"Our Chamonix Alpine Climbing Week is ideal for mountaineers who have attended an alpine intro course, or done some Uk winter climbing before and now want to cut their teeth on longer, more technical routes and high quality alpine summits."
Experience: You need to either have prior alpine experience, or have climbed at least Scottish II in winter and Severe on rock in the UK (or equivalent).
Included:Guiding Fees and Expenses.
Other Costs:Accommodation, food, travel and uplift ~ £400
A week of quality alpine climbing in the Mont Blanc Range. Technical summits, including 4000m peaks may be attempted. Routes are selected according to your ability and ambitions for the trip.
Climbing at 2:1 gives good flexibility to tailor each week to your particular ambitions, with typical grades in the range PD+ to AD+.
Course Base
We base ourselves in the world famous alpine resort of Chamonix, climbing in the Mont Blanc range during the week.
Sample Itinerary
Subject to weather and conditions, we follow the general format below:
Day 0 - Sun
PM, meet in Chamonix - discuss plans, sort equipment and overnight in valley.
Day 1 - Mon
Acclimatisation Climb. Ascent of a high quality mountain route and brush up on alpine skills.
Days 2 - 5 Tue - Fri
Chamonix Alpinist. A varied week of quality alpine climbing, tailored to your ability and ambitions.
Our guides select some of the finest climbs in the range, to make best use of weather and conditions. Typical objectives might include:
• Multipitch Climbs : Chapelle de la Gliere, L Edge, Contamine Mazeaud etc
• Ridge Traverses: Cosmiques Arete, Aig D'Entreves etc.
• Technical Summits: Tour Ronde, Aiguille du Peigne, Dent du Geant etc
We run all of our courses on a guiding & instruction only basis. Food and accommodation must be paid for seperately. Our recommended accommodation in the Chamonix valley is Ice and Orange - Chalet Tissières, who we will happily put you in touch with if you'd like to reserve a room. You are however free to make other accommodation arrangements if you choose (for a full hotel service, Hotel Les Lanchers in Chamonix Les Praz is another good option - Chamonix has numerous other hotels and rental apartments available at a wide variety of prices - click on 'reservation' at the Chamonix website for more details).
Travel
Chamonix is easily reached by flights to Geneva and an airport transfer, both of which are bookable online.
Ability and Experience
To get the most out of this course you need to either have prior alpine experience, or have climbed at least Scottish II in winter and Severe on rock in the UK (or equivalent). Alpine mountaineering requires good levels of fitness & stamina (see fitness level 2-3) so we advise you to prepare well in advance with days out in the UK hills or other regular exercise and some climbing training.
Equipment
We will supply you with a full kit list. All communal safety equipment (ropes etc) is provided by us. You are expected to come equiped with personal clothing and climbing equipment. For the more technical items (ice axe, crampons, harness, helmet, boots etc) local equipment hire is also available.
