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Updated: June 18, 2025
In this case it is necessary to cut steps in the ice, and the two leading guides, armed with a sort of hatchet, perform this difficult and perilous task. A special circumstance makes the entrance on the Bossons dangerous. You go upon the glacier at the base of the Aiguille-du-Midi, opposite a passage whence stone avalanches often descend. This passage is nearly six hundred feet wide.
They dragged themselves upward in a worn and weary way, for they had been climbing steadily from the Grand Mulets, on the Glacier des Bossons, since three in the morning, and it was eleven, now. We saw them sink down in the snow and rest, and drink something from a bottle.
There is, as might be expected, a great deal of humbug about the difficulty of getting about in the Alps, and the necessity of guides. Most of the dangers vanish on near approach. The Mer de Glace is inferior to many other glaciers, and is not nearly so fine as the Glacier des Bossons: but it has a reputation, and is easy of access; so people are content to walk over the dirty ice.
Harris and I took some guides and porters and ascended to the Hotel des Pyramides, which is perched on the high moraine which borders the Glacier des Bossons. The road led sharply uphill, all the way, through grass and flowers and woods, and was a pleasant walk, barring the fatigue of the climb. From the hotel we could view the huge glacier at very close range.
"Ha!" quoth Giles, "they work apace yonder, and by Saint Giles they lack not for engines; verily Black Ivo is a master of siege tactics but so is Giles, brother! See where he setteth up his mangonels, trebuchets, perriers and balistae, with bossons or rams, towers and cats, in the use of the which he is right cunning but so also is Giles, brother!
From the foot of the Aiguille du Midi, at the Pierre a l'Echelle, across the Glacier des Bossons to the rocks of the Grands Mulets the distance is about a mile and a quarter, and the perpendicular increase of elevation nearly two thousand feet.
Some of the excursionists had left at a much earlier hour. Four strapping youths, with guides, had set out for the summit of Mont Blanc; a mingled party of ladies, gentlemen, guides, and mules, were on the point of starting to visit the Mer de Glace; a delicate student, unable for long excursions, was preparing to visit with his sister, the Glacier des Bossons.
It was past the middle of the forenoon of the 10th of August when, with Couttet and the porter, I left Chamonix. Dismissing my tired mule at the Pierre Pointue, which hangs with its flag nearly seven thousand feet above sea level, and high over the séracs of the Glacier des Bossons, we began the ascent by way of the Pierre a l'Echelle and over the missile-scarred foot of the Aiguille du Midi.
The guides and travellers were then bound together by a strong rope, with three or four yards between each. We were about to advance upon the Bossons glacier. This glacier, difficult at first, presents yawning and apparently bottomless crevasses on every hand.
As soon as the guides informed us that they were ready to attend us, we continued our journey to Chamouny, making another little detour to visit the glacier des Bossons.
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