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Cheating for the goods

One car was driven to les Houches train station while another went all the way up to Flatiere with the bikes.  October shuttling at it's best. Cheating some might call it.  I've ridden all the way up several times before, but I'm not doing it on a DH bike!

We were on our way to get access to some of the best out of season trails Chamonix and Servoz Valley has to offer.  It was still fairly warm so t-shirts and shorts were order of the day as we hung onto our last bit of summer before heading onto the leaf covered Autumnal forest trails.

On the way to les Grosse Peirres the all-mountain mini ridge line pedalled and flowed ok on big bikes and we battled the super slick roots with ease as well as the poisonous mushrooms.

At the left turning you enter a descent section with some of the best switchbacks ever. Some are flat, and some have almost natural berms and jumps out of them.  It is a superb lower alpine trail that is great on any bike as it never gets too technical except for the big, ever-wet rock slab half way down.  If your good with a map you can get to this descent from Brevent/Aig des Houches and really ramp up your vertical descending into Servoz.

The next section is a long hike-a-bike traverse from just above the hamlet of Montvauthier.  I don't think it see's much foot traffic, and I've never seen a bike track on it except of groups I've been with.  After some carrying, and traversing your treated to two very technical rock slabs which today we didn't do due to the green moss covering them.  Scared, yeah, but just walking over them was slippery enough.  This then drops you straight into a steep rock and root chute which is again nearly impossible to get down and around.  Perfect for us to session! And for Tom to clear with a small dab!


And then its time to let go of the brakes all the way down to Servoz at 845m on more superb forestry alpine singletrack. We had alittle bit of time before our train back to les Houches so we pushed back up the last section as if we were back in an English wood, where we sessioned a natural jump several times trying to get a good photo. A little push further and it was time to let go of the brakes back for our second run down.  We arrived with a few minutes to spare at Servoz train station, muddy, but happy and time for our last bit of cheating to get the cars back!

Uphill rode: 10 metre's-ish
Uphill pushed: about 1km's distanace
Vertical descending: 800m worth of goodness!
Downhill pushed/carried around: 2 rock slabs...maybe next time...
Kilometre's driven: 8-ish

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