Day 14 – But wait, there’s more!

Today’s adventure begins on the Port de la Peyre Saint Martin, a mountain pass on the border of France and Spain, just below and east of the mountain Balaitous (a good name for a dragon).

I awoke in the shadow of the mountains, and so it was pretty cold. There is still ice and snow all around where I was camping (in late July), if that helps explain how cold this valley was!

I packed up and set out for the next mountain pass separating me from the Mediterranean Sea, Col du Cambales. The traverse was rough, mostly on loose scree (like gravel mixed in with all sizes of rocks) and ice. The ice was especially nerveracking because I don’t have any snow gear, and because it was early in the morning, meaning the snow was hard as ice and it is very easy to slip and slide down to your death, or break a bone or something. None of which sounds appealing to me.

So I took my time on the icy traverses, meticulously kicking my boots into the ice to carve out steps, until I was confident that the next step could support my weight without fail. It took me about 30 minutes of this act to get across about 50 feet of ice. I was more worried about this first ice sheet, because I couldn’t actually see the bottom of it, which usually means it gets steeper as you go down it, which means you gain that much more speed if you were to fall and hit whatever is at the bottom with that much more force. Ouch. I dont even wanna think about it!

Anyways, I made it across the ice fields, exhausted from all the kicking, and had to climb a huge steep mountainside of loose rocks to get up to the Pass of Cambales. Easy enough.

The view on the other side was pretty alright, by Pyrenees standards. I was more excited about another fact: after climbing all the way up here to 2,700m, I get to slide down the ice on the other side of the pass, which is really fun, and a quick way to get down fast!

I continued on down past some very scenic lakes, the Lacs du Cambales.

Then I made it down in the forested valley, to the refuge Wallon.

After that, it was a long uphill to the Lac de Arratille, where I took a (very brief) swim in the glacial meltwater to cool off! It was hot on the way up from the valley in the afternoon sun. I once again fell in love with the colour of pristine glacial lakes. I wish all water could be this color.

I carried on from the lake, up towards the Col du Arratille, where there was a secret surprise lake just below the col! Ugh! There are so many glacial lakes! I’m in heaven!

I passed the col and got my first view of the famous mountain Vignemale, which has a commanding presence in this valley.

After a long ridge walk, I came to the last col before the Gaube valley, where I settled down to camp for the night. There were a ton of people down in the valley with the same idea! I decided to keep up high on a bluff, as I’m not a fan of people noise right now, especially since I go to bed so early, usually as soon as the sun goes down around 10.

All in all an awesome day of lakes, mountains, and forests. Tomorrow, I will make it to Gavernie, where I should meet back up with Robin, who is all recovered now! Yay! We’ll take a good full zero rest day before tackling the next 7 days of the HRP, which are billed as the hardest part of the whole trail. We’ll see about that! Stay tuned!

Ps just when I thought the view tonight couldn’t get any better! I saw this little arc of white appear above one of the mountain peaks. The moon rose right above Vignemale! Just getting to watch the moon slowly unveil itself from behind this beautiful massif of peaks, made me feel very present here. It was a cool moment to experience.