Day 11: Refuge de Péclet-Polset to Modane
Wednesday 19 August 2026, 15km, 360m up, 1790m down

We woke to yet another beautiful day for our final hiking day in the Parc National de la Vanoise. The path started out from the back of the refuge, and wound around and over the nearby hilltop bringing us to the foothills of another mountain. We walked through a lunar type landscape – barren and rocky. We passed through a large area that was dotted with rock cairns. Passing this, we continued to climb but much more steeply up a scree slope to reach the high point for today, the Col de Chaviére, at 2796m altitude.

Up at the pass it was cold and windy. We had fantastic views, including, behind us, back to  Mont Blanc, the summit clearly visible in the cloudless sky. Ahead of us, we were able to make out a group of boquetin in the distance, and then saw another quite close by and completely unafraid.

From here, our way was mostly downhill, steeply at first, which was slow going, but then much more gradual as we descended out of the Vanoise NP and down a track to the town of Modane where we had started our circuit 11 days ago.

We are now in a hotel just near the station for tomorrow’s train to Milan, and have enjoyed a dinner of galettes (savoury pancakes).

Overall, we are very satisfied with the hike and would highly recommend it. Thanks for following along.