For the novice or even competent adventurer, visiting a dedicated outdoor adventure destination can breed insecurity.
There’s only so many carabiners (climbing), fluid suspension forks (mountain biking), carbon fiber wheels (road cycling) and spandex (power shopping) that one can encounter before introspection sets in and you start wondering, am I strong enough? Am I fast enough? Is my credit card limit high enough?
Not so in Chamonix, France. Located just over an hour’s drive or train ride southeast from Geneva – or six hours southwest from Paris – the Alpine town straddles the Swiss and Italian borders, nestled at the southern base of Mont Blanc, the highest mountain in the Alps. For complete area, visit the Chamonix Mont-Blanc website.
Despite world-class hiking, rock climbing, skiing, ice climbing, mountain biking, electric biking, paragliding, whitewater rafting, high-end shopping and even summer luge-ing (!), there’s a quiet confidence and humility in Chamonix that make everyone feel welcome here, freeing them on an uninhibited pursuit of their bucket list of active experiences.
Luge: It's not just for Winter Olympians in spandex. (Photo: RAPHOZ pierre/Chamonix Tourist Office)
The first thing you notice when you arrive in Chamonix are myriad small groups of purposeful activity. Hikers march in sync, en route to one of the dozens of well-marked trails; mountain climbers arrive at a gondola station, pick axes in hand, ready to conquer a rock or ice challenge; and cyclists set psych themselves up to conquer the famous mountain passes of the Tour de France. The three-week race heads into the Alps for its final three mountain stages beginning Thursday, July 25. That’s where the winner – and possibly the first French champion since 1985 – will likely emerge before heading for the finish line in Paris on July 28.
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