Some free time…
The first of seven free days was spent mostly in my apartment, organising, washing clothes and resting. Later I rock climbed with Henri and his wife, Marie, on Barbarine, near the Swiss border before Martigny. Three hard pitches on Autoroute Blanche were climbed, before Marie’s last winter skiing injury to her leg and foot caused too much pain to continue. We abseiled off and returned to base.
Next morning, Henri picked me up and we drove to over to Switzerland, to a crag called Pissvache above Martigny. There we climbed a six pitch route called Meirville que Dalles, a superb but quite stiff route, with two 6A pitches and the rest 5b and 5c. Great climbing, but tough for the grade I thought?.
I travelled down next morning to Henri’s place in Plateau du Passy and socialised with Marie and him. I stayed overnight as we planned to go climbing together at Annecy the following day.
Unexpected work commitments for Henri meant we couldn’t all travel to Annecy together. With a later rendesvous planned, I drove to Bernard Dumerest’s house in Annecy le Vieux at mid-day. Later on, I climbed with Bernard on Zig-Zag, a pleasant 5-pitch on the cliff overlooking the Annecy lake and reached from the Col du Contrabandiere. That evening, Bernard and I met up with Henri, Marie, Christophe Dumerest, Bernard’s famous son, and Chris’s partner Timour. Bernard’s partner Chantel joined our dinner party later. A superb evening meal was taken at the lovely Cloches restaurant in Annecy le Vieux. Good conversation and socialising, especially with Christophe being there. A very hard and tough climber, he was moving his belongings that night from Grenoble to Villiars, just outside Annecy so the wine didn’t flow too much. I stayed over in Annecy le Vieux for the night.
I drove back in the morning on the normal roads to Argentiere. At one pm I went bouldering for an hour and a half at the Col du Montet with Rob, David and Amanda. We all retired for coffee to the Office when the rain started and then me to my apartment. A wet afternoon with heavy rain materialised. There was a gloomy forecast on the internet as well.