Time for something a bit different. I thought that at the 3 week mark in our trip I would try to tally up all the trips on different forms of transport that we have taken so far: - taxis - 6 - airplanes - 2 - buses - 4 - Underground (tube) trains - 6 - double decker buses - 1 - scenic trains - 4 - long distance trains - 2 - ferries - 2 - hire cars - 2 (3 for Geoff) - gondolas or cable cars - 10 (14 for Geoff) - bike - 1 (Geoff)

Today was our last full day in Chamonix and we started the day with a change of plans. Geoff was very keen to go up to the top of the cable car to Aiguille du Midi, which is at an altitude of 3842 meters. We had booked to go up but were told that the trip was not suitable for young children especially in the busy periods (like now) because it can be difficult to descend quickly if anyone suffers altitude sickness, and in children it can be difficult to know when ...

The last couple of days we have been very active, with lots of walking at altitude. Yesterday we wanted to go up to the top of the Aiguille du Midi but we were a bit slow to get to the bottom station and the queues were very long when we got there, so we decided to take the cog railway up to Montenvers to see the Mer de Glace (sea of ice) glacier. The train climbs to about 1800 m and the we walked down 380 steps to go inside an ice cave carved out of the glacier...

Matthew, Oliver and I have had a great couple of days exploring Chamonix while Geoff has been getting ready for and participating in the "Etape de tour" from Albertville. Yesterday we wandered through the Saturday morning market and bought some fresh strawberries and raspberries. There is an international rock climbing competition in Chamonix this week, so we stopped to watch some practice. We found a lovely play ground to play in and Geoff headed off to Albert...

We arrived at Chamonix this afternoon and checked into our self contained apartment. We took a stroll through Chamonix and did our shopping then came back to the apartment before the rain started. We really aren't having much luck with the weather as rain seems to follow us wherever we go!