Route: Col des Mosses-Col de Chaud-Villeneuve-St Gingolph in France Another tough day and an easy half day to finish This map is copied from the Official Map of the Automobil-Club der Schweiz, (with their permission) which is on this link but not to scale

Wednesday 21st June Col de Chaud from Col des Mosses to Villeneuve Delicious breakfast and comely breakfast wench, unusually so for Switzerland. There was also an old French couple (with a car) and I kept bumping into them during the day. Rather a lot of road walking. I walked down to La Lecherette to take the road to the Lac d'Hongrin. As soon as it starts, one passes a large barracks in chalet style with an old Centurion tank on a plinth outside. I gave this no thought at the time and walked up the road round the North-East part of the lake musing that all I could hear was the sound of trickling water, birds and cow-bells. The lake was unattractive as half-empty which surprised me.

Lac d'Hongrin & Col de Chaud

One expects them to be down at the end of the winter but every stream yesterday was in spate and many had colonised the paths as well. Before I got to the double dam, war broke out in the direction I was heading for. This was in bursts with gaps in between, presumably while the monitors analysed what the toy soldiers had achieved with their machine gun fire and mortars. I walked across the dams and found at the far side, a notice saying my way was barred for the manoevres. So, I walked back furious. I had wasted half an hour and now had to cross the Col de Chaud on KR's route, which I had intended to avoid by going down to Roche in the Rhone Valley. The road drops 160 metres from the dam into a deep gorge and then, the pass path begins, first through cow-fields and then, steeply up through the woods like yesterday, very hot making. Part way, there was a wire fence that was almost impossible to get through. I damaged it with my ice axe & a clear conscience. Above the steep part, the path slogs through woods, frequently dropping and then becomes made up by an old farmhouse before the Col. It is 1621 metres, rather than the 1480 of the Roche route, so this day was in no way a rest after yesterday. From the pass, it drops 1250 metres to Villeneuve 375m, some of which is steep path. I now have to rest going down as well as up. The water situation was getting critical but I found a chalet over a rickety bridge with signs of occupation and labelled Refuge de la Tinière (the name of the stream). No one around until I noticed them up the hillside in hammocks. This delightful old couple from Villeneuve plied me with water and questions. It made it easier to get down. I discovered at the Tourist Office that all the hotels were on the lake. The Vieux Pecheur was supposed to be reasonable but was 80 fr for a proper bath (needed). They had a café across the road on the lake and I ate there under the canvas during a storm and feeding bread to the birds. (Beefsteak, illegally out of my diet. I did not fancy experimenting with horse when so hungry). Bruckner's stormy 8th Symphony appropriately on the radio later. The day had taken 9 hours, 10 minutes.

Thursday 22nd June 1995 Villeneuve to St. Gingolph in France The night had been quite noisy, as it was so hot that I had to have the window open. Rest days are not what they seem. It was hot and quite steamy as I set off across the marshes and various exits of the Rhone (old Rhone, canal and main river) to Bouveret (where the Cesar Ritz Hotel School is), getting bitten by the one horse fly I did not spot. I walked this section flapping my map and waving my brolly. It was interesting, as it is flat, rural and what France should look like - well tended in all respects. It is a road walk from Bouveret to St Gingolph 388m, the correct pronounciation of which I have never mastered - something like St Zhinzholf. This town is built round a stream that makes a bay suitable for steamers on Lake Geneva but the tidy-minded cartographers put the frontier with France along the stream, splitting the town in two. I walked a few metres into France and asked the male frontier thug to photo the female one unnecessarily inspecting my passport for the record. So I have now walked every inch of the way from Austria to France and feel it was well worth it.