Iles Guadeloupe Adventure
The Ascent of the Volcano
Eddie Winthorpe/TeamSleepMonsters / 28.11.2007
On arrival, the sun was out, but the mountains in cloud. Mysteriously the itinerary was cut down to remove the Forest Trek and Canyoning, leaving just the Mountain Trail and Discovery Event.
Starting from Les Bains Jaunes the route took in the peaks of La Citerne, L\'Echelle & La Soufriere. The ascent was a steep, loose path through the vegetation, in many places a narrow washed out jungle-gully. (Trace de l\'Armistice)
Emerging from the gully at La Citerne, the wind speed rose and the temperature dropped and I was suddenly concerned that we\'d be in trouble if we had an accident and had to stop on the side of the mountain. With visibility down at times to 20m in the hill fog \"it was just like being back home.\" ...in fact, quite a good day.
Continuing the climb to L\'Echelle, the conditions underfoot improved somewhat. We observed the \"no running\" rule on the tricky (and protected in places), narrow descent to Col de L\'Echelle. I wonder if this would have been intimidating on a clear day..?
The foot conditions improved to a rocky path and we passed 4 teams before reaching the summit La Soufriere: the highest point on the island at 1467m. The smell of sulphur was overpowering and I shall choose to blame that for what happened next. Leaving the summit, Marco and I became separated as I found myself on a secondary path. That meant I missed our turn and could then be seen heading for someone else sporting an Inov-8 bag... And that meant that no less than 5 teams passed us.
The descent was along a good path: Chemin des Dames, which I should imagine would be classed as the tourist route. Despite our best efforts, we only managed to claw back one place before arrival back at Les Bains Jaunes and a well-earned bath.
Team SleepMonsters/Inov-8 are now placed 12th with 569 points.
Simon & Sarah of team RockAndRapidAdventure.co.uk received 100 bonus points for clearing up rubbish on the beach campsite at Grand Bourge. This means they move up to share joint 13th place with Team Sportera Saint-Priest at 568 points.
SleepMonsters
