Smithsonian hiking tours in Europe

According to the travel porn- I mean catalog-that I received the hiking tours are new in 2025. They look interesting.

Actually Smithsonian started offering Active Adventures (guided hiking tours) before the pandemic—-2018 or 2019. They contracted with MT Sobek, a Berkeley-based company, to provide the tours, and only offered a few. We have done guided hiking with MT Sobek—-Tour du Mont Blanc, Patagonia, and Japan——and they are great. The maximum group size of 12 is nice, although the tours we have done had only 7-10 people and that was even better.

MT Sobek also ran the National Geographic hiking tours——indeed our Patagonia guides had logo jackets that said both MT Sobek and National Geographic.

I do not know if MT Sobek still runs the Smithsonian tours, but if not, I am sure they have chosen a good provider. Maybe they will say if you ask them. I looked at the Smithsonian Tour du Mont Blanc to see if I could recognize it as one offered by MT Sobek, but while they have one that is similar “luxury tour’” with hiking in around Chamonix and Courmayeur, plus wine tasting and other cultural experiences, it is not the same as the Smithsonian one. And it is more expensive. The Smithsonian price of $5999 is very reasonable for this type of small group tour.

Which tour are you considering?

Lola, the Mont Blanc tour was the one that immediately drew my attention, but a couple of the others (Ireland, Portugal) also sound interesting. This is the first I’d heard of these. It’s so weird that I cannot find any reviews anywhere. Also, if we decide a hiking group tour is what we’re interested in, we probably should look at companies who specialize in that. I’d love to hear more about your Mont Blanc experience. Did you have a lot of rain and how did that impact the hiking?

Probably no reviews as they are just starting up again, after the pandemic. I don’t even know how successful their earlier trips were; I did see them listed in their brochure (2018 or 2019) but have no idea if they even ran those trips.

I will say that if you want to hike the Tour du Mont Blanc, that trip is not for you. Their itinerary goes to Nendez and Aosta, neither of which is anywhere near the standard RMB trails. Then Courmayeur, and the hikes there. Val Veny and Val Ferret are on the Tour du Mont Blanc; we did not to get th=o hike the latter as the trail was closed by a recent mudslide. But I do remember the hike coming in to Co=urmayeur being beautiful. Then they head to Chamonix, but the hikes there are not part of the standard TMB either; they are hikes and lift rides you can easily do on your own (we did, on a previous trip with a week in Chamonix).

It looks like a very nice trip, actually, with the nice hotels, wine tasting, food tours, museums, Roman ruins in Aosta, and other cultural experiences. But it is not a hike on the Tour du Mont circuit.

This is the one we did with MT Sobek:

https://www.mtsobek.com/trips/europe/the-alps/alps-tour-du-mont-blanc-express-hiking/

You asked about rain. We arrived in Chamonix after 10 days in Switzerland in a heat wave. WE checked in to the tour hotel, went to the pool with friends who were also on the tour, and exited quickly 30 minutes later when it started to rain. And then it began to pour buckets. What followed was one of the most amazing thunder and lightning storms I have ever experienced. I actually recorded the sound of the rain on the roof and the water pouring off by our hotel window with a video on my phone. And then it was over.

The next day was bright and clear, and we hiked to Les Contamines in good weather until the last 30 minutes or so, when it began to drizzle a bit. But nothing like the day before. And it did not last long. I needed to go shopping in town for new hiking shoes (long story, but it worked out fine) and by then the rain stopped.

Day 2 of hiking again dawned bright and clear, and we hiked up to a Refugio for lunch. It clouded up and began to rain as we started the long descent to our little auberge, our last stop in France. It wasn’t hard rain but constant. Our descent was on solid rock and the visibility wasn’t great, but our guides know the way and it actually wasn’t bad. The wet rock was not at all slippery because it had eroded in layers, like corduroy, with the ribs running perpendicular to our direction of travel, so the traction was fine (especially with new hiking shoes!). With good rain jackets and pants we were quite comfortable.

And that was the last bit of rain we had. The next 4 days we had perfect weather for hiking. It was a great trip and my husband said he would love to do it again!!! But then the pandemic hit and since then we have tended to head to the Dolomites.