Chamonix, France
Tuesday, May 23, 2006
After Pari, we have moved on to the Alps where it was a bit more our speed. We took a night train down and that was quite an experience. Sleeping in these couchettes rolling around with each turn of the train. I slept ok but Erin worried too much about missing our stop. She was a bit worn out when we hit Chamonix, but the mountain views and air revived us both. Over the course of two days we saw glaciers from every angle. Below where they are pushing dirt ahead of them, inside where ice is blue and from the top where snow is forming. We saw skiers hiking off these mountain lifts tied to one another so they didnt all plunge to their deaths, and then skiing down just above where the glaciers formed. It was crazy. The skiing actually looked doable but getting there by hiking out mountain cliffs to get to the skiing might put me off a bit. These skiers were pretty extreme dudes. It would have made a great "in my day" old man story.
The coolest part of this trip was this mini-gondola that seated two people that ran from one mountain peak in France (Aiguille de Midi 3842m high to another mountain peak in Italy. In between were mountains and glaciers that we floated over. I faked like I was going to shake the gondola and erin did not think it was funny. We had hot chocolate on the Italian side and that is actually when I realized we were in Italy because I was dropping my French on this guy and he is answering me in an as yet unknown language which I figure out later is Italian.
