Dwight Peck's personal website

A ritual annual walk to Poêle Chaud (in Switzerland)

A bracing start to the autumn season, 2013

You may not find this terribly rewarding unless you're included here, so this is a good time for casual and random browsers to turn back before they get too caught up in the sweep and majesty of the proceedings and can't let go

Not a year should go by without at least two, or even three, walks up the Pointe de Poêle Chaud (1628 meters), snuggled in alongside La Dôle overlooking Lake Geneva.

Dr Joe precedes us, as is inevitable these days, and practices his route-finding skills in the forest under the cliffs called Roche Verte (6 October 2013).

Dr Joe's route-finding skills are being challenged severely.

Eventually, however, we've stumbled our way up to the little col between the Pointe de Fin Château (1555m) and the ridge leading southwestward towards the Pointe de Poêle Chaud.

The views over the far side are not worth the effort of looking at them.

Impatient of delay

Dr Joe coaxes us upward along the ridge towards the summit.

We've been here so many times that it's almost like auto-pilot. Except that it's mostly been in winter.

A pause for reflection

Fog has its own charms

We have but to follow along. There seems to be an anemometer just peeking over the horizon there.

Indeed. An anemometer it is.

This is the amateur radio French-Swiss relay station La Glutte on top of Poêle Chaud (1628m).

And that's the famously photogenic La Dôle -- somewhere over there.

Joe spots a lone chamois not 15 metres from us, but by the time our lame Nikon Coolpix got itself fired up, he was receding into the distance.

A majestic sentinel -- but no sign of his entourage

He wants to communicate with us . . .

. . . but only speaks French.

The trail down from La Dôle down the far side

The Chalet de la Dôle below

The Chalet de la Dôle, now a mountain restaurant in summer

A couple descending the path from La Dôle, the guy yacking away on his cellphone and his friend stopping to wait for him from time to time.

The fog lifts briefly.

A wander through the forest for a good long while. We've traversed over the top of the Pointe de Poêle Chaud, forgetting that we'll now have to slog all round the base of it to get back to the carpark.

An interminable old forestry track from the old days

The Roche Verte

from SwitzerlandMobility (http://map.schweizmobil.ch/?lang=en)

Feedback and suggestions are welcome if positive, resented if negative, . All rights reserved, all wrongs avenged. Posted 16 November 2013.

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