Vanoise – day 14

26.7.2023 Wednesday

Val-Cenis – Valfrejús

→ 40,16 km ↑ 2573 m ↓ 2382 m

We get up at 6:30am. Finally a calm night, just a bit of rain and no wind at all. We slept well. For breakfast is instant soup with extra pasta. We pack first, then eat. We set off at 7:45am. First today is 700 m of climbing over 3 km. There’s low cloud cover, and it looks like there’ll be a inversion up top. We climb slowly, first through forest, then across a meadow that instantly soaks our shoes. For a moment we see the mountains we walked yesterday. There’s a dusting of snow on them. Even the air smells like snow. Cold, sharp, the kind that stings your nose nicely. There must have been a settlement up here once. We pass a lot of ruined houses, and lower down there was even something like a cargo lift. Going up we’re still in short t-shirts, but once the terrain eases off we put on jackets and gloves.

We’d originally wanted to sleep here, and I felt a bit sorry we went down instead, but now I’m glad we did. We’d have been wet and cold, maybe even with snow on the tent. We join the red trail, which is surprisingly busy. We passed about 30 people in total. We don’t understand how people manage to hike with packs like these. We know that not everyone can afford lighter, more expensive gear, but having a backpack I could almost fit inside, with a tent strapped on top and plastic bags hanging off the sides, is a bit extreme. We’re still in cloud cover and it’s pretty cold.

But at least we move fast and don’t stop much, since there’s nothing to see anyway. After 3 hours, once we get away from the high mountains and glaciers where the fog lingers, the sun finally comes out and it’s a bit nicer.

I’ve been hungry for quite a while now, but Jozef keeps pushing the break. By the end I’m pretty grumpy. Good thing we’re going downhill, I couldn’t manage uphill right now. During the break I have three little Nutella buns, and then it’s better. We already have nice views, our shoes are drying, and in an hour there’s a hut where we get coffee.

Just before the hut I’m running out of energy. We drink coffee fast, we still have a lot ahead.

The coffee perks me up a bit. Before the hill I have the last pieces of chocolate. It’s quite a struggle. My calves feel completely dead. Once I get them moving it’s better, and then it’s a gentle climb up to Col du Barbier pass (2295 m).

We take a break in a meadow after the pass. I eat two more buns. Jozef gives up his too. He can handle being hungry. I really can’t (or rather, he’d rather be hungry than deal with hungry me). And we still haven’t seen a single marmot today.

Ahead of us is a descent back to Modane (where we started Vanoise), 1250 m over 7.5 km. We’re down by 5pm, half jogging the whole way. We go shopping at Casino. Since we’re starving, we massively overbuy, way too much food. We walk a bit into a park and pitch the tent there so it can dry a bit. We have our first dinner. I start with a peach, then baguette with smoked ham, Beaufort cheese, tomato and anchovy olives. We have a Pilsner with it too. We can barely finish it all somehow. We wanted to camp outside town, but we can’t find an outlet to charge things for the next three days. So we decide to push on to the tourist village of Valfréjus, 5 km and 470 meters of ascent. We climb pretty fast even with heavy packs. A guy even stops to offer us a ride, but despite the temptation we decline. I’m well fed now, so it’s fine. At 7:45pm we’re up top. There’s some kind of horse show going on. But our path leads to a bike charging station. We drop our things and charge our phone and power bank. I sit there and write the blog. People give me odd looks, since it’s a pretty upscale village.

Jozef first buys prosecco, from the Savoie region, then goes to the toilet. He texts me that even the toilet is fancy, with hot running water. We take turns and I go wash up a bit there too. Then we just fill up water and head back a short way to a spot we’d picked out for the tent. We thought no one would come by, but a few people go for a walk to the Notre-Dame-du-Charmaix de Valfréjus chapel.

Everyone’s very kind though, complimenting the good spot we found. So our paranoia about someone kicking us out fades away. That’s exactly why we chose France, since nobody really cares as long as you’re not in a strictly banned spot and don’t make a mess. Dinner is canned chili con carne with baguette. Tomorrow’s forecast is genuinely amazing, so we want to make the most of it. It’s going to be great.