Gran Paradiso

After hanging around Chamonix for a few days, we were ready to head over to the headquarters of Mont Blanc Guides, the company we'd booked in with to do our climb. They run a week long schedule containing an acclimatisation peak (Gran Paradiso in Italy, 4061m), followed by an ascent of Mt Blanc itself. Each peak is basically 3 days, the first day you hike up to the Refugio (or mountain refuge), followed by the summit day which starts and ends at the refugio, then on the 3rd day you exit the mountain to return to the valley. With Mt Blanc there's an additional days contingency to allow for inclement weather which can see the summit day start at the Refugio and end all the way back down in the valley, making that summit day a BIG one.

When you do the course with Mt Blanc Guides, all the nights that you're in Chamonix are spent in their accommodation in town which was surprisingly nice. Mai and I scored the studio apartment above the garage which was really spacious. After getting settled in we went upstairs in the main building for our first team meeting to discuss the week ahead with the Guides and our team.

John the owner of Mt Blanc Guides is a really great guy, very personable and has lots of funny/scary mountain stories to tell. Our two other guides for the week were Dave and Fabio who were also very knowledgeable and passionate about the mountains. All of them had LOTS of climbing stories and seemed to be pretty proficient which was comforting to know seeing as the basis of my mountaineering knowledge is having watched nearly every episode of Man Vs Wild with Bear Grylls (impressive I know). We were lucky to have a small team, just six of us, containing two friends Cindy and Lynn from US and UK and Vit and Katrina a couple from Slovakia all of whom were super nice people, a little older than us but also quite a bit fitter too!

The next day we all set out around Chamonix for a last minute gear and snack shopping session before getting into the minibus to head to Italy. We stopped on the way to our destination in a pretty weird little restaurant that's decc'd out with goblin and fairy paintings and statues which I'm assuming was just part of local culture, where the food was good and the coffee amazing. Then it was onto the Gran Paradiso to start our acclimatisation mission.

Now climbing the Gran Paradiso is a very important part of your acclimatisation for Mt Blanc, but make no mistake, it's also a test. If you're not fit enough to get up the Gran Paradiso, guess what, you're not even going to Mt Blanc let alone attempting to climb it. So after hiking up to and staying the night in the absolutely awesome family run Refugio Federico Chabod, I think we were all a bit anxious to get going the following morning to see if all our training had paid off.

We started out pretty early and after an hour or so of hiking you make it to the glacier where you put on your crampons and rope up. It wasn't our first time walking on a glacier, but probably was the first time walking on one where there was a real danger of falling in a crevasse. The Guides talked us through some techniques to moving in a group over glaciers and was good to be learning some new skills.

We zig zagged up the glacier for what seemed like quite a while until it finally flattened out onto the mountain at the foot of the steeper rocky section before the summit. We did a bit of scrambling up the rocks where a queue was starting to form (such is life on one of the easier 4000m peaks in the European alps). After not too much time we were at the only technical part of the climb which was a bit of a scramble traverse over quite an exposed drop. You get roped in so really wasn't that bad and also there was so much cloud cover it was hard to see the drop so that probably helped too.

After the rock traverse we were at the summit and I found myself a bit surprised by how quickly we'd got there. Don't get me wrong, there was a lot of walking but wasn't as bad as I thought it would be. Of course as they say, the summit is only half way, so after a couple of celebratory photos it was time to start making our way down. The way down was WAY quicker than the climb and we were back in the refugio drinking beers within a couple of hours.

All in all Gran Paradiso was a pretty great couple of days, definitely our first 4000m peak and a good confidence builder that we were properly acclimatised and fit enough (just!) to have a crack at Mt Blanc!

Welcome to Chamonix

Well firstly I feel I need to start this post by just saying wow .... Chamonix .... what a place! I think to call it the outdoor adventure capital of Europe may be fair? It's just a very nice picturesque mountain town in the French alps with a pretty serious history of mountaineering, skiing, alpinism and all sorts of outdoor activities. Extremely touristy of course, but hey tourists generally don't flock to places that are dull with not much to see or do.

When we arrived in Chamonix there was a lot of cloud cover and it was raining so we couldn't initially see the famous Chamonix needles. After a quick bite to eat and a short walk around town looking at the outdoor gear shops (so Mai could get her fix!), we were keen to get up to the Aiguille du Midi on the cable car to get a head start on our acclimatisation.

It's a pretty amazing situation for anyone planning a journey into the alpine realm to have a cable car that can take you up to an altitude of 3842m with absolutely no physical effort whatsoever! We planned to utilise this very handy facility to maximise our acclimatisation over the course of the next two days (which actually turned out to be 3 days as we had our dates mixed up!) spending as much time up the top as possible. It was definitely a gradual improvement with us both feeling pretty out of breath the first couple of times, however slowly but surely we both started feeling better each time to the point where I was trying to do as many laps of the stairs around the complex as possible to try and sneak in a bit of excercise (that's when we weren't sitting around drinking hot chocolate of course!).

The first two days the weather was pretty grey and cloudy, but then it all cleared up for the third day and we got to enjoy the amazing mountain views from both the valley floor and the Aiguille du Midi complex and got our first good look at Mt Blanc ...... looks pretty high ...... but doable!

Training's Over

Well, we were hoping to step up our training even further in these last two weeks before flying out, but alas Mai has been crazy busy at work and I've picked up a chest infection! Ah well, such is life, the timing for me getting sick could have been worse I guess, hopefully with some rest I'll be fine by the time we get to Chamonix. It's a pretty hard choice to stop training in favour of rest, but think it's the wiser one to make. I don't think my conditioning would really come along too much when I'm sick anyway and the danger of prolonging sickness by training is almost guaranteed.

The weekend before I got sick we were both pretty busy at work so couldn't get up to the Blue Mountains like we wanted, so opted for a Saturday morning session in the altitude chamber (or torture chamber as I've started to call it), followed by a some sand walking from Collaroy Point to North Narrabeen and back.

The altitude chamber's a pretty handy training facility that's for sure. It doesn't actually apply the same air pressure as being at altitude but rather matches the percentage of oxygen in the air that you would find there. I think simulation is a great tool when training for anything and seeing as there's not really any opportunity to train at real altitude in Australia this has got to be the next best thing.

The reason I call it the torture chamber is not because it's ridiculously hard, it's really as hard as you make it (and I will always try and push myself in there) but because it can be pretty boring and a bit confined walking fast on a treadmill with a heavy pack in a tiny room! It is pretty convenient though and just easy to know that it's a one hour training session where you don't have to think too much, just get in there and get on with it.

Getting Heavy

Another weekend, another amazing walk in one of the great outdoor areas surrounding Sydney. We were back in the Blue Mountains this week as I finally had an entire weekend off work, yeewwww! (It's been a while)

We thought we'd do the Wentworth Falls Loop this week for two reasons. The first being that we are lucky enough to have a couple of friends who live in Wentworth Falls who very generously put us up for the night from time to time, often spoil us with dinner and generally put up with our shit! Cheers boys, you're legends. Second reason is we decided to up the weight in our packs a bit this week and didn't want to over do it with a really long walk.

At 10kms the Wentworth Falls Loop still isn't a bad walk lengthwise and there's definitely lots of steep climbs and descents. It's also just a really beautiful part of the Blue Mountains so is always a pleasure to get out and enjoy the spectacular views.

Mai was carrying just over 10kgs and I was carrying a little over 20kgs. Oh man were we feeling it!? Ha, a bit more weight makes such a big difference, but think it's really great training in preparation for Mont Blanc. I mean carrying extra weight at no altitude must go towards simulating how much harder everything is once you're up at 4800m. We brought our walking poles along but didn't need to use them which was good because I think our legs needed the workout the most and we're both pretty comfortable hiking with poles so it will be nice to have them at hand on the mountain in case we need them.

Once again feeling the benefits of just having a good excuse to get outdoors and get some really good excercise done. We went to look at a house on Saturday that was really expensive and just incredibly average, was honestly a bit down about the fact that we can't afford a house in this crazy city we live in (not many people our age can!). However getting out in the wild gets your mind in a happier place, you start to realise life's not about things and what you've got, it's about experiences and what you do. If we weren't training for Mont Blanc I guarantee we wouldn't have got out on the trails this weekend and would probably have just been sat at home doing nothing.

Just Keep Going

Once again the week's been busy with work, life seems to be a constant battle between doing what we really want to do and making sure by doing that we're not still going to be working until we're in our 90's to get by! It's all good though, pressure's starting to ease for me at work as of tomorrow (hopefully) which may just leave me to focus a tiny bit more on our goal of getting in shape to climb Mont Blanc.

It's hard to know if what you're doing is enough, I mean we would certainly like to be doing a little bit more than we currently are but have both had a lot on our plates lately. We didn't go to the altitude chamber this week on Tuesday, still feeling a bit wrecked from our run around Narrabeen lake, but did on Thursday which was actually our wedding anniversary. There's no better way to celebrate 5 years of marriage than struggling to breathe while sweating buckets on a treadmill in a very small room with the air pressure equivalent to 4000m altitude I find! Don't worry we did go out for dinner on Friday as well.

So at least we did do something during the week this week, but with only four and a half weeks to go until we fly to Europe I think we could do with stepping it up a little.

We did still do our weekend training session this week too. We were originally planning on another walk in the Blue Mountains but thought we'd go a bit closer to home instead. Have had a window open on my iPad for ages now of the Mount Kuring Gai to Cowan walk (via Berowra Waters) so thought we'd give it a go.

The walk starts and finishes at train stations which is pretty handy when doing a one way walk. Mai's watch had it as about 18kms (although website said 17.2kms), either way we completed it in around 5 hours. There was quite a lot of up and down which was good, not quite as steep as a lot of trails in the Blue Mountains but still some good hills that got the legs pumping. Was nice to see a wild area so close to Sydney that we'd never really been to before.

If nothing else training for Mont Blanc has been a great excuse to go and do a lot of really great day walks in and around Sydney that we might never have done otherwise! Mai was struggling a bit today but did really well to push through and get it done, particularly as the last 2kms we were practically sprinting to make sure we didn't miss our train. I think mental conditioning is just as important as physical for us at the moment and being able to keep going when things are getting tough is exactly the kind of mindset we are going to need when we're on the mountain in July.

Long Weekend Run

Been a bit slack this week training wise, really seeing as it's Monday we didn't actually train at all this week just gone. However as  it's a long weekend and today is a public holiday I reckon we can just get away with saying today's run was our training for the week.

Will save the excuses for not hitting the altitude chamber this week (busy, work, tired etc etc) and just say maybe we'll call it an easy week to rest a little.

Of course we did get off our arses today to train with x2 laps of Narrabeen lake. It seems to be becoming a recurring theme of me heading into a training session thinking it's going to be a breeze and coming out struggling! I knew that x2 laps of Narrabeen lake is a bit more distance than we usually run but as it's so flat just thought it wouldn't be too bad.

Well after the first lap I was still feeling comfortable and Mai was feeling a bit tired, then the second lap was a bit tougher for me and a bit better for Mai. Regardless, we pushed ourselves and are now reaping the rewards lying on the sofa hurting!! Haha, okay so wasn't that bad but wasn't that easy either though and think it's probably the furthest either Mai or I have ran in one go.

Mai's watch said we'd done 16.72kms in 1:47, not exactly a blistering pace, but I'm not much of a runner and Mai hasn't been doing many runs lately so we'll take it. We were also a lot more concerned with pacing ourselves and making sure we got it done than burning out trying to set a good time.

The weather came to the party and was a beautiful day, this also brought out the hoards of families so the trail was very busy. Not a surprise really as it's such a nice circuit. Busy as it was, it's still very handy for us when we can't be bothered driving to the Blue Mountains to train as it's a pretty cruisy 15mins drive from home. Not a bad session, pretty sure my legs will be feeling it tomorrow!