Mont Blanc hiking for the 'average' level of fitness

Exodus travels are a good company and their trip will be well organised. Does their itinerary give you an indication of what level of fitness they require and if you should be familiar with ice axe use, putting on/taking off crampons and walking in them and have some knowledge of climbing harnesses and rope techniques, all of which I would think would be required? Mont Blanc isn't the place to start learning these things if only because I believe time will be at a premium.

My friends have done it, climbed to the summit of Mont Blanc that is - a husband and wife couple, but their levels of fitness are above and beyond mere mortals like myself (I like to joke that they get me into scrapes, but more importantly, they get me out of them as well). On their attempt the wife didn't think she was going to make the summit as she was struggling with the altitude but took an aspirin and 'had a word with herself' then soloed her way to the summit. If your idea is to climb to the summit then if you have no prior experience of mountaineering then you'll need to do some beforehand I think.

However, there are routes in the area that cater for the less than superhuman level of fitness! Usually, this is the Tour du Mont Blanc, a multi stage journey that circuits the mountain at lower levels. Is this what Exodus are offering as opposed to a summit attempt? I have attempted the Tour but regrettably fell on an innocuous footpath and ended up in a French Hospital where they did an excellent job of repairing my leg - don't let this unfortunate accident put you off! I still have to go back and complete the final two stages!

I would think that if you wanted to base yourself in one place and venture out from there then Chamonix, Les Houches, Argentiere and Courmayor (sic) are all excellent bases.

Hope you can determine what sort of trip best suits your needs.

Ian

If you need an ice ax and crampons, be aware that trip Medical and Medivac insurance will exclude hazardous sports. You should get a hazardous activity rider. Alpine Clubs offer policies that cover mountaineering.

Hopefully when you say "hiking" you mean just walking in the area - summitting Mont Blanc is not something to attempt unless you have significant mountaineering experience.

I need to clarify .... I think it’s more of the mint Blanc highlights trip, not climbing the summit. I think it’s day hikes from a base in Chamonix. Exodus refers to it as a Level 3 - Moderate level of fitness ..... not sure if an average level of fitness, for a 50 year old is good enough for this trip. The summit sounds incredible but so not within my expectations for what I can do. Thanks for all of your replies and I will likely call exodus to clarify.

"Moderate" means different levels of exertion to different people. If Exodus is British keep in mind that Americans call long vigourus walks on footpahts hiking while the British call the same walking. Have you tested your "average level of fitness" at higher elevations and up and down steep gradients?

You may want to download and read the Exodus Travel fitness guide:
http://www.exodus.co.uk/assets/pdf/Exodus_WT_Fitness_Training_Guide.pdf

Also interest to note that Exodus recommends:

"Please note: On this trip it is essential to have helicopter
evacuation cover within your travel insurance."

Getting into a proper mountain fitness level can be a challenge if you don't live near real mountains (over 5000 ft ASL) with long ascents. I remember encountering Floridian bicyclist on a ride in California who trained back home doing short intervals over a highway overpass. Wind sprints are not the same as 8 mile bike rides up a 8% grade.

We haven't used them yet, so I cant offer a review, but we are looking at Active Adventures, a New Zealand company, for a Patagonia trip next year, and they also have a Mont Blanc trip that looks great.

I ran into a couple in Chamonix who were doing a ten day guided hike in the area. They didn't do any mountain climbing but walked lower trails and stayed in various barns with a guide and a van to carry their bigger bags. Unfortunately, I don't recall the name of their guide.

At altitude, anytime of year, you will need crampons, axes and ropes to hike as well as a guide to keep you out of crevasses. I was there in September and saw multiple groups hiking with guides as well as smaller groups of experienced mountaineers doing various routes.

We just did the Tour du Mont Blanc as a group guided hike with REI Adventures and loved it, both the hike and the guides. Our hikes were 8-14 miles a day, with elevation gains ( and/or loss) of up to 4400 feet. That rates as a strenuous hike, but everyone in our group was capable. (fWIW, I am 71 and my husband is 74.)

I looked at the Exodus fitness page linked by Edgar and cannot make any sense of it. The meaningful stats are distance, altitude, and elevation gain each day. If you are an experienced hiker, as you should be to take on a trek like this, you will understand those numbers. Talking about it in terms of minutes of exertion and resting is meaningless.

We have friends who have done this unguided, but we were very happy we chose a guided hike. There are multiple routes and while all are well -signed, it would be easy to take a wrong turn. And some paths are better than others. Our guides deemed our group capable of challenge, so took us off the beaten path on some higher, sometimes off-trail paths that were beautiful and so much fun. Also there was a section of the route between Italy and Switzerland that was closed by mudslides, so our guides were able to plan an alternate route.

If you are looking for a center-based experience instead of a trek around Mt Blanc, you can simply stay in Chamonjx and do dayhikes, no guide necessary. We did that a few years ago ( more like ten), staying in a rented chalet for a week, and that was nice too.

But the trek around the mountain, from France through Italy and Switzerland and back to Chamonix, was our favorite. We did not walk every meter of the way, but we did the best parts, and enjoyed good company while doing so.

The Exodus fitness & training guide is the UK tour operator's suggestions as to how to prepare for their guided trekking tours. The training guide is not a description of the tour itself. The Exodus guide is prefaced with: "Walking, fitness and nutrition suggestions to help you prepare for a Leisurely to Moderate walk, a Challenging trek or a Tough adventure with Exodus...." Exodus' Mont Blanc Highlight" trip appears to be a moving base camp trip that they rate as "Moderate".

The Exodus suggested training is mainstream in that it includes both a build up of "overdistance" (Long Slow Distance) exercise and "intensity/interval" exercise over a multiple week period. Overdistance training is intended to train you muscle cells and heart to efficently generate energy and use oxygen. This is what your body needs to trek for multiple hours covering long distances. The Exodus training guide calls this "Long walking cardio" and their Level 1 program has their clients work up to walking "3-5 hours steady hill walking with breaks".

The Exodus guide also includes "Medium Effort Cardio" training. While not true intensity training working at levels of effort that can only be sustained for a few minutes, intensity training conditions your body (including heart and lungs) to handle shorter durations of more extreme exertion at high altitudes ("thin" air).

The key to the Exodus conditioning is "3-5 hours steady hill walking" in that mountan trekking includes distance, elevation gains (and losses) and high altitude. Walking at on your gym's treadmill at flat 0% inclines for a half hour a day is fine for general fitness but not enough to train for a mountain trek.

My concern with the training guide is that they divide their trekking offers into levels 1-9 on a wheel chart, naming them (1-3) leisurely, leisurely/moderate, moderate; (4-6) moderate/challenging challenging, challenging/tough, tough; and and (7-9) tough, tough/tough+, tough+. But they never say what those designations mean in terms of distance, terrain, and altitude gain and loss.**

And then they prescribe a specific considtioning program for Level One (1-3), Level Two (4-6) and Level 3 (7-9), still without saying what goal you are actually aiming for. But the toughest day they prescribe, at the end of Week 6 and Week 7, is a hike of 6-8 hours with at least 1000 meters of elevation gain. I would not want to head off to what they call a “tough+” hike with only two hikes of that distance and gain. I realize their program is designed for working folks who only have time for 30-60 minutes of exercise most days, but I firmly believe the best training for hiking is to actually get out and hike.

For the OP, I would suggest that if they have not done much hiking and do not know what their capabilities are, they should find a hiking club or guided hikes in their area and get about and hike so they know their baseline. And then they can figure out what additional training is necessary, if any.

I doubt the Amalfi Coast hike is offered in summer, as it is quite hot there. The Chamonix Highlight hiking looks OK, but personally I would prefer the hotel to hotel trek, along the route of the Tour du Mont Blanc. It is tougher than the one based entirely in Chamonix, however. Also look at the TMB walk offered by another UK company, HF Holidays. I will note that both these UK companies offer the TMB in the clockwise direction, which is not the preferred route. I did not understand why until we actually did it going anti-clockwise. In this direction, you depart from Les Houches by cablecar and gain quite a bit of altitude before you start walking. The scenery gets better and more dramatic each day, and the final day, as you complete the circuit by walking from Argentiere back to Chamonix you have Mont Blanc and the Aguilles du Midi right in front of you the whole way.

**Most hiking clubs and hiking tours I have seen use a designation similar to that used by the Seattle Mountaineers, where Easy describes hikes up to 8 miles with up to 1200 feet of gain; Moderate means up to 12 miles and 2500 feet of gain; Strenuous includes hikes up to 14 miles and 2500-3500 feet of gain; and Very Strenuous means more than 3500 feet.

Looking at specific Exodus hiking tours, I see they describe the Amalfi Coast as “Moderate walks at a leisurely pace”. The actual hikes are listed as 9-11 km; in other words all would fit within the Mountaineers’ Easy designation. The Chamonix Highlights trip is described as a “3” (Moderate) with hikes from 9-15 km. They do not talk about elevation gain and loss, which makes it hard to understand how difficult the walk might actually be.