The scenery near rifugio Bertone was some of the most beautiful of the trip. The wildflowers were amazing, but still no Edelweiss.
Rifugio Bertone. It had one of the best outdoor seating areas of the rifugios we stopped at for drinks.
Ken and Magnus were grabbing our drinks so Linnea and I were taking advantage of the views around and taking some pictures.
We had a great time talking with Magnus and Linnea. We talked about many different things such as different travel destinations, not having children, and different rock bands. We really enjoyed our time with them. We were nervous that since they were hiking further than us on this day that we might not see them in the days to come. We exchanged information and took a few pictures with them.
Us with Magnus and Linnea
Mick told us to be silly, so Ken and I obliged.
Who is Mick? Well, Mick is an American that we met just before we left Bertone. Ken and I were making jokes about the baguette of bread we saw in his backpack and the next thing you know, we learned all about him. He was really funny and it was great for me to get to be sarcastic with someone that understood my humor. He took some pictures for us and we bid our farewells to him. We figured we would never see him again.
One last picture from Bertone. The tip of Mont Blanc is hiding. Just the tip.
As we were leaving Bertone, we saw the guys from Israel that we had been leaping frogging with the day prior. We said hello and were on our way toward Tronchey. Magnus and Linnea were hiking on to Rifugio Elena, so they were taking their time getting ready to leave. We climbed a little more uphill and saw more gorgeous views.
Many different options on where to go!
We were having such a great day
We were going to be just below Rifugio Bonatti. The trail on the entire route of the trip is very well marked. The times on the signs are pretty accurate as well. We found we were usually slightly faster than the times posted, but not slower which was good for morale on long days.
The next hour or so was completely flat. The views were incredible. The Mont Blanc was right there. It was just right there. It seemed like we were so close to it at times.
We always feel so fortunate to get to see scenery like this.
This section of trail was so easy to hike. It was a welcomed break after some of the terrain.
There is an ultra that takes place on this route in August and we spent a lot of time talking about parts of the trail that were runnable. This day had a lot of runnable terrain, unlike some of the others.
Since there is no true camping between Courmayeur and Rifugio Bonatti, we decided to descend the mountain and camp at Tronchey, which is located in the valley. It was not really out of the way and we ended up loving it.
We were not 100% sure as to where we were going, but we knew we needed to take a trail to get us down into the valley. We found a trail and decided to start our descent. I wish I could remember what the sign said, but I believe it said Mal something? It looked like a skinny dirt path. It was not too steep going down. It only took us about 30 minutes or so.
The valley floor was beautiful. It kind of reminded me a little bit of the Lauterbrunnen Valley, just minus the dramatic cliffs.
We used my phone to find the location of Camping Tronchey. Look at Sprint coming in clutch! Honestly though, Sprint has excellent coverage in Europe. We found the campground and went inside to pay. There were some children outside that obviously belonged to the owner and they were so sweet. They kept saying hello to us in English, Italian, and French. They were really cute.
We paid, set everything up for the night and walked about 5 minutes down the road to a restaurant. We enjoyed wine, a charcuterie plate, and views of Mont Blanc. It was pretty amazing.
I was pretty much loving life
We left the restaurant and walked back towards the campground. I had remembered seeing a restaurant right by our campground and figured we could stop for more wine. Ken did not notice anything. It does pay to be married to someone that is so observant like myself. :)
We went into the restaurant and attempted to order a bottle of wine. No one spoke English, so it is a good thing I know how to say white wine in Italian, however, I am not sure how to say bottle. We sat outside and had this adorable Italian grandma serve us white wine and potato chips. We were the only people there, but we had so much fun. We also quickly remembered all the potato chips we ate in Italy back in 2017. Ah, memories.
We enjoyed our wine and went back to our campsite to get ready for bed. We were thinking that we were going to have a semi-long day tomorrow since we had to hike back up the mountain to get to the trail. One of my besties was scheduled to have a major surgery in the morning, so I sent her a little love and we watched a little TV and were fast asleep.
It was a very easy day, but very much welcomed after the difficult days prior. Our love for Italy only grew on our last night there before crossing over into Switzerland.
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