Still Too Much Snow

I’ve only been running in the French Alps for a couple of months, and so far I’ve not ventured up high as the weather has been poor and there’s too much snow. However we’ve had a few weeks of fine, warm and sunny weather, and all of the snow has gone from valley level. Looking out of my office window, I can see the Grand Ferrand, the largest mountain in the area, and an ultimate goal.

However I figured the whole vertical mile to the top might be a bit much for now, so I set my sights a little lower, and decided to aim for the shepherd’s cabin at Le Fleyrard. This is about 500m up the mountains, and marks the upper limit of the treeline. From there, there is a track that traverses the front of the mountain, leading to the sheep pastures, from where it is a downhill run back into the valley via the Col de la Croix.

Le Grand Ferrand, on approach. Its looking remarkably snow-free on the pastures above the treeline.

I started the run at the end of the day, and the 4km run along the valley, along the river Büech was a joy. Late in the day, the sun was setting creating a great effect as the sun caught the trees and the snow.

Even in the valley, sheltered places still had a lot of snow, which had repeatedly thawed and refroze, making running tricky.

The snowbank above the trees covers what is another sheep grazing pasture in the summer. It feeds the Cascade de Mougious, a steep waterfall that I should be able to run up from about May onwards.

As I headed to the end of the valley, I passed quite a few walkers coming off from a day’s hike on the mountain.

The trail along the valley floor forks left. It's 1.7km to the cabin, and about 300m of vertical.

Egged on by a few ‘bon courage’ from passing hikers, I managed about another 300m of vertical before I had to turn back because of too much snow. Descending in thigh-deep, crusty snow was even tougher than climbing, and I got stuck a few times and took the odd tumble.



I reckon another 2 weeks and I’ll be able to get up past the Fleyrard shepherds cabin and up onto the Grand Ferrand proper.