mont blanc success!

9 Clients and 5 guides, it was always going to be a tall order, but it worked. There were summits, friendships made and heaps of fun had.

James chilling in the evening sun, the Chardonnet behind.

The first few days were spent up around the Albert 1er and then over to the Trient Hut in Switzerland. The weather was less the perfect but we all had a great time up there, even Matt who managed to fall into a crevasse on Day 2. (He was safely pulled out!!) The night in the Trient hut was quite exciting. A major storm system passed overhead at around 3am, the electrics were rather impressive to say the least. We have to say a huge thank you to Annie and Graham from Adventure base who drove all the way round to Champex to pick the team up after we changed our plans on Day 3.

The girls on top of the Petite Fouche

Despite fresh snow the team decided to stick with the plan and we headed up to the Gouter Hut on Wed morning. The climb to the hut was great fun, some of the team were pushed a little but we all arrived in one piece with beaming smiles, the ascent was on! The afternoon was spent fine tuning our equipment before we were treated to stunning sunset that evening. Breakfast a 2.30 am is never going to be easy and the gouter hut doesn't make it any easier being at 3800m, but the whole team were heading up by 3.10am (good effort to all on that). The initial sections went really well despite the fresh snow on the route that had fallen overnight. Matt and Jim were the first to summit at 6.40am, an impressive time guys! About an hour the bulk of the team arrived, Sue and James were there with their guide Krister as were Sue and Rebbecca with Dave. Lori with Jonathan and Laura had to turn back a mere 500m short of the summit, as did John and myself. (John was in rehab from a knee operation only 6 weeks ago so even getting to the hut was impressive). The descent seemed to take forever as it always does but a cold beer was waiting as was the Adventure base hot tub for those tired limbs.

Sue and James on top!!

Our final day was spent rock climbing, and what a fun day, the sun was out and the gang knocked off loads of routes. A special mention to Matt and James who climbed pretty much all the routes there an impressive achievement after the effort of the week's mountaineering. I speak for the whole team when I say we had a great week. All the guides had fun which is normally a good sign. For those who didn't summit we look forward to seeing them next year and for those who did, well plenty more wonderful mountains in the alps to go at Guys. From me (Kenton) a huge thanks to all the guides and clients this week, it really was a fantastic 6 days. Kenton and Team Dream Guides. The Summit Video!!