It's been 4 years since I climbed some mountain with Pascal ! We kind of lost contact over the last years but it's been always like that since I know him, since 20 years !
Anyway I took a train on friday to aix-en-provence nearby where he lives now, with his wife, Marguerite.
After a quick lunch, his half broken peugeot 405 took us to the Pres de Mme Carle where the hike starts.
We stopped at the Glacier Blanc hut to enjoy a nice meal while watching the night set, blown by a crazy moon rise before the stars started to pop all over the place.
Funnily everyone in the dorm woke up at 6:30, needless to say, 2h late ! There were a group of english guys pissed off to miss their last day as they had planned a short route before leaving. No big deal for us, the warm up day was just shifted. As always we started really fast and took the wrong path on the glacier which ended up in the middle of cracks ! Interesting navigation that eventually led us on the ridge. Unfortunately we were missing some time and Pascal was paying the price for 3 weeks of twisted ankle so we didn't reach the Roche Faurio summit and went back to the Ecrin hut.
D-day, this time impossible to not wake up ! A massive bustle took up the hut at 3:30. Half an hour later the usual procession started on the Glacier Blanc.
We reached the Lorry breach (nearly 4000m) around 8am. Sounds like we had a lot of time ahead ... not so much indeed. We spent 5 bloody hours on this impressive ridge ! But it was the price to pay : the whole thing was really beautiful and exciting.
Hopefully our young legs took us down to the car (~ 1800m) fast enough to get back to salon de provence not too late for the dinner !
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