Real World Riding

Aaand we're back...

Just a brief chance to take a breath before jumping back into real life. I had an AGM yesterday when I got back from Geneva, James has an interview today; real life really does just sit and wait for you.

100% - you have to squeeze adventures in these days, but at life's pace they are even more precious.

This wasn't the first time I'd had everything ready to do this trip - in 2025 it was all booked and ready to go when I broke my collar bone on my last training day, and so have been rehabilitating and training since.

That was a solo plan, but with the delay, James was able to jump on, and with some advice engaged a French company (Velorizons) to do the logistics for me including arranging a route designed by local guides that differed from my original plan. This had a different feel to it, but paid off with the welcomes we had from our hosts and some amazing trail we'd never have found ourselves - so rather than 'just' the journey and the scenery, it became a top quality mtb ride as well, and being able to do it with James was brilliant as we'd shared the GR5 trip together.

And this wasn't a standalone trip. I've mentioned the GR5, which was truly epic (18 days), but I had long ago wanted to ride these two iconic trails as well as the Tour of Mont Blanc, which I rode solo about 8 years ago. So now the triple is complete.

I'd also been ill between the TMB and the next trip and so GR5 and C2Z were part of my recovery plan.

So now I have some amazing memories, and memories shared with James of things we find hard to put into words. Over this time we've both changed, and so has the world. I was so glad to have kit transported this time round and also glad that I rode the TMB when I did - Its so much busier so much later in the year than 8 years ago.

Mountain biking has moved on too, but my trusty mega has done it again and now as a mullet it has travelled some epic trails.

We're not sponsored, but I will thank the team at Greenriggcycles in Falkirk for prepping my bike for me as it took a beating, and there will be a wee video in support of some indirect support from my other job.

Final Thought? - Don't dream, plan. Now.

Rushing away from the end of a trip can mean that you don't really get to fully let the enormity of what you've done settle in.

Certainly this trip has been massive - huge days, some of the biggest days I've ever done, back to back on amazing trails and in spectacular scenery will take me a while to process.

So as part of gerring space to let it 'land' we had a planned day of riding trails around Zermatt as well as our arrival day. We may even squeeze a quick run in on our departure day too, then it's off on our quest to find cardboard boxes before very early flights home on thursday.

Epic is the only word I can use right now. Even todays stats of 43km and 4400m of descent and 900m of ascent is massive.

So, a little more to come, hopefully no dramas on our return journey, and then back to earth for the weekend.

Final Day roundup - Chamonix to Zermatt; arriving in Zermatt!!

What can I say? The trails were amazing, and the views were iconic.

In fact, the conditions and trails were so good we promptly used the lift system to access some old favourites in Zermatt once we were there.

It was always going to be epic getting here on this amazing journey and we were determined not to get here and juat rush away again, so we have another day tomorrow to head out onto the local trails ans enjoy alpine enduro riding for one more blissful dat before we need to start thinking about getting back to 'normal'.

Its.been absolutely wild, and I hope we have been able to capture some of our outrageous journey in both photo and film. Until then though.....

Chamonix to Zermatt - Day 7 overview.

Another big day today, thankfully largely in the woods for much of the climbing, but with a notable ascent in the baking afternoon sun to get us to Moosalp for our final descent.

Slightly distressingly the day began with a descent to get us to the nearest bridge across the massive gorge separating us from our final ridge. Fortu"you're latenately the quality of trail made up for the extra climbing.

First job of the day was to make our height back, on a zig-zagging route up through beautiful Swiss alpine communities, which, as a payoff; was followed by some quality singletrack traversing and descending to get us to Bürchen and a great little self service shop which we properly 'raided'.

Fired up we then continued the second climb of the day to Moosalp, on which, near the end of the climb we were overtaken by TrailTaxi and teo service busses. Oh well.

The remainder of our approaxh to Herbriggen consisted of a wild traverse so bonkers it had 2 tunnels on it, a wild switchbacking drop of almost 1500m directly to a railway station, and a quick ride on the train into Herbriggen

Outward Bound UK

Rundown of Day 6 - Zinal to Overems.

Today started absolutely beautifully, but it was also absolutely baltic (in fact we did find some frost later on)

A Spin down the valley and on up tothe beautiful village of St Luc saw us on the rack and pinion train up onto the balcony above and accessing the trails criss-crossing this whole area.

We had a lovely traverse back toward Zinal a little ways before setting out up into the upper corries and climbing up to the Meidpass at 2789m just in time for lunch.

More people on the trail than other days as we were briefly on the walkers Haute Route, including several ebikers, and a family up on the ridge.

The descent was rough, there's no getting around it but it had an amazing viewpoint over the glacier at the head of the valley.

We eventually hit the valley floor and flew down to our destination for the day of oberems; perched high on the end of the ridge we'd crossed and overlooking tomorrows final ridge to cross before reaching the Zermatt valley.

We're definitely in German speaking Switzerland, so the dodgy french will have to be parked, and we'll have to dust off the iffy schoolboy German - should be a hoot!


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Chamonix to Zermatt day 5 - Les Hauderes to Zinal.

Today was thankfully set to be cloudy in the morning as we had a significant climb to get over, helped significantly by the discover of another bus to help us clear a road climb before we settled down for a morning of climbing and pushing seeing us at the Col de Torrent somewhere in the region of 2900m.

The climb was very atmospheric, and led us to ths amazing discover of the sunny mountainside awaiting us for our descent.

For an alpine pass this was really friendly, and we were riding from the off on an amazing trail descnding into the corrie below.

We diverted from our original plan once at the bottom and headed straight for the Moiry Dam, and what Komoot lists as the beautiful descent into Grimenz. From here we were due to traverse round the mountain, but we's decided to take the Weisshorn cablecar to the top of the resort, and descend all the way into Zinal.

Bar one or two hair raising switchbacks in a set of several hundred, the descent was another notable track heading into the back of the valley above zinal.

Absolute belter of a day, and very welcoming hosts - amazing day.

Chamonix to Zermatt day 4 - Mâche to Les Hauderes

A day of two halves (and not just an up half and a down half!) Very cloudy as we started, and then as the cloud lifted, the views opened out.

We started by confusing 2 busses and a truck in the middle of Mâche and eventually blagging our way on to the bus going the right way up the valley, and then confusing the driver and getting dropped off higher up the valley than intended. At this point we realised that we'd actually scored a massive win as we could traverse round to the track we should have bssn on, but quite a way above it - bonus!

The scales were then evened out as we were charged £25 for coffee and cake (It was blueberry tart as big as your face, but still...) at the alpage near the top of the ridge.

An amazing traverse later onto the north side of the now decidedly autumnal mountainside saw us threading through several pastures which gave us a name for the day. Today was named "Cow sh # # day" as both us and the bikes were covered by the end of the traverse.

We'd been given a trail to ride to get us down from the ridge top, which proved to be absolutely amazing and with a great traverse direct to above Les Hauderes, we finished on another 5 star rowdy steep and techy switchback trail directly into the beautiful village.

Big day tomorrow, but we may have found a bus....wish us luck.

Chamonix to Zermatt day 3 - Verbier to Mâche in Val Dixence.

Not as big a day as yesterday, but it felt it with the residual aches from yesterday. There were (fortunately) chairlifts, mist and clouds, and just after we reached our destination; rain.

In between there was possibly the best trails that either of us have ever ridden. The descent to Mâche was absolutely out of this world from the crest of the ridge at Mont Rouge just short of 2400m all the way to the village at 1300m.

No aids tomorrow - It'll all be us, but it looks like a good one as we head toward Evolene.

Chamonix to Zermatt day 2 - Salvan to Verbier.

Beautiful morning in Salvan, and a crazy switchbacking gravel trail down to Martigny for a boulangerie raid and the cunning post bus up 700m of our ascent today.

Fortunately we managed to navigate the streets of Martigny in time to grab a sustantial feed before the bus arrived, unfortunately the cunning plan was killed off by the bus apparently spectacularly breaking down on the way to the station - the Bombadiers were out washing diesel and oil off the road most of the way up the mountain.

So we decided to ride the whole route up to the ridge above verbier. By mid afternoon I was regretting this choice as we topped out at around 2300m in the heat, but the 1500m descent into Verbier was well worth it.

Looks like we may be getting some weather tomorrow....

Chamonix to Zermatt Day 1 roundup.

We used public transport to the max to turn a large hot first day of riding into a relaxing (but hot) intro to the journey.

An easier first day is always a good way to gently break your brain and body into the idea that you're undertaking something large.

Picking up quality lunch from the local bakery was a great way to start, as was riding to Chamonix Praz and jumping on the train to Montroc, riding up the hill to Le Tour, and then using the cablecars to get almost to the Swiss border at Col de Balme.

I'd been here before around 8 years ago and was hoping the refuge might be open for coffee, but never expected it to be absolutely mobbed with TMB walkers - the season is much longer than it used to be, and really popular.

Fortunately we were able to traverse out from the col, and in 5 minutes were on our own for an amazing descent through mountain pastures and what turned out to be Switzerlands oldest pine forest.

We eventually traversed tbrough some of the villages here to find our lovely Gite, and to discover the amazing view.

It was a really hot day, and windless in parts so while we're not going to use public transport all the way, we'll use a little to take the sting out of the biggest day of the trip tomorrow.

The riding has been amazing.