Day summary:<\/p>\n
This was a fantastic day – tough hiking over the first pass, but not bad, and the views were fabulous.\u00a0 The Trient Glacier is astounding!\u00a0 It is sad to realize that it is shrinking so quickly due to global climate change.<\/p>\n
Here is the journal entry for today:<\/p>\n
We really weren’t disturbed by runners all night.\u00a0 We both even slept through the ambulance that came at 4:00 am (according to our dortoir mates).\u00a0 There were still runners coming through in the morning.\u00a0 The rule was that they had to be in Trient by 8:00 am, so we didn’t see a lot after that hour.\u00a0 That’s about when we left for Champex.\u00a0 We parted company with the French women and with Roland, though we knew we’d likely run into him again.\u00a0 And we did.\u00a0 The hike out of Trient and up to Le Fenetre d’Arpette was STEEP and arduous.\u00a0 We walked alongside the Glacier Du Trient – apparently much smaller than before (Barry conversed with a fellow hiker who had been here 10 years before who reported that it was several hundred meters smaller now).\u00a0 Barry claims that I can tell (my sister) Sia that I no longer have to climb Mount Whitney – the mountaineer’s route – (a trip I failed to complete several years ago) – what I did today was much more difficult and steep (though at a lower altitude)!\u00a0 We definitely had to scramble with hands a few times.\u00a0 You couldn’t really tell where you were headed until you got close enough to see backpacks sitting on the rocks.\u00a0 Kev calls this the Champs d’Elysees of the Alps because of the number of people hanging out there.\u00a0 There were day-hikers as well as through- hikers from both directions.\u00a0 We did meet Roland up there\u00a0 again, as well as Marco, a fellow from Finland.\u00a0 They were both headed short of Champex, staying at the Relais d’Arpette<\/a>.<\/p>\n After a tedious rock-jumping trek down the other side, we stopped at the Relais to use the bathroom and enjoy a diet coke before heading to Champex.\u00a0 We met Marco there and sat with him, Roland and another guy (a Jewish Russian ex-pat living in Israel), while we rested and refreshed ourselves.\u00a0 This is going to seem crazy, but you MUST stop at the Relais d’Arpette to check out the toilet.\u00a0 As soon as we figure out how, we’ll be putting in a link to the video I got with my camera.\u00a0 The toilet has a mechanism that sticks out, grabs the toilet seat and rotates it all the way around while cleaning it!!!\u00a0 I’ve never seen anything like it!<\/p>\n