Page 2: Tour du Mont Blanc

The dramatic elevated highway leading into Chamonix.

 

Grand Hôtel des Alpes. One of the few 5-star hotels I've stayed in that deserves all five stars.

 

Mont Blanc at sunset. IMO, this is one of the most dramatic HDR photos in the album.

 

On this trip Laurie and I are doing the last third of the Tour du Mont Blanc - from Chamonix to Champex-Lac, in celebration of our 40th anniversary. We did the first third on our 10th, and the second third on our 30th.

 

Laurie pauses at the top of a sequence of cliffs. The trail continues to her left but far below her. How to get down there?

 

Ladders, of course! In keeping with protocols we learned on the Via Ferrata of Italy, three points of contact always; move only one hand or one foot at a time.

 

Auberge La Boerne, our stop after the first day. Eating is communal...

 

...and so is sleeping.

 

Sunlight dappling a forest trail is a common enough scene. An SDR photo doesn't capture the drama, but an HDR photo, rendered in HDR, does.

 

Mont Blanc towering above trail.

 

Requisite selfie. I like the way the glints on my white hair are rendered in the HDR version.

 

Last view of the Chamonix Valley before we cross the Col de Balme into Switzerland.

 

Fellow hikers relax near Auberge La Grande Ourse (the big bear) on our second night.

 

Similar view the next morning.

 

Another sun-dappled trail, rendered nicely in HDR.

 

A record-breaking heat spell was beginning in Europe, but we are 4,000 feet above the Rhône Valley, so we barely feel it. The city of Martigny is in the middle distance.

 

Champex-Lac, our destination on the third day, and the end of our Tour.