Self-guided - Tour du Mont Blanc - 10 day hiking

10 day TMB itinerary (no rest day), hotels and refuges only, zero shortcuts, some variants.

Below is a breakdown of our 10 day TMB itinerary including which hotels/refuges we boked, variants we took, and some takeaways from each day.

One thing that we noticed when planning, is that people would post their 6 or 7 day itineraries but wouldn't really mention all the shortcuts taken (until you did some digging) which made planning very hard for backpackers that just want to hike it (and not take busses/cable cars). For a group of very active and fit people in their 30's/40's, we all felt 10 days was a solid trek, still got to enjoy our days, had hard days and easy days, didn't feel rushed and didn't feel like we needed a rest day. I've noted what I personally think the level of difficulty is but understand this is subjective... (I am a trail runner and mountain biker that competes in races for reference)

We would start hiking after breakfast around 8am and would typically finish each day between 3-4pm (some of the easier days we arrived around 1). We started planning a year in advance... booking everything in Oct/Nov. Hope you guys find this post as helpful - happy to answer any questions regarding itinerary and planning.

Day 1: Les Houches to Les Contamines (Stage 1) via Variant
o Garmin data: 13.5 miles, 5,000ft gain, 4,300ft loss
o Hotel: Hotel Gai Soleil (great sleep, hospitality & food)
o Difficulty: 8 out of 10
o Takeaway: do the variant (our friends didn’t like the regular TMB trail) also… should have brought snacks, lunch spot at Refuge de Miage was further than we thought. Get the duck salad at Miage!

Day 2: Les Contamines to Les Chapieux (Stage 2)
o Garmin data: 11.7 miles, 4,500ft gain, 3,300ft loss
o Hotel: Les Chambres du Soleil (great sleep, hospitality & food)
o Difficulty: 7 out of 10
o Takeaway: stop at Refuge de la Balme for a dessert!

Day 3: Les Chapieux to Elisabetta (Stage 3)
o Garmin data: 9 miles, 3,800ft gain, 1,700ft loss
o Refugio: Elisabetta (liked the rooms and dinner, bad breakfast/lunch)
o Difficulty: 4 out of 10
o Takeaway: be sure to order lunch at Elisabetta before 3pm… it's very good!

Day 4: Elisabetta to Courmayeur (Stage 4)
o Garmin data: 10.5 miles, 2,200ft gain, 5,500ft loss
o Hotel: Hotel Croux (great sleep, location & best breakfast)
o Difficulty: 6 out of 10
o Takeaway: you won’t be able to get food until 7pm here so walk around the beautiful Italian town eat snacks in the little shops until you can get into a pizza place.

Day 5: Courmayeur to Bonatti (Stage 5)
o Garmin data: 7.5 miles, 3,500ft gain, 1,000ft loss
o Refugio: Bonatti (great dormitory, lunch/dinner amazing) #1 Refuge!
o Difficulty: 3 out of 10
o Takeaway: this is as good as a rest day if you can't squeeze a real rest day in. If you can wait to eat lunch at Bonatti, do it (but do it before 3!).

Day 6: Bonatti to La Fouly (Stage 6)
o Garmin data: 13 miles, 3,500ft gain, 4,800ft loss
o Refuge: Gîte de la Fouly (nicest dormitory, hospitality & food)
o Difficulty: 5 out of 10
o Takeaway: stock up on some snacks at the grocery store in La Fouly… food will be sparse the next few stages.

Day 7: La Fouly to Champex (Stage 7)
o Garmin data: 11 miles, 2,000ft gain, 2,500ft loss
o Hotel: Hotel Splendide (best sleep, nicest hotel we had) #1 hotel!
o Difficulty: 4 out of 10
o Takeaway: don’t skip this day by taking the bus… it’s a charming and unique day and one of our favorites!

Day 8: Champex to Le Peuty/Trient (Stage 8) via Variant
o Garmin data: 11.2 miles, 4,300ft gain, 4,800ft loss
o Refuge: Refuge Le Peuty (loved the yurt & best dinner)
o Difficulty: 8 out of 10
o Takeaway: make sure this variant is safe to do before doing it. Don’t do it in bad weather. We did it early July and it was fine.

Day 9: Le Puety/Trient to Lac Blanc (Stage 9 + 10.5)
o Garmin data: 12.3 miles, 7,000ft gain, 3,700ft loss
o Refuge: Lac Blanc (ok dormitory, bad food, no showers, ok service)
o Difficulty: 9 out of 10
o Takeaway: this is the hardest day hike all of us had ever done with a pack and we were all very physically fit. The sheer unforgiving elevation gain takes a while. Plan accordingly and bring snacks.

Day 10: Lac Blanc to Les Houches (Stage 10.5 + 11)
o Garmin data: 14 miles, 3,200ft gain, 7,600ft loss
o Hotel: Hotel Oustalet (great sleep, rooms & hospitality)
o Difficulty: 8 out of 10
o Takeaway: you can take the cable car around mile 6 to the bottom to cut off about 5,000 ft descent but that won't technically "close the loop". So be prepared for knee murder on this day if you want to close the loop.

Map Source featured in video: is from ​⁠‪@thedailypackers‬ This is an EXCELLENT interactive google map we found that lists out all the hotels, refuges, water sources, shortcuts, variants, etc. worth the $12.