Yesterday afternoon Bryon, Chris and I arrived back at the camp-site, feeling rather pleased with our day's efforts, to find John ad Dave looking glum. Whereas we had escaped the rain, down with them it had drizzled all day.
They had escaped to the drying room - a small bunker under the owners flat - but soon ran into difficulties .. there was only a small electric bulb in there, and it ran on a 5 minute press button timer. If you left the door open it sounded an alarm - apparently the boiler got upset with the door open.
With the tents wet out side and the prospect of more to come, we quickly came to the logical conclusion to make a break for a gite. ...
From past trips both Chris and I had used the gite de la montagne (not far away), so we quickly drove around there and discovering there was space available for the remainder of the week, we unanimously opted for the cushier option. the tents were quickly put away and we decamped to the gite (much to the camp-site owners disappointment - but he could not offer us the sheltered space.).
The gite is an old farmhouse in the middle of the pasture past the Chamonix sport centre between the main road an the back road to Les Praz. We had were all in a dortoir, for about 8, but we quickly took it over completely.
The frist night after we had arrived, Dave did some exploring to see what the facilities were, and got the surprise of his life when looking in what he believe to be a cupboard was actually the door to another dortoir, only to interrupt a couple "in flagrante" although I am not sure they realised he had made an appearance!
the rain continued when we awoke, and into the day. The best we could do was walk into Chamonix and drool over the equipment we could not afford.
The forecast was for improving and return of the sun later in the week.... already thoughts of the Chamonix - Zermatt route (or even sections of it) were rapidly disappearing.
They had escaped to the drying room - a small bunker under the owners flat - but soon ran into difficulties .. there was only a small electric bulb in there, and it ran on a 5 minute press button timer. If you left the door open it sounded an alarm - apparently the boiler got upset with the door open.
With the tents wet out side and the prospect of more to come, we quickly came to the logical conclusion to make a break for a gite. ...
From past trips both Chris and I had used the gite de la montagne (not far away), so we quickly drove around there and discovering there was space available for the remainder of the week, we unanimously opted for the cushier option. the tents were quickly put away and we decamped to the gite (much to the camp-site owners disappointment - but he could not offer us the sheltered space.).
The gite is an old farmhouse in the middle of the pasture past the Chamonix sport centre between the main road an the back road to Les Praz. We had were all in a dortoir, for about 8, but we quickly took it over completely.The frist night after we had arrived, Dave did some exploring to see what the facilities were, and got the surprise of his life when looking in what he believe to be a cupboard was actually the door to another dortoir, only to interrupt a couple "in flagrante" although I am not sure they realised he had made an appearance!
the rain continued when we awoke, and into the day. The best we could do was walk into Chamonix and drool over the equipment we could not afford.
The forecast was for improving and return of the sun later in the week.... already thoughts of the Chamonix - Zermatt route (or even sections of it) were rapidly disappearing.