Altitude Montblanc — Local services in Thonon-les-Bains

Buyer beware! The Tour du Mont Blanc was the fourth and most challenging self-guided multi-day hike my husband and I have taken. We were attracted to Inn Walking’s 8-day trip because of the reduced mileage and hotel accommodations. We finished the trip mid-September 2023. I expect that some of the challenges we encountered can be attributed to a busy year on the TMB and for tourism in Europe overall. Other problems are endemic to the way Inn Walking handled our arrangements and I hope will serve as a cautionary note to other travelers planning to make this spectacular trek. I explored making this trip with 17 other walking travel companies and I wish I had chosen one of them. Inn Walking is part of a travel agency called Traventuria. The accommodations they arranged on the TMB were consistently lovely and comfortable. However, communication was terse and sometimes difficult to understand, as if it had been run through a translation application. The route planning and support were handed off to Altitude Mont Blanc, Traventuria’s partner for the TMB. There is only one way to describe Altitude Mont Blanc’s role in our trip: terrible. Terrible. On Day 3 there was no route provided to get us from our hotel to the Day 4 trailhead. Had we not noticed this, we would have had a 25-mile day. Instead, we spent several hours pinpointing the problem, mapping a route, and arranging public transportation. An “urgent” email arrived sometime that day alerting us to the problem. Email is not something we check while we’re hiking. Traventuria knew where we were staying and it seems more appropriate for that kind of a time-sensitive notification to be left at the hotel desk, where we would see it upon check in. But if “urgent” information is going to be shared via email, we would have appreciated knowing that before we began the trip. In another example of cavalier route support, Altitude Mont Blanc did not alert us to the closure of the gondola we were supposed to take on the final day. When we learned of it ourselves and asked for guidance, Altitude Mont Blanc offered no option other than to add four miles on a steep gravel road to that day’s walk and wished us a “nice day under the sun.” Altitude Mont Blanc’s route guide itself was sparse and poorly translated. Alternative routes were difficult to follow. We are capable hikers and could have planned this trip ourselves. But we also are over 60 and value the peace of mind that comes with route support and trail guides. We ended up second-guessing every bit of information provided to us and spending too much time on logistics that we had paid someone else to manage. Notably, we have not been asked to provide any post-trip feedback to Altitude Mont Blanc, Traventuria, or Inn Walking. I suspect they know it would...

We booked the GR54 through Altitude Mont Blanc, who subcontracted to La Vie Sauvage, something Altitude Mont Blanc failed to tell us at any stage. We only discovered this when we contacted the first gîte to reserve picnics, and they told us they had no record of a booking made through Altitude Mont Blanc. What followed was a series of logistical issues, poor communication, and a complete lack of accountability from both companies.

The problems listed below are just a selection of the issues we experienced, not an exhaustive list. We spent a significant portion of the trip chasing down basic details that should have been clearly provided and confirmed in advance.

The correct contact number was provided at the time of booking, but somewhere between Altitude Mont Blanc and La Vie Sauvage, it was entered incorrectly. This led to missed messages and confusion around transfers.

We were told to expect private transfers, but instead were left with vague instructions, no meeting points, and last-minute guidance via gîte managers who couldn’t give clear directions. On one occasion, the instructions passed through the gîte were so unclear, due to poor coordination between the two companies, that we started our hike two hours later than planned.

The itinerary and app often didn’t match, and printed documents were outdated or incorrect.

The distances listed for the hikes were consistently shorter than the actual routes, making daily planning more difficult and adding unexpected time and strain to already demanding days.

Despite submitting dietary requirements in advance, three gîtes had no idea two of our group were vegetarian (so we paid for meals we couldn’t eat).

Promised materials (English guidebook, extra luggage tags) were missing on arrival.

Emails requesting help during the trip, sent to Altitude Mont Blanc, were ignored.

We repeatedly contacted both Altitude Mont Blanc and La Vie Sauvage during the trip to raise these issues and ask for support. La Vie Sauvage’s replies were consistently dismissive and defensive. Altitude Mont Blanc, the company we actually booked with, has yet to respond at all.

It would have been even more difficult if one of our group hadn’t spoken French. Much of the communication and fallback relied on French-speaking staff at the gîtes, making this experience particularly challenging and frustrating for English-speaking travellers. We would not recommend this trip to non-French speakers.

We booked a supported trek to ease the burden of logistics on a 10-day, 188km route. Instead, we’ve had to double-check everything ourselves and chase the basics every step of the way.

Would not recommend either company, especially if you expect clear communication, attention to detail or...

Unfortunately, our experience with Altitude Mont Blanc was completely unsatisfactory. We booked a supported GR54 trek expecting a seamless, well-organised trip to allow our group to focus solely on the physical task of the trek. What we got instead was disjointed communication, missing information, and a complete lack of ownership when things went wrong. This caused a significant amount of stress for our group throughout our trip.

Our first issue arose upon contacting the gîte for our first nights accommodation to discover that they had no booking with Altitude Mont Blanc which was very alarming. It was only then that we discovered that altitude Mont Blanc subcontracted our booking to another company without ever making us aware.

Following this there were multiple errors in our itinerary, incorrect contact details and transfers that didn’t match what was communicated to us. On one occasion the start of a 20km+ hike was delayed by two hours due to insufficient communication regarding bus transfers to hike start point. When the bus finally arrived there were insufficient number of spaces and group members were forced to sit in the boot. This is completely unacceptable. In addition three gîtes were not made aware of the dietary requirements of group members despite being told during the booking process that it would be looked after. This resulted in two of our group members being offered no vegetarian options for evening meals after 7+ hours of hiking.

We contacted both companies during the trip regarding these issues multiple times, but Altitude Mont Blanc never replied, and La Vie Sauvage took a dismissive tone in their responses and refused to even acknowledge our concerns. We would not recommend this service, especially for English-speaking travellers, as a lot of the on-the-ground communication relied heavily on speaking French especially when the booking company were consistently so unhelpful and unresponsive.

Overall an extremely disappointing experience after paying a significant amount to the company with the intention of reducing stress, when in fact it did...