Julian Morel takes on the formidable Tour du Mont Blanc as a self-supported bikepacking loop, with all the hazards that entails.

WORDS & PHOTOGRAPHY JULIAN MOREL @ LOS.PICAROS

Like many, as lockdown stopped play, I bought a turbo trainer and huffed and puffed my way up a virtual Alpe d’Huez and around the fictional land of Watopia a few times a week.

My legs began to halt their slow decline into pipe cleaners, but sitting in a room pedalling while staring at a screen is no substitute for the mountains from either a physical or mental perspective. I made the decision that as soon as Europe reopened its borders this was the year I would attempt to bikepack the Tour du Mont Blanc.

I had read somewhere that bikes were banned from the TMB until September, so on August 31st I began the 11- hour drive to Chamonix. I arrived and went out to enjoy my last supper: half a dozen snails and a cheese fondue for two, washed down with a few pints. On September 1st, I tried desperately to pack all of my stuff into the various bike bags and backpack, but couldn’t, so I left some of it behind and spent the next half hour cycling around the outskirts of town trying to pick up the start of the route on my GPS. I was off on my first ever bikepacking trip, solo or otherwise.

Watopia had not prepared him for this

Day 1: Chamonix to Trient

34km, C 1,226m Though I felt I was prepared from an equipment perspective, after the initial adrenaline rush of embarkation wore off, I realised that I had underestimated the physical element of this endeavour. Though light, the hardtail rig when loaded with equipment, was far heavier than I was used to, and a few months of virtual biking had done little for my core fitness.

As I wrestled my bike up and over the ridge to begin the descent into Switzerland towards Trient, I got my first puncture. The Swiss side of the Col de Balme has multiple drainage ditches across the path –I must have slammed my rear tyre down onto one of these and that created a tear along the sidewall right by the rim. Deflated and faced with a long walk back to Chamonix to the nearest bike shop, I attempted to plug the hole using a device called a Dynaplug I’d recently purchased: effectively a metal plug with a multi-stranded sticky rubber tail which you jam into the hole. Thankfully, (and unexpectedly), the fix worked and I was soon descending glorious cow-lined singletrack towards Trient where I hoped to find somewhere to sleep. The Refuge Le Peuty, which has a campsite, a shower cabin and a yurt, promised an evening of gastronomy for €20. It was here, on the Swiss border, that I pitched my tent against the backdrop of pine forests and a distant glacier. After a decent three-course meal washed down with an unpronounceable German beer, I retired to my tent to a fitful night of bizarre dreams.