Tag adventure

Top Ten Retirement Adventures: No. 5

Reg Spittle Leave a comment

Record-setting Appalachian Trail runner Jennifer Pharr Davis said it was her favorite trek in the world. “You can do it,” she told us about the Tour du Mont Blanc during her visit to Ashland, Oregon. We weren’t as certain, but after months of nervous debate, we jetted to France, played tourists in Paris and Strasbourg, then rode two trains to Chamonix, one of the world’s most popular winter sports cities.

It was July 2016. The Tour du Mont Blanc was our greatest challenge to date. The trail guided us from Chamonix around western Europe’s tallest mountain (15,766 feet) and its massif, counterclockwise, through France, Italy, and Switzerland. Although the TMB never climbed above 9,000 feet, it offered steep tests, sections of snow, and a blizzard that we barely avoided.

The Alps treated us to a grand show as we climbed nearly 30,000 feet and walked 110 miles over 10 days. We stayed several nights in rustic mountain huts, sharing drinks and meals with adventurers from all over Europe and even a few from America. At Rifugio Elisabetta, the tiny window in our bunk room revealed a glacier.

When we quit the working world in 2012, we longed for adventure, expecting to travel by planes, trains, and automobiles. Maybe a day hike here and there. We never, I mean never, would have dreamed (or had nightmares?) about such a foolhardy enterprise as the Tour du Mont Blanc.

Never assume.

Top Ten Retirement Adventures: No. 8

Reg Spittle Leave a comment

If the most satisfying times in life are hard, then my retirement adventures would have left me content. But within a few weeks, sometimes just days, of returning home, I want more. Sue is more patient, keeping me more grounded than my heart yearns to be. But, I’ll grudgingly admit, probably better off in the long run.

Our feet have carried us more than 2,000 miles over seven distance trails, six in Europe. Our latest backpacking trek began in August 2023 and continued into October. It fills the number eight spot on my top ten retirement adventures.

Its name? It has at least three. The French Camino, the Via Podiensis, or the Le Puy Route. We battled heat like we had not seen on any trek, but when it was done, we celebrated like conquerers.

It was our longest backpacking trip yet—more than 600 miles, including sidetrips—and it transported us through beautiful French countryside, ranches, and farmland along with more villages than we could count–or pronounce. The trail has been around for more than 1,000 years and is known for the thousands (millions?) of pilgrims who have walked to Santiago de Compestella in Spain.

Our steps began in Le Puy, France, a bustling tourist town with history around every corner and a grand cathedral that has welcomed pilgrims for centuries. More than six weeks later, we arrived in St. Jean Pied de Port, at the foot of the Pyrenees mountains. St. Jean also serves as the starting point of the most famous pilgrimage in the world: Spain’s Camino de Santiago. Some, including a few we met in France, walk from Le Puy, though St. Jean, all the way to Santiago, more than 1,000 miles. There are even pilgrims who begin the traditional way, from their front door.

At a trailside stand, above, we sipped refreshing drinks on one of the few flat sections of the Camino, which snaked through valleys and over hills and mountains that tested our resolve.

When we first glimpsed the Pyrenees peaks in the distance, our reaction was disbelief. Was it really nearly the end? Had we really walked that far?