Of Cable Cars, Ski Lifts and Acrophobia
WALES & FRANCE 2011 - Chamomonix
We walked to Les Praz about 2km East of Chamonix, where we used our final day of cable car passes, to ascend to the Flegere Plateau (1894m) on the sunny south side of the Chamonix Valley:
with views across the entire Mont Blanc range.
It is paraglider country up there, with enthusiasts arriving by cable car, their gear in packs on their backs, on their way up the mountain to the launch site at Planpraz.
They all had that look that I recognise so well from windsurfing, intent, focused, yet faraway, as they stopped at good vantage points to assess conditions, before hastening further up the mountain to launch themselves into the thermals and to drift forever over the abyss.
At this point, we accessed the chairlift to L'Índex (2396m) to take in even better views of the Mont-Blanc range. It was my first experience of a ski lift, having not skied before and I really don't know what possessed me, given a lifelong fear of heights.
I was distracted initially, as I focused on standing correctly on the little yellow footprints marked on the platform, and then keeping my balance as the chairlift scooped us up. I then experienced pure and utter terror as we surged upwards, with no possible escape, and no lovely cable-car capsule providing snug, safe enclosure, only a totally inadequate little metal bar, between us and a plunge down the mountainside into the chasm below.
Needless to say, I did survive and we returned for another night in our B&B that evening, walking back up the hill through Les Bossons.