Cybercasts

Greetings From Chamonix France!  IFMGA guide Jonathon Spitzer arrived yesterday in town after the long flight across the Atlantic.   Today, Jonathon will be finalize details and logistics before Mont Blanc trip #1 starts.  

The team will be having dinner tonight in downtown Chamonix before heading into the field tomorrow.  We will be spending our first 3 days acclimating in the the Le Tour part of the Mont Blanc Massif.  Hopefully climbing Aig Le Tour and Tete Blanche. 

Here is a photo from this morning of downtown Chamonix looking up more then 13,00ft to the summit of Mont Blanc.

Will be in touch more as the trip get going.

Ciao,

Jonathon

Recent snowfall and strong winds caused an avalanche warning to take place in the French Alps. With the current conditions we felt the safer and better option would be to traverse the Valle Blanche to Italy.

We started out traversing from the to Aig du Midi and walked over to Courmayeur, Italy. We had a beautiful day and an even better lunch in Italy.

Last night we celebrated our week of climbing at a local restaurant with some good red wine. We did not summit Mont Blanc, however we created new friends, improved our climbing skills, learned about the Alps, and most important had a good time along the way.

This was the last and final trip in the Alps for the 2012 season. Thank you for following our cybercast!

Today the Aig du Midi was closed due to strong winds again this morning. We opted for “Plan B” and went down valley from Chamonix to do a Via Ferrata. A Via Ferrata (Iron Road) is a mountain route which is equipped with fixed cables, stemples, ladders, and bridges.

We did the Via Ferrata in a small town of Passy, France located about 30mins away from Chamonix. It was just over 700 vertical feet high and took us around 2hrs. After completing the Via Ferrata we walked up to a secluded restaurant up high on the mountain hillside for lunch.

We are back in Chamonix for the evening to watch an amazing lightning storm come through town. It is currently raining incredibly hard here in town. Tomorrow we are hopeful to get up the Aig du Midi and do some climbing in the alpine environment.

Mountaineering and climbing is very dynamic and even more so in the Alps. We have lifts, trams, trains, huts, and many logistics to coordinate. This morning we left the Hotel L’Arve in Chamonix and went up to the Mer de Glace for some glacier trekking and sightseeing with the idea of riding up Aig du Midi in the afternoon.

All the climbers had a really good time climbing up and down the ladders to access the glacier. There are signs that show how much and quickly the glacier has retreated in the past years. It’s astonishing and eye-opening how much glacier recession has taken place.

However, plans change in a moments notice in the Alps. The Aig du Midi closed this afternoon due to strong winds and we are forced to spend another night in Chamonix. The forecast is calling for very strong winds tomorrow and heavy precipation with lightning in the afternoon.

Tomorrow we are going to wake up and see what happens with the weather. Hopefully this storm diverts around the Alps and we can still make a summit attempt on Sunday.

Hello from Chamonix, France!

Today we woke up at 5am and left the Trient Hut just after 6am this morning in Switzerland. We divided into two teams; one team enjoyed the scenic views of the Trient Plateau while the other team summited Aig du Tour 3544m.

Both teams had a great time and are back safely in Chamonix enjoying a hot shower and a traditional French meal.

We are currently getting ready for our summit attempt on Mont Blanc. The forecast is calling for a storm Friday and Saturday, but we are going to get ready and be in position to climb if the storm breaks. The best day for making a summit attempt on Mont Blanc looks to be Sunday morning.

Thanks for following our cybercast and we will be in touch over the weekend!

Jonathon