Last Sunday, it was time once again for a brisk snow shoe hike, because the wind and snow were too severe for cross country skiing. There was also a high risk of avalanches. Therefore, the choice was made to take a relatively safe trip from Le Mont, above Abondance, to Ubine. This small village consists of a refuge, a small restaurant, a church and a few farms. This village is inhabited in the summer, but now in the winter, the village is abandoned. From the parking area, a lovely, but also fairly steep path leads you up the mountain. Past the chalets of La Plagne du Mont, you then arrive at the similarly named mountain pass. From there, the trail bends a bit further to the right through the woods and up above the alpine pasture. After a few hundred meters, the path once again veers to the left, taking you back into the woods and the path (insofar as you can see it) emerges from the woods above a rock face on a steep slope that runs towards Ubine. The area lies under a thick pack of snow and beneath the imposing north face of Mont Chauffé. There was nobody there yet, so it was time for a break after all that hiking through the deep snow. After that, it still took a solid hour to get back to the mountain pass, not using the same route, but through the woods beneath the path on the way, arcing back to the Col de la Plagne du Mont. Once we arrived there, the sun began to set rapidly and when I arrived at the chalets, it was definitely time to put on the headlamp to walk the last kilometer back to the car. All in all, it was another wonderful trip!
