Wednesday 20/06/07

Although we slept in a nice bed I didn’t get too much sleep as I was worried about today’s walking. The guide books says ” this is the day many walkers dread, indeed  some walkers have been known to slip away down the road rather than face the Cirque de la Solitude.”

There was never any question of me slipping away down the road but that did not stop me from feeling a little scared.

We were up early as we had breakfast booked for 6am, but that was not to be as by 6.30 the hotel had not opened for breakfast.

So we decided to leave with out our breakfast, we had stocked up with bread and cheese the night before and had some chocolate too so would be ok.

I don’t work well with out breakfast so it was a very slow start made even worse as I was very worried about what lay ahead at the top of this long slow climb.

The last half hour was a very steep and rocky climb to a  gap known as the Col Perdu, it took us 21/2 hours to reach this gap. 

I remember taking a look down into the Cirque and thinking “shit” what am I doing here.

It was nothing like walking you had to climb down to the bottom using chains at the hardest parts… I shook like a leaf all the way down and Geoff even had to swear at me …lol. one false move and I felt I would be dead. so you can imagine my relief and delight when I finally made it to the bottom in one piece.

We thought this was the end of the cirque only to find that after a small walk we then had to climb out the other end with the aid of chains and a ladder at one point. Must say climbing out was far easier than climbing down.

It took a total of 3 hours to get into and out of the Cirque, an experience I will never forget.

We then had a long descent down to the refuge Tighjettu but we decided to carry on for another half hour to reach Auberge U Vallone as we had heard the rock pools were to die for.

We finally reached the refuge 7 hours after setting out.

We decided to use the Tent tonight and pitched it right next to the river and a fantastic rock pool where we spent the whole afternoon swimming and sunbathing.

( I think I had been right not to carry on yesterday and I think I just maybe heard Geoff say that the Cirque was indeed a hard day but i don’t suppose I will hear him say it again )