Le Grand Galiber from Pont d'Alp
Trail photos
Author
Trail stats
- Distance
- 12.21 mi
- Elevation gain
- 5,095 ft
- Technical difficulty
- Difficult
- Elevation loss
- 5,095 ft
- Max elevation
- 10,579 ft
- TrailRank
- 38
- Min elevation
- 10,579 ft
- Trail type
- Loop
- Time
- 8 hours 38 minutes
- Coordinates
- 2557
- Uploaded
- January 7, 2019
- Recorded
- September 2018
near Le Lauzet, Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur (France)
Viewed 190 times, downloaded 14 times
Trail photos
Itinerary description
Plan was to tackle a circuit of the Arete de Bruyreres followed by the Aiguillette de Lauzet.
The guide book warns of a vertical scramble leading up to le Grand Lac, but as usual with these guide books they overplay the difficulty – the assisted section up to the lac was straightforward and no more than a simple grade one scramble. We soon arrived at Le Grand Lac in its spectacular setting next to a sharp blade of rock known as the Arete de Bruyreres.
We followed the path around the Lac, but somehow in the excitement we both missed the path up to join the GR57 higher up to take us around the arete. Once we realised, we stopped to check the map to find we were on the way to le Grand Galibier on an unmarked path (i.e. not on the map) leading up to the Crete de la Ponsonniere, west of the Col de la Ponsonniere. Rather than backtracking to le Grand Lac to pick up the path, we decided to continue onwards to try to summit the west peak of Le Grand Galibier.
We were a little apprehensive as we had no guide book for this and the 1:25k IGN map is patchy - I had done a little online research earlier in the week and knew from reading the forums that we just needed to follow the blue markings and we should be fine.
Our faint track joined the path rising from the Col de la Ponsonniere just above Lac Blanc. We followed the cairns guiding us through very rough rocky terrain to eventually find the blue markings guiding us to the final scramble up to the west summit – again grade one and not too difficult. Absolutely breathtaking views from the summit – we were totally surrounded by huge mountains in all directions and possible to see the Col de Galibier below.
We carefully retraced our steps through the rocky terrain - quite disorienting in parts as there are too many conflicting cairns and the blue markings are not visible on descent.
Picked up the GR57 at the Col de la Ponsonniere taking us to the col on the shoulder of the Arete de Bruyreres. From here we picked up the original route leading us back to Pont d'Alp.
Superb unplanned route today. Great to summit such an iconic peak and will be back to do the east summit another time.
Marked the difficulty as difficult due to the length of the route combined with the level of ascent and the route finding difficulties on the return.
The guide book warns of a vertical scramble leading up to le Grand Lac, but as usual with these guide books they overplay the difficulty – the assisted section up to the lac was straightforward and no more than a simple grade one scramble. We soon arrived at Le Grand Lac in its spectacular setting next to a sharp blade of rock known as the Arete de Bruyreres.
We followed the path around the Lac, but somehow in the excitement we both missed the path up to join the GR57 higher up to take us around the arete. Once we realised, we stopped to check the map to find we were on the way to le Grand Galibier on an unmarked path (i.e. not on the map) leading up to the Crete de la Ponsonniere, west of the Col de la Ponsonniere. Rather than backtracking to le Grand Lac to pick up the path, we decided to continue onwards to try to summit the west peak of Le Grand Galibier.
We were a little apprehensive as we had no guide book for this and the 1:25k IGN map is patchy - I had done a little online research earlier in the week and knew from reading the forums that we just needed to follow the blue markings and we should be fine.
Our faint track joined the path rising from the Col de la Ponsonniere just above Lac Blanc. We followed the cairns guiding us through very rough rocky terrain to eventually find the blue markings guiding us to the final scramble up to the west summit – again grade one and not too difficult. Absolutely breathtaking views from the summit – we were totally surrounded by huge mountains in all directions and possible to see the Col de Galibier below.
We carefully retraced our steps through the rocky terrain - quite disorienting in parts as there are too many conflicting cairns and the blue markings are not visible on descent.
Picked up the GR57 at the Col de la Ponsonniere taking us to the col on the shoulder of the Arete de Bruyreres. From here we picked up the original route leading us back to Pont d'Alp.
Superb unplanned route today. Great to summit such an iconic peak and will be back to do the east summit another time.
Marked the difficulty as difficult due to the length of the route combined with the level of ascent and the route finding difficulties on the return.
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