The Swiss Alps. Kev Reynolds

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СКАЧАТЬ two small groceries, and a tourist office beside the road. The valley is broad and pastoral here; the eastern side being terraced, the lower hillsides wooded. Above the village to the north rises Mont Brulé (2572m), a walker’s summit with commanding views of the Mont Blanc range, as well as the Bernese Alps and the Dents du Midi. A path ascends the east flank of the valley out of Liddes, making for Col de Mille and the small, timber-built Cabane du Col de Mille (2472m) in about 3½hrs. From there Mont Brulé is but a short and easy walk away. Being used by trekkers on the Tour des Combins and the Tour des Val de Bagnes, as well as walkers enjoying a few local routes, the hut can be very busy – especially at weekends. It has just 36 dorm places, is owned by the Liddes commune by whom it was built in 1996, and is staffed from mid-June to the end of September (tel 079 221 15 16).

      Six kilometres beyond, and almost 300m higher than Liddes, Bourg-St-Pierre (1632m) is the largest village in the valley proper; an old place crowded just below the main road. This is about as close as you get to a mountaineering centre in Val d’Entremont, although it’s little more than a place from which to set out for one or other of the huts that serve the Combin and Vélan massifs, or to retreat to in order to dry out when the weather turns foul. It’s also used as one of the main starting points for the multi-day Tour des Combins. There’s a long-established alpine garden here, a small supermarket, a few hotels, including the Auberge les Charmettes which has dorm accommodation, and a campsite, Camping du Grand St Bernard. For tourist information go to www.verbier-st-bernard.ch.

      Above Bourg to the southeast the Valsorey tributary drains the west flank of the Combin massif and the north side of Mont Vélan, and is the way through which to approach the Cabanes du Vélan and de Valsorey. Leaving Bourg-St-Pierre an underpass sneaks beneath the main road and leads onto a minor road which cuts for a short way into this small tributary valley. After about 45mins you reach the Cordonna chalets at 1834m, and continue above the stream for another hour or so to a fork. The right branch is the one to take for Cabane du Vélan (see below), but by keeping ahead you shortly reach the Chalet d’Amont (2197m) about 2hrs from Bourg-St-Pierre. The view of Mont Vélan is impressive from here. Now the path goes up to the Six Rodzes rock barrier, ascends a gully aided by fixed chains and sections of ladder, then swings round to the east, heading for pastures and a long spur to reach the Cabane de Valsorey at 3030m, about 4–4½hrs after setting out. Owned by the Chaux-de-Fonds section of the SAC, this stone-built hut, with its direct view of Mont Vélan, is used by Haute Route skiers as well as by climbers. It has 60 places and is staffed in the ski-touring season (mid-March to May) and from July until mid-September (www.valsorey.ch).

      The ascent of Combin de Valsorey, the 4184m West summit of the Combin massif, is an obvious attraction. This is climbed either by the West Ridge (AD) via Col du Meitin, or by the SW Face (PD+) via the tremendous viewpoint of the Plateau du Couloir – the latter traversed by ski-mountaineers on the ‘classic’ Haute Route (there are alternative stages), of which it forms a key passage on the way to the Chanrion Hut via Col du Sonadon. The highest of the Combin summits, the 4314m Combin de Grafeneire (Grand Combin), is also climbed from the Valsorey Hut via Col du Meitin and the NW Face, or by first taking in Combin de Valsorey, then descending to a saddle at 4132m from where the NW Face route (see 2:3) is joined for the final ascent to the summit.

      Southwest of the Valsorey hut Cabane du Vélan (2642m) serves climbers tackling the 3731m Mont Vélan, one of the earliest snow mountains to be climbed. The initial route of approach to the hut is identical with that to Cabane de Valsorey, but when the path forks just below the Chalet d’Amont, you branch right, cross a footbridge over the Valsorey torrent and climb south in a series of zigzags to gain the hut, which is situated below the Tseudet glacier with magnificent views of the Grand Combin in one direction, and the Mont Blanc massif in the other (3hrs from Bourg-St-Pierre). Property of the Genevoise section of the SAC, this modern-looking hut has 60 places and a resident warden usually from mid-March to the end of September, although the hut may not be permanently staffed in June (www.velan.ch).

      To the southwest rises the 3202m Petit Vélan, but at the head of the glacier to the south the main block of Mont Vélan carries the frontier with a dome of snow and a complex of ridges at the culminating point of a great spur thrust out from the Grand Combin. As with so many Swiss mountains its glaciers are shrinking fast, as its moraine troughs testify, and it’s very different from the Mont Vélan known to the pioneers. But in late winter and springtime, when the snow cover is consolidated, it attracts ski-mountaineers, for whom it affords a fine ascent by way of the Col de la Gouille and Valsorey glacier. Perhaps the finest summer route from the Vélan Hut is the NNW Ridge (the Tseudet Arête AD/AD+), first climbed in 1897 by a large party that included Tom Longstaff, one of the greatest of the early Himalayan explorers. From the Aiguille du Vélan the route goes along the linking snow crest to the Dôme du Vélan and the main summit (7–7½hrs) overlooking the vast cirque of the Conca di By on the Italian flank, while the Grand Combin nearby, Mont Blanc to the west, and the Paradiso massif to the southwest are highlights in a memorable panorama. Hubert Walker called it ‘a panorama of equal magnificence with any in the Alps’ (Walking in the Alps).

COL DU GRAND ST BERNARD: A PLACE IN HISTORY

      Reckoned to have been in use since the Bronze Age, the Col du Grand St Bernard is the oldest and best-known of the alpine pass routes. Tradition has it that Hannibal crossed with his elephants in 217BC, and in 57BC Julius Caesar marched with his army across the windblown gap in the mountains to attack Martigny. The emperor Augustus built a road across the pass, and there set up a temple to Jupiter, which was sacked with the fall of Rome.

      Its earliest name was Mon Jovis, after the Roman temple, and between the 8th and 15th centuries it was regularly crossed by Rome-bound pilgrims, clerics and medieval emperors. But the pass was (and still is) prone to sudden storms and many travellers perished whilst attempting to cross, so in 1070 Bernard of Menthon, the archdeacon of Aosta, masterminded the construction of a hospice on the summit overlooking a small lake. This became a welcome haven for travellers, with the canons and lay brothers quartered there providing free shelter and food to all who requested it. These same custodians of the pass also rescued countless snowbound travellers, although the first mention of the famous St Bernard dogs was not made until 1708. (Today helicopters and sophisticated search equipment have more or less made the dogs redundant for rescue purposes, although a number have been retained by the hospice.)

      During the late 18th century whole armies crossed the pass, the most famous being that of Napoleon who, between 14 and 20 May 1800 led 40,000 troops into Italy to defeat the Austrians at Marengo. Accounts of that crossing describe the future emperor’s descent as a form of glissade: ‘suffering himself, according to the custom of the country, to glide down upon the snow.’ But as a result of the difficulties encountered in manhandling heavy pieces of artillery up to and across the pass, within three months of his victory at Marengo, Napoleon ordered the road across the Simplon from Brig to Domodossola to be made passable for artillery, and this was completed five years later.

      As for Bernard of Menthon, he was beatified shortly after his death around 1080, and in 1923 Pope Pius XI confirmed him as the patron saint of the Alps. His statue now gazes out over a wild landscape near the Italian customs post.

The Upper Val d’Entremont

      Skirting the Lac de Toules reservoir above Bourg-St-Pierre the main road is protected by a long section of avalanche galleries and a tunnel. At the southern end the old road emerges to a moorland-like СКАЧАТЬ