Walker’s Haute Route

: While I was walking the Jordan Trail in 2019, I met some Belgian guy who recommended I one day do the Tour du Mont Blanc because it’s one of the most beautiful hikes he’s ever done. Then just last summer while I was hiking the Coast to Coast trail in England, I met a British couple who said that the Tour du Mont Blanc was just okay, but if I was serious about doing a hike in that area then they’d recommend the Walker’s Haute Route over the Tour du Mont Blanc. They said there’s less people on the trail and you get a bigger diversity of landscapes along the way. I’d never heard of the Haute Route at the time but began to look into it. Trailwise – the company I ended up booking with to make reservations at all the hotels and huts along the way – describes the trail as: “The Walker’s Haute Route is a historic trekking route from Chamonix in France, at the foot of Mont Blanc, to Zermatt in Switzerland, in the shadow of the Matterhorn. Its 225km snake across some of the most spectacular mountain passes of the Alps.” And here you have the image of some map that I stole off the internet that roughly traces our steps on the Walker’s Haute Route.

: The International Federation of Sport Climbing’s 2024 World Cup happened to coincide with the couple days we’d spent in Chamonix before embarking on the Walker’s Haute Route

: Heading out of Chamonix on the morning of the first day

: Introducing Sabina, my companion on this hike, posing in the hills just outside of Chamonix

: A charcuterie board we ordered at a place called Les deux aigles somewhere up in the hills between Chamonix and Argentière. There’s definitely no shortage of cheese anywhere along the Walker’s Haute Route.

: Artwork of a dude – I dunno, sniffing a woman’s thong? – at Les deux aigles

: I was pulling on this door in the hotel lobby that evening and it wasn’t opening when I heard the guy at the front desk say “poo-sii.” I turned around and said, “Da fuck did you just call me!?” And he said, “No, no, no. ‘Poussez’ is French for ‘push.’ It’s a push door.” “Oh, okay,” I said, “thanks.” Just kidding, that never happened.

: Looking back down on where we came from during the long slog up to Col de Balme pass (2195m)

: Looking back in the same direction as the previous photo, but more than halfway done with the climb at this point. Col de Balme marks the border between France and Switzerland.

: At the top of Col de Balme, we sat in the grass and had lunch while we enjoyed the view. Meanwhile, this Chinese hiker here pulled out a flute and started playing what turned out to be the soundtrack of our lunch stop. His music was pretty soothing in general, but I especially liked when he played “Scarborough Fair”

: I’ll show you a real pecker!

: Serving of ice cream with the Swiss flag on it. This dessert topped off a rather boring “family style” meal in an overcrowded, claustrophobic dining space at the guesthouse in Trient. Although it looks quite sad in photo form, it was actually pretty good – maybe the highlight of that dinner.

: Walking out of Trient on the morning of the third day. The afternoon before, we took a stroll up to that pink church up on the top of the hill. It had a little graveyard in its immediate vicinity where many of the headstones marked the resting places of people who’d been dead for more than a hundred years.

: For a good part of this morning’s walk, there’d been a little stream flowing to the left of the path here. Like most streams, it was in the ground except for this stretch right here where it flowed through this wooden canal that was lined at the bottom by some kind of waterproof tarp thingy. It was weird, the first time I’d ever seen anything like that.

: Making our way up to a pass known as Fenêtre d’Arpette (2665m)

: The terrain was pretty steep near the top of Fenêtre d’Arpette and there were lots of big boulders that required some scrambling

: Me as we headed down the other side of the pass

: Our hotel that evening was located right on the edge of Lac de Champex

: I remember Day 4 as being a pretty easy day of walking, mostly downhill

: Towards the end of the day, we walked through the town of Sembrancher where they had…

: …this fountain that pumped crystal clear, ice cold mountain water for all to enjoy.

: From the town of Le Châble, we started the day by taking a cable car (known locally as a “gondola”) up to the town of Verbier. Even after taking that cable car a good ways up the side of the mountain, we still had an additional 1172m of ascent that day to accomplish on foot – here we are in the midst of it.

: Pretty purple flowers

: Got some elevation now

: On the left of the photo, the trail ran for quite some time on the side of this mountain

: Looking back on what we’d just traversed. The area with the snow was kinda slippery since it was on such steep terrain. It was also a bit dangerous because it was melting from underneath, meaning that we were walking on parts that could collapse below our feet. At one point, the snow broke under my feet and I fell about thigh-deep, which gave Sabina a bit of a scare.

: In the distance, in the center of the photo between the two mountains, you can see a dam. I’m not sure which dam it is though – probably either the Grande Dixense or Mauvoisin.

: While we were making the descent down to Cabane de Louvie, we saw this grass and these flowers with the Grand Combin massif in the background and thought it’d be a fun place to take some photos

: That one’s goin on this year’s Christmas card

: Approaching Cabane de Louvie which can be seen on that hill at the end of the lake in the center of the photo

: Morning view from Cabane de Louvie. The forecasts that day were calling for some shitty weather starting around 11am and instead of going up and over a couple pretty high passes to sleep at the Cabane de Prafleuri in the middle of nowhere, Sabina decided to descend from Cabane de Louvie and take public transportation over to the town of Arolla where I’d meet her in a couple days. I, on the other hand – since this is the sorta shit I live for – decided to go for it.

: I think I ended up leaving Cabane de Louvie (on the other side of the lake) around 6:30am

: Same view looking back towards Cabane de Louvie as I make my way up to the Col de Louvie pass (2921m)

: I picked this toad up and licked the back of it hoping for a hallucinogenic high, but it didn’t deliver. Guess it wasn’t the right kind

: One last look back towards Cabane de Louvie before I start going up and over the pass

: Look at the size of the horns on that guy

: Prior to starting this hike, Sabina and I had read that there was still a lot of snow on different parts of the trail and some people were suggesting the usage of microspikes to prevent slippage. So, she and I each bought a pair of them from a sporting shop in Chamonix before setting off.

: As I was going down here on the other side of the Col de Louvie pass, the snow was so slushy that the microspikes didn’t grip shit. I was slipping all over the place and one time even did a dramatic Harry-and-Marv-from-Home-Alone style wipeout onto my ass before sliding fifty or sixty feet downward.

: It was kinda tough to navigate where the trail went from here, but I figured it out

: Coming down the other side of the second pass, Col de Prafleuri (2987m), it was so foggy I couldn’t see anything. Although I had high hopes of making it to the cabin before it started raining, I ended up getting caught in a storm for the final 45 minutes or so of this day’s hike and arrived to my destination dripping wet.

: I got to Cabane de Prafleuri around 11:30 and after changing into dry clothes and eating lunch, I took a nap for a couple hours up in the dorm room here

: Low cloud cover over the Lac des Dix

: Mountain stream that drains down into the Lac des Dix

: Sweet helmet, bro!

: Heading up towards a pass called the Col de Riedmatten (2919m). The pass that people normally take when doing the Walker’s Haute Route is Pas de Chèvres, but that one was closed during this season due to rockfall that’d wiped out the path

: On another foggy day with limited visibility, here I am following the path on the left side of the photo before making a sharp left and going up the steep, narrow and boulder-strewn path to Col de Riedmatten

: Coming down on the other side of the Col de Riedmatten, the fog began to lift enough for me to see…

: …this beautiful glacier off on the right-hand side of the path.

: Interesting flowers

: As I was making my way into Arolla, I had to walk through a few narrow gateways like this that’d lined people’s properties. Little did I know when I put my hand on it while walking through that these were electric fences – the zap I got scared the shit outta me.

: Most of the morning walk up and out of Arolla passed through pine forest

: As we were approaching this rock on the path, I thought this was someone’s ballsack hanging off the side of it. After closer examination, Sabina and I decided it hadn’t been a ballsack at all, but was actually probably a snail without a shell on its back.

: The lovely Lac Bleu

: Heading into La Sage they had a bunch of these really distracting banners in the forest, telling visitors about the wildlife that lives around there and offering a QR code you can scan for further reading. To me, this kinda takes away from the experience more than it adds to it – QR codes and nature don’t mix.

: Common room in Hôtel de la Sage where they had a bunch of books available including…

: …French translations of R.L. Stein’s Goosebumps.

: When I went out to go buy some lunch items for the following day’s walk, I was shocked to discover this severed penis for sale at the Épicerie de La Sage

: As a professional gutter cleaner, I have to admit that this is the first time I’d ever seen wooden gutters on anyone’s house

: Lookin back down towards the valley we just climbed out of when leaving La Sage

: Lookin up ahead now towards the Col de Torrent pass (2916m) – it’s that low part of the mountains there just right of center of the photo next to the clouds. Doesn’t seem like it’s too far away from here, but it’s still a pretty long ways away

: Closing in on Col de Torrent

: View from the top of the pass

: Heading down the other side of the Col de Torrent towards Lac de Moiry

: View of the Barrage (dam) de Moiry, which is where we’re walking down to. Across the valley on the right side of the photo, you can see a zigzagging path going up the side of the mountain. That’s where we’d be walking the following day on our way to Zinal. On this day, however, since there’s no accommodation at the dam, we’d be taking a 20-minute bus down to a town called Grimentz where we’d be spending the night.

: After taking the same 20-minute bus back up from Grimentz to the dam, we picked up where we left off the day before. Here we are marching up the aforementioned zigzagging path

: View from the top of a mountain called Corne de Sorebois (2896m)

: View from the top of the same mountain, but in a different direction

: Part of a long but scenic descent down into Zinal

: Looking back on part of the morning ascent up and out of Zinal

: Another one looking back, this one showing Sabina climbing up behind me as we chip away at the day’s 1217m of total ascent

: A group of Chinese guys flying a drone at the top of this day’s major pass – Col de la Forcletta (2865m). Col de la Forcletta marks the linguistic barrier between French-speaking Switzerland that we were leaving behind and the German-speaking part that we were about to head into.

: Heading down the other side of the pass we had a bit of snow to contend with, but we were kinda used to it and knew how to handle it by this point in the hike

: Goin down

: Tried my best to get a photo with that Swiss flag behind the cabin fully open in the wind, but couldn’t quite manage it. Fun fact: Did you know that the flag of Switzerland is one of two national flags that are square-shaped? The other belongs to Vatican City. And the only national flag that isn’t a rectangle (because squares are considered rectangles) is that of Nepal.

: Hiking I just take time. And all through my water break time. I say a little prayer for you. Forever and ever…

: Decorations in front of someone’s house in Gruben

: Sabina walking across a snow patch not long after we’d gone up and over Augstbord Pass (2894m)

: Looks like these rocks are wearin frog skin camo

: One of the most impressive stretches of the entire trek

: Me on a rock with the Matter Valley, which leads all the way to Zermatt, stretching out in the background

: Me n Bina

: Instead of walking all the way down here to the town of St Niklaus, we took the Jungenbahn cable car down which saved our knees from 850m of descent over a distance of 4 kilometers

: Abbey Road meets Evergreen Terrace

: A “bad oder douche” – sounds like something your mom uses

: Making our way out of St Niklaus along the Matter Valley for 6km until we reach the town of Herbriggen where we’ll begin our approximate 1300m of ascent. The flag with the stars on it on the building to the left is that of the Canton of Valais, which is one of the twenty-six cantons that make up the Swiss Confederation.

: Didn’t know that throwing bottles at cows out car windows was enough a problem around these parts to warrant the creation of a PSA advising against it

: Snail trail

: A little altar built on the side of the trail with a giant rosary hanging on the rock face above it

: Sabina coming up behind me

: A bit further along the trail with Sabina now in the lead

: Just a little left of the photo’s center you can see Europahütte which is where we’ll be spending the night

: A look further along the Matter Valley where we’ll be walking on the morrow. The diagonal line in the bottom center of the photo that sticks out over the forest in the distance is a bridge. It looks quite intimidating, but we’ll cross that bridge when we get to it…both literally and figuratively.

: “Please pee seated” – sign on the bathroom door at Europahütte

: Starting off our last day on the trail by making our way down to the Charles Kuonen Suspension Bridge

: Inaugurated in 2017, this bridge spans nearly half a kilometer in length

: Quite a bit of this 22km stretch from Europahütte to Zermatt was pretty dangerous with crumbly, precarious paths set over sheer drop-offs

: Then a bit further on from where we were in the previous photo, tumbling rocks are said to be a pretty big concern and this here sign is advising all hikers to stay under the manmade ledge that helps prevent people from getting bludgeoned

: This part of the aforementioned protective ledge was so damaged from falling rocks it looked like the bombed-out roof of a building in a warzone

: One of the tunnels we were supposed to pass through (normally about 7 or 8 feet tall) had also been damaged by rockfall. Here you can see there’s only about two feet of clearance at the end of this tunnel. So, the two options you had of getting around this little obstacle (barring the option of turning back) were either getting down and crawling through it or climbing over the steep terrain with loose rocks on top of the tunnel. We opted for the latter.

: A view back towards where we’d walked from

: I don’t know what was going on with the lighting here, but I remember this one flower looking like it had a spotlight shining on it

: View of the Matterhorn (4478m) looming in the distance with the town of Zermatt – our final destination on the Walker’s Haute Route – nestled in the valley below

: Instead of descending into Zermatt on foot, we decided to try a ride on this funicular railway built into the interior of a mountain that runs the approximate 4.5km and 650m down into town from Sunnegga

: It was at least 80 degrees Fahrenheit during our last day on the trail and I ran out of water well before we reached town. So here we are in Zermatt on a mission to find the Migros Supermarket from where we planned to get the cold refreshing drinks that we’d been dreaming about for the past several hours.

: After we got our drinks from Migros, we wandered across the street and noticed these tennis courts. We ended up just sitting down and chilling right here for a good couple hours before we decided to get off our asses to go find our hotel and shower up for dinner.

: The Matterhorn at sunset, as seen while we walked to go get a well-deserved dinner to celebrate our completion of the Walker’s Haute Route

Intro

Day 1: Chamonix to Argentière (8.8km)

Day 2: Argentière to Trient (14.9km)

Day 3: Trient to Champex (15.4km)

Day 4: Champex to Le Châble (14km)

Day 5: Verbier to Cabane de Louvie (14.5km)

Day 6: Cabane de Louvie to Cabane de Prafleuri (11.1km)

Day 7: Cabane de Prafleuri to Arolla (18.5km)

Day 8: Arolla to La Sage (11.2km)

Day 9: La Sage to Barrage de Moiry (12.7km)

Day 10: Barrage de Moiry to Zinal (9.6km)

Day 11: Zinal to Gruben (17.4km)

Day 12: Gruben to St Niklaus (17.4km)

Day 13: St Niklaus to Europahütte (∼13km)

Day 14: Europahütte to Zermatt (22km)