French Alps Hiking: Glacier d'Argentiere

Jul 27, 2015
2 min read

Without intention, this trip to the Mont Blanc area of the French Alps has turned into a glacier chase. It is heartbreaking to imagine that these glaciers that have been existing for hundreds of years could just one day be gone. Regardless of where you stand on whether the warming of the planet is casued by man-made greenhouse gases or not, the fact of the matter is, the climate is changing and it is affecting rather adversely much of the planet, these glaciers included.

The day we were at Argentiere, for example, it was sweltering hot. And this was a week after a much hotter heat wave swept western Europe.

But not to be Debbie Downer, Glacier d'Argentiere was a breathtakingly arresting sight. The thought of how old and powerful these ice rivers were enough to carve cliffs on a mountain - it is just so mind-blowing. It was a relatively easy hike up to the panorama point where you're head-to-head with massive blocks of ice cascading down the mountain. Unlike most of Most Blanc, there are not very many tourists here so that when the glacier makes a loud thundering noise when it breaks, it echoes and completely shatters the silence.

And in that moment I wondered if the glaciers were left to tell their own story, I wonder what would they say?

Getting There

The lift to Glacier d'Argentiere is covered by the Mont Blanc MultiPass.

You have to make your way north to Argentiere from Chamonix either by train (not included in the MultiPass), bus, or car. Distance, according to Google, is 9.2 km.

Take the cable car up to Lognan and hike up to the Glacier viewing point. According to official time tables, it's 1.5 hour round trip hike.

Trail Gear Featured

Eddie Bauer First Ascent Bacon Pack like here.

Him: Eddie Bauer Travex Men's Departure Long Sleeve like here.

Layered with Eddie Bauer Travex Mountain Shirt like here.

Eddie Bauer First Ascent Men's Guide Pro Shorts like here.

Her: Eddie Bauer Travex Aster Tank like here.

Eddie Bauer Travex Horizon Cargo shorts like here.

Merci Beacoup

to the Chamonix-Mont Blanc Office de Tourisme

for sponsoring my Mont Blanc Multipass.

Traveling to Mont Blanc soon? Get your Multipass here.