Short summary -- stress test.
Dinner at the Refuge de la Coire was OK. The soup was so-so, as was the dessert and the wine, but the main course was excellent: pasta with cheese and sausages and zucchini and cream and there was lots of it... fortunately... because we were all very hungry (except for the Day One-ers -- I may have mentioned before that it seems to take a day or two for the natural post-hike state of near starvation to manifest).
There was not much doing after dinner -- a little desultory conversation, and then to bed. But not, at least in my case, to a full night's sleep. Unfortunately there were two snorers in our bunkroom. Murder was narrowly averted, but I DIDN'T SLEEP VERY WELL.
The following morning the bunch managed to be ready to leave only seven minutes later than the requested 8:15... not perfect, but an improvement. Not a cloud in the sky. The hike started off with a bracing climb of 400m or so up to the Col du Coin, from which we had immense views, especially of the Pierra Menta (a huge monolith we were heading for). Then we traversed to the beautiful and seemingly aptly named Lac d'Amour (there were a couple of tents pitched next to it from which, despite the late hour, people were only just appearing). And then there followed a second, longer, and steeper climb to a 2600m pass next to the Pierra Menta with the odd name of the Col de Tutu. This proved to be very difficult for most of the group, and I took candid photos of each as they arrived (which will be shared later once I have Internet access again).
Lidia in particular was exhausted (although in her case it seemed to have as much to do with an unruly tummy as with the climb), but Christophe and Roxane were not much fitter. In fact Christophe had to stop about 60m down from the pass to catch his breath and eat something... during which rest break he yelled up to me that he hated me and my mountains because we made his legs hurt :-).
Then came a steep little descent (marked on the map as being difficult) and this was exceedingly challenging for the three mentioned above. Lidia came last and by the time we had finished the descent and a tricky following traverse we were probably 10-15 minutes behind the others. We caught up with them because they had sat down to have lunch, and while we ate I pondered what to do.
Lidia was not in good shape. We could see the pass we had to cross (over 2650m) ahead and she wasn't sure that she would be able to do it (it did look pretty imposing). She had asked whether there was any other way down (which there wasn't really, or rather, the other ways down would take pretty much the same time as the planned route). It was clear that she wouldn't be able to keep up with the others, and moreover, since clouds were in the meantime gathering, it seemed unfair to ask them all to wait around if it meant that they would get caught in a rain- or thunderstorm.
So, I called Arnulf over, gave him the map, explained where they needed to go, and sent everyone on while Lidia and I came after.
The climb to the pass was... difficult. And slow. But fortunately Lidia's stomach began to settle and some time after crossing the pass and after a while we started to make better time. But we were over a half an hour behind the others... and the clouds got darker and thicker. Eventually it becan to thunder and the first raindrops fell. But we were once again lucky and none of the thundershowers that were around did more than brush us. (Side note: 25 days hiking on the H3H so far, and this is only the third time I have had to put on raingear... and in all three cases the rain was very light. How's that for weather planning?)
We eventually arrived at the refuge around 6:15PM... oddly enough only 15 minutes after the others. They had also had a few problems -- in particular, Roxane's knee had not been reacted well to the 1500+m of descent, so they had stopped to bandage it and for the last couple of hours Père Ephrem carried both his pack and hers (Christophe's conjugal failure due to his not being in much better shape than Roxane!). Pretty impressive of Père Ephrem, who is not a big man and of undisclosed, but clearly not particularly young, age!
All in all, a challenging day, in many ways and for many people.
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