Cabane de Prafleuri, Valais, Switzerland
Early start for what I knew would be a marathon long day.
Well, 8:00 is early when breakfast is at 7:00 and they push you out quickly but
also when it’s not getting light all that early anymore. My guidebook says the
day’s hike is 6 to 6 ½ hours, but by now I know that the author is a liar and
must be marathon fit. I estimated the 15 kilometers (9 miles) would take me
nine hours, which is pretty close to the actual.
Anyways, Day 6 on the Haute Route starts with a dip from the
Montfort hut, but then the trail gradually rises along the side of a mountain,
the Bec Tormin, and follows it around the west side and then the south side
several thousand feet above the valley with spectacular views of the Grand
Combin and Petit Combin peaks across the valley. I consider myself to have a fear of heights,
but I think exposure has helped me overcome it, because if I didn’t have a
panic attack on the narrow cliffside trail I should be able to handle anything.
Conditions were, of course, sunny, dry, and ideal, very different from the
treacherous snowy condition Doug and I had on our Pyrenees Haute Route trek ten
years ago.
We’re talking about stretches of trail with chains bolted into the
cliffside to enable you to hang on. Anyway, I made it.
Both on the early part of the day’s hike and then again
toward the middle near the Col de Louvie I saw some Ibex along the trail. They
didn’t seem phased the slightest by my presence as they lounged and nibbled on
the grass.
This was the day of the three alpine passes. The first one,
the Col de Tormin, was just kind of a notch in a ridge overlooking the Balmes
Valley at about 8,800 feet. The next stretch of trail for a few hours rose over
the Lac de Louvie toward the Col de Louvie, the second pass on the route. The
trail genereally rose gradually with more spectacular views and some treacherous
cliffside stretches. The climb to the Col du Louvie was fairly steep but not
too big an ascent to the approximately 9,700-foot altitude pass.
My guidebook describes the next stretch of the trail as
having to do with glacier crossing and unclear trail markings. That’s what you
get by using a very dated guidebook you got on the cheap during the era of
global warming.
The Glacier de Grand Desert has retreated far enough to be
irrelevant to the descent from the pass and crossing of the valley, to the extent
that it looks just like a big snowfield. The descent involved some steeps and
fun scrambling down a boulder field.
The crossing of the bleak valley was intensely hot in the
sunshine. It takes a while for vegetation to recolonize the land uncovered by retreating
glaciers, resulting in barren rocky landscapes. The ascent out of the valley
was rather gradual, though, to some more retreating glaciers. And then a scene
that could almost make you cry – a steep descent into one last rocky glacial
valley before the final steep ascent to the third pass of the day, the Col de
Prafleuri at 2,965 meters (about 9,900 feet).
The view into the new valley from the pass was completely
new and different, another “know your socks off” view of the mountains toward
the south and the Italian border and major glaciers. The steep descent to the
Cabane de Prafleuri, my home for the night, was steep and stunning. I arroived
just after 5:00 P.M., nine full hours of hiking with only a few brief rest
stops. Again it wasn’t very busy, a good thing I guess when the dormitory
“beds” are nothing more than unseparated thin mattresses on raised platforms in
a large room. It’s empty enough that I don’t have any next-door mattress
neighbors to get cosy with. Multi-course group dinner was good, as it usually
is in these European mountain huts. Some Ibex visited in the evening, but it
was pretty much lights out early with everyone in bed by 8:30, a pleasant end
with a few beers to a spectacularly beautiful but physically demanding day.
2025-05-22