TMB Day 2 - Auberge du Mont-Blanc to Gite Alpage de La Peule (Switzerland)

 The Original Plan

Estimate Mileage	22.8 miles
Climbing	7,336 feet
Descending	-4,724 feet
Highest Elevation	6,797 feet

How It Actually Went

This picture sums up the amount of tension and frustration I probably caused everyone the following day when the "loose" plan had trouble materializing. We were up and out the door by 5:30 am to try and catch a bus to <someplace close to La Fouly>. I again slept like shit and was still feeling the stress and fatigue from the day before. We were trying to pool our collective international travel experience to help interpret the bus schedule that would get us from Point A to Point B. Two or three different apps and a few bus stops later, we managed to piece things together.

The look on everyone's faces...

Our European public transportation cred leveled up this day. We would end up taking a bus and a train before ending up in Orsières. We still needed another bus to get to La Fouly but we had time to spare so we went wandering around town looking for a place that served breakfast.

We ended up at a little place called Café-Restaurant Quai de l'Ours. We literally smashed the breakfast buffet of breads, croissants, nuts, jams, Nutella, eggs, fresh cheese and fruit. 7 hungry dudes with American appetites destroyed the buffet for all the other customers! I'm pretty sure we ate our weight in croissants! Well, Shane did at least. #SorryNotSorry

Our final bus ride would deposit us in La Fouly (Switzerland). From there, it was a 5-mile hike to the lodge...but not without some climbing of course! For the most part, the trails were in good shape and the grade wasn't too bad until we got closer to the lodge.

Gite Alpage de La Peule

Coming into this lodge you could tell that this was a popular place. Tables lined the front of the property packed with hikers...food, snacks, soup and beers! Amazing! Let's not forget the cattle roaming around the entire property either. It wasn't until later in the day (or maybe even the next) that we realized that this was also an active dairy farm. Pretty sure the cheese, ham, bread, butter, milk and cream were ALL locally sourced from the good folks eating the grass out front. Love that!

We arrived around 1-2 pm and decided to sit outside for a while before checking in. Shane noshed on a huge baked ham sandwich (which was neither baked nor a regular-sized sandwich). It was at least 4" tall - 2" of that being just the bread slices! The rest of us drank our calories (in the form of beer) and then checked in to get showered, unpacked and ready for dinner.

Gite Alpage de La Peule was a bit rustic but still had some modern touches. They're making sandwiches, serving beer, wine and soup to weary travelers so how rustic can they be! The beds inside were in good shape and often stacked 3-high...which can make folks nervous but there were no incidents in this lodge.

There were ample wash closets and a few showers for guests along with solid Wifi for guests.

Dinner (much to Shane's dismay), turned out to be that same baked ham sandwich...just open-faced and smothered in...guess? More cheese. There was a delicious fresh fruit sorbet for dessert. Breakfast the next morning was a combination of bread, cheese, jams, mueslix, coffee and some fruit. It was all amazing...

Amenities - 6/10

Food - 6/10

Location - 7/10

Day 2 Strava link

Looking Ahead

Tomorrow would be a bigger mileage day as we headed from La Peule into Courmayeur, Italy. We felt like we were finally getting our trail legs under us and figuring out both the lodging and public transportation.

--> Day 3: Gite Alpage de La Peule to Gite le Randonneur du Mont Blanc