Mountains

This has nothing to do with crafts, but I really wanted to show off all our amazing mountain pictures from our visit to Mt. Blanc. That's right, I'm still going on about my honeymoon and we haven't even got to London yet! I think Mt. Blanc was my favourite place because it was so beautiful everywhere and I love hiking in woods and (apparently) on mountains. I've never been on a mountain before and I can't wait to go back.

When we arrived in the afternoon it was very cloudy and it soon began to rain. The picture at the top is the view from our hotel window. We could see glimpses of the mountains and even a snowy glacier right from the balcony! But it was so frustrating having clouds covering everything and it really began to pour in the evening. We spent quite a while walking around town looking for a raincoat for me.

The second day things cleared up a little and we took a train up the mountain so we could see the ice caves and this glacier:From here we did some hiking and even saw a marmot hiding under a rock. It was very scenic despite the foggy clouds that were still lingering.
I love this view of the mountain because it looks like it could be in Narnia.
Lucky for me, Bradley LOVES maps and did all the navigating so I could just follow his lead. He bought a fantastic map at the tourist place that had details of all the hiking trails throughout all the mountains that surround Mt. Blanc on either side.
On the second day it was still overcast so we went hiking again in forested areas of one of the mountains across the valley from Mt. Blanc. The scenery really looks similar to forests in Canada.
There are chalets up in the mountains where you can stop and have tea and cookies or drinks and a meal. The chalets are quite picturesque but there was a sign asking us not to take pictures of the house. On a clear day this picture would have had snow-capped mountains in the distance.On our way down the mountain we came across a field of blackberries. I picked lots of them (I love picking berries) and we had a picnic of baquette, goat's cheese and berries. We were in the habit of having baquettes everyday in Paris so we had carried them with us on our hike!
Up until this point we had a great time but Bradley was sorely disappointed about the weather particularly as he had wanted to take the cable cars up to the peak of Mt. Blanc and there was no point going with all the clouds. So on our last day it started out foggy but by 10 o'clock we were so thrilled to finally see the sun peaking out and see this glimpse of snow-capped mountain tops.
On that day we took the train partway up the mountain then did a five hour hike across to where you take the cable cars. It was so beautiful!I did not realize how goofy my sunglasses are until seeing the photos...

This is the kind of path we were following, in some areas it was quite steep and the path was very narrow. We got a bit of vertigo in places and decided not to look down too often! Believe it or not some people were actually parasailing from the mountain tops.
The autumn colours were gorgeous... more berries...
This is the area near the cable cars - a huge snowy glacier.
Here is the view into the valley below:
And the view in the other direction:
If you look carefully you can see tiny mountain climbers in the snowy expanse of the picture below. They are the little row of dots near the bottom of the picture. This was the view from the top of the mountain once we took the cable car up.
This is the view from the top across the mountain range towards Italy. There is actually another cable car that will take you across to Italy where you can descend and spend time in a village. We had wanted to do this but it was too late in the season and that route was closed. It was disappointing but at the same time this trip looked a little scary!And here you can see how happy (and emotional) Bradley was to finally reach the top of the mountain on our final day there. Thank goodness the rain cleared up! After this we had to rush down and run to catch our next train - which we did with only minutes to spare.