we travel, then walk, on a budget
Following our day and hike with Rose this past spring weekend, we were on our way back to SW Virginia. Since the drive on I-81 can be quite monotonous with the heavy traffic, we decided to stretch our legs and arms out with a hike and some scrambling.
Previously, I had covered Sharp Top, one of the two peaks making up the Peaks of Otters. This is one of the more popular spots along the Blue Ridge Parkway. Earlier this year, Meg, Mark, and I headed up the second peak, Flat Top (FT) and tacked on an addition loop to the Fallingwater Cascades (FWC). Read More
Living in Southwest Virginia and around Virginia Tech, majority of the day hikes we can feasibly do are around a 3 hour radius. We don’t get to the trails out in Northern Virginia much, but recent events will have us exploring there more often now. Read More
Two years ago, we found a cheap COPA fare down to Santiago de Chile for spring break. Of all the places available to us, we went for Patagonia and it has remained one of my favorite trips. Crossing over Paso John Gardener to the magnificent glacier grey was beyond words, though I tried my best. It was my favorite viewpoint among all the places I’d seen to that point. There was also something so simple as getting off the plane and hitting the trails for a week. That feeling was especially strong for me this past spring after the mega planned New Zealand trip a few month before. All these factors combined to motivate me to head back to Patagonia once again when we found another sale to Santiago de Chile, this time we were headed to the Argentinian side. At the end of it, I came out with a new favorite trek.
Recently, airfare between Europe and United States have been on an all-time low driven by budget airlines like WOW, Norwegian, and Level even in the summer high season. With the ease of the trans-Atlantic commute and the beginning of summer hut to hut trekking season in Europe, I thought it was appropriate to jump back in the time machine to June 2014 and write about the time we did a segmented Walker’s Haute Route trek. As with my previous report about the past, my information might be dated now. Please cross check all the trail information with reputable sources.
Before I get started on the report, a key aspect to keep in mind is that the Walker’s Haute Route is really sections of different hut to hut hikes that was put together to fit the 2 week holidays Europeans, especially Brits, have by Kev Reynolds and the Cicerone guide books. There are many, many different alternatives you can take or loop together. The number of trails in Switzerland is pretty astounding, though it fits since the entire country is pretty much just glacier carved valleys.
A unique aspect of our trek was that we started the hike in mid-June, which was before the official Walker’s Haute Route season that year. So we had to mixed and matched different sections of the trails around, hence the segmented nature of this trip.
This post is part 3 of our New Zealand adventures over the holiday break during December 2016 to January 2017. You can also navigate to the other sections among the different posts below.
This post is part 2 of our New Zealand adventures over the holiday break during December 2016 to January 2017. You can also navigate to the other sections among the different parts below.
