Ascent of Roc D’Enfer
The Roc D’Enfer is a picturesque peak in the Vallee D’Aulps, near Morzine in Haute Savoie, France. It’s been on my ‘to do’ list for a few years now as we look up to it’s rocky outline each year we go skiing. I can tell you now…it’s not for the faint hearted as you need a good head for heights, but it’s truly well worth the effort for the spectacular views and the challenging position you find yourself in as you cross the knife-edged ridge.
It was a fabulous day for the traverse with cloudless blue skies, summer sun and a gentle breeze. The route was exhilarating to say the least, if not a little bit scary in places with the exposure and huge drops down to the valley below.
The mountain is known as the devil’s horns locally as it has two prominent summits. The highest being the first summit adorned with a silver-painted wooden cross bearing the height. The second summit further along the ridge is marked with a short granite pillar and a cairn. There’s stunning panoramic views across to the Grande Alps looking over to Switzerland and Italy beyond. It’s easy to pick out the snow-covered summits of Mont Blanc, the Grand Montets, Aguille du Midi and many, many more peaks as well as the surrounding deep wooded valleys in a southerly direction. In the opposite direction, the magnificent views down lush-green glaciated valleys leading to the glistening Lake Geneva and over to Lausanne and the Jura Mountains on the other side of the lake.
From the Col D’Encrenaz, the route takes an uphill stony track and passes a few restaurants and traditional pinewood chalets before arriving at a small cheese farm. On leaving the farm, the track continues upwards through pasture before leaving behind all habitation and reaching a col where the path splits in three directions. We left the track and continued uphill through the alpine meadow with cows grazing and the traditional cow bells around their necks producing gentle melodic tones as they moved around. It was now an obvious and slightly eroded footpath as it climbed its way steeply out onto the open mountainside before reaching a narrow stile at Col Ratty at the height of 1905m.
Again, the path split three ways; one direction heading into the beautiful nature reserve and the peaceful neighbouring valley of Graydon, whilst our path continued a high level traverse around the side of the Roc D’Enfer. The path was narrow, rocky and uneven and a warning sign reminded us of the nature of our impending adventure ahead. The cliffs were steep and imposing above as we crossed a rocky scree slope before reaching the window on the rocky ridge. You could feel the exposure now as we looked breathtakingly down over the narrow col towards the Grand Terche ski area a long way below. It was time to catch our breath and anticipate in wonderment the adventure above as the ridge loomed steeply up ahead on our left.
Onwards and upwards, the narrow path climbed the crest of the ridge like a huge dragon’s back. The adrenalin was pumping with the steep drops either side and momentarily, I lost Darren. As I looked up, I found we had taken slightly different paths. He’d stuck to the top of the exposed narrow ridge whereas I had chosen a more technical, rocky scrambly route on the north side of the ridge that was cooler in the shade and reminded me of Jack’s Rake on Pavey Ark. The two routes shortly met up on the crest, where we waited for another couple travelling in the opposite direction to pass.
The path continued along up the green rocky ridge where hands were required on occasions due to the 
steepness. We arrived at the main summit breathless but happy at a height of 2243m. It wasn’t quite as exposed here so it was the perfect opportunity to take in the picturesque views all around.
Continuing along the ridge the narrow path descended at first and then a rocky scramble led up to the second, slightly lower summit at 2215m. The exposure became more apparent as we glanced down the north-side to a fantastic rocky cirque caused by glacial action thousands of years ago. At the base of the cirque was a small dirty patch of perma-snow that hadn’t melted from last winter. We rested again on the summit for a while and ate a spot of lunch before continuing down and across the crest of the ridge with the crux still to follow.
The next section was fun scrambling out and back over two subsidiary tops; the first hadn’t seen the passage of many feet and required an ‘a cheval’ positioning over the ridge to shuffle along as it was that narrow! A little further beyond was a stark reminder of the exposure, a small memorial cross dedicated to a fallen climber certainly helped to focus the mind. The final mini-summit at the end of the ridge presented a fantastic viewpoint looking back across to where we’d walked earlier in the day. Again, it was topped with a matt-black memorial cross.
The final challenge and probably most tricky section of the day, was the rocky descent, which required a 
concentrated effort in places to down-climb. The rock was a little brittle and loose in places so care was needed before we finally arrived at a section, where a chain had been provided to act as a handrail over the weather-worn smooth limestone to aid with the descent.
The ridge became more green as the narrow path winded its way through juniper bushes and other low-lying prickly shrubs before a loose, rocky eroded path led trickily down to the Col de Foron. Now that the angle of the path had eased somewhat and we were back in the soft alpine meadow, we started to steadily run the descent. Passing through summer pastures and through grazing cattle to the summer residence of the Chalet Foron. We soon arrived on a stoney track, which meandered down the valley to the small hamlet of Le Foron below and joined a smooth tarmaced road. Darren got his second wind and took off ahead of me at a good pace for the last 2.5km. Me, I ran steadily behind on the gently ascending road back up to our start and end point at the Col D’Encrenaz.
I was happy to be back, but what a fabulous day out we’d had in the mountains 🙂
