The day after coming back from the Tour du Ruan trek, I guided two of my friends on a great, wild and off-piste hike on the Autannes ridge.

This ridge is located on the north of the Mont-Blanc massif and the Chamonix valley, south of the Balme pass, and mark the frontier between France and Switzerland. From the pass, we entered Switzerland to follow the alternative Tour du Mont-Blanc track going to the cabane des Grands hut so we could enjoy the view on the fenêtre d’Arpette pass and the Trient glacier.

Before arriving at the hut, we left the track to start hiking off-piste in the La Chaux dale. With the Pointe du Midi ridge on the north, the Autannes one on the west and the Pointe des Grands one on the south, it gave a feeling of entering a fortress. But with the Bron and the Grands glaciers on the south, minerals and stony slopes, and alpine prairies on the north the valley gathers in a single place a unique concentration of mountain landscapes. Thanks to the fact that there’s no trail going there, it is also nicely quiet (except two lost persons looking for the Balme pass…).

The top of the Autannes ridge, offers a different but magnificent panorama. South, the Mont-Blanc massif with the Aiguille du Tour, Aiguille Verte, the Drus, the Aiguilles de Chamonix and the Mont-Blanc summit; west it’s the Aiguilles Rouges massif, the Ruan, the Tour Sallière and the Dents du Midi.

We then followed the north part of the ridge to go back down to the Balme pass where our hike ended.

15 days later, I decided to go back and do a different itinerary to walk the entire ridge. I climbed it from the Balme pass and followed it to go pass the Pointe des Grands to then go down the slopes of fallen rocks to the Albert 1er hut. After the Pointe de Bron peak, the terrain changes. The ridge becomes more narrow with unstable rocks and some areas difficult to cross. It becomes more an alpine environnement as we are at the source of the Bron and Grands glaciers. But it offers great views on the Tour glacier, the Aiguilles d’Argentière and Aiguille du Chardonnet that I couldn’t see before,

and north, the Bron and Grands glacier under me.

As I reached the Albert 1er hut, I could then go close to the Tour glacier and end my hike by observing the séracs.

This hike crossing the wild La Chaux dale, it’s ridge, it’s glacier views, it’s panoramas on the Mont-Blanc and Aiguilles Rouges massifs is in my opinion one of the best – but also one of the most technical and difficult – hike in the valley.

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