Highlights of the Tour du Mont Blanc

TMB Trail 

• Completing the TMB from Les Houches to Les Houches, hiking over three international borders and completing the full official route on foot. Loved crossing the many mountain passes. The final two days were the most challenge from an endurance and exposure perspective. We did more scrambling and boldering than expected.  We were happy we did the final long descent (when it was done) skipping the cable car many other take.
• The scenery: fabulous mountain scenery, magnificent snowy peaks, high passes, pretty Alpine villages, farms, and the ever present Alpine cows in high meadows with their bells.
• Staying in the Refuges (Rifugios), a must do for a true Alpine experience and the opportunity to break bread with an international group of fellow hikers. We met some great people (like the three Australian physicians who were taking a year out of their specially training to travel the world or our Irish friend who bought us a celebratory aperitif our last day). Everyone we met was friendly, positive,  considerate, genuine. Hikers are the best people!!!!
•  The food: consistently fresh, tasty, and flavorful - and did we mention lots of cheese.
•  The Skyway cable car that  goes over the Mont Blanc massive from Courmayeur, Italy to Chamonix, France. It was truly spectacular. 
• Brilliant weather, sunny and warm with a couple of part days of light rain and one day hiking in fog (a neat experience even if we did miss some views).

What we wish we knew: Actually, not that much. Alpine Exploratory sent us a wealth of information in advance. However, for next time:

• We will book return transport in advance as we had a small issue when we learned express buses did not run Sunday.  It all worked out as we were able to "catch a ride"  with some fellow hikers as their private transport was not full. 
• Next time we will check out the Mont Blanc Skyway in more detail as we could have gone from the Italian/French border (summit) to the first French station at a moderate fee. If money is no issue you can go over the massive on the Skyway and catch a bus back through Mont Blanc tunnel.
• We will not be quite so conservative and will plan longer hikes on days we are staying in Refuges. It is pointless to get in too early as there is nothing to do but sit and wait until 7 pm dinner.  In retrospect we found that 8-9 hours hiking (6-7 hours moving) time is just about right leaving plenty of time for breaks, route finding, chatting to others on the trail etc. 
• Always remember to take soap to Refuges, some supply, some do not. 

Key points for others: 

• It is very simple to alter the TMB depending on your needs or the weather. Although we never needed to use them, we always had alternatives to shorten the route, walk at a lower elevation,  or eliminate most walking for the day.
• The TMB is doable as a single male or female.
•  The route is well signed. Some navigation skills are an asset and would be required in very low viability (heavy fog, snow). Interesting for us, the post signage always had the distance in time (i.e. 2 hours, 25 minutes). We could never understand what the source of the time measurement was but it seemed to work for us.
• There were many sources of potable or bottled water and food on the trail. All the Refugios serve food and drinks.    
•  We were able to communicate everywhere in English using only some very basic French words and phrases - mostly for courtesy.