Valais Canton, Tête-Noire
Distance: 4.06 km.
Walking time: 2h.
Elevation gain: 293 m.
Access: Car or bus.
Parking: at Le Plan road - 46.071486, 6.975252
Bus: stop at Tête Noire.
Vallée du Trient:
It was a cloudy week with occasional showers, but we really wanted to sight see a new place within Switzerland. We decided to explore Vallée du Trient. We felt slightly confused on the number of gorge walks over in the valley - there are 4. The access between all of the gorges takes some time and it may not be easy to do multiple walks within a day.
Gorges du Trient - Shortest of all gorge walks (~20 min), ticketed entrance.
Gorges du Dailley - 6.7 km, free entrance.
Gorges du Triège - 1 km, free entrance.
Gorges de Tête-Noire (Gorges mystérieuses) - 4.06 km, free entrance.
Gorges de Tête-Noire:
We did this hike in early June, however the platform going down to Nymph's cave was closed due to seasonal maintenance. Saying this, MySwitzerland website indicates the hiking season for this route to be from April. Before setting on this hike, we contacted Tourist offices in Vallée du Trient and Martigny, who were very helpful on all the up to date access information. Regardless the closure of the cave, we still drove over for this hike.
It was an enjoyable, but a challenging route. The whole loop walk is in the forest and the platform over the gorges is at the deviation from the loop, on the way to the Nymph's cave. There are information boards throughout this hike. We would recommend doing the loop hike, rather than coming back the same way. Doing so, there is much more history to be learned about the route and many more views. There are two nice picnic points near the start of the hike; the first one is in the forest below the steps, the second one is at the first viewpoint (small deviation). The first picnic point has benches outside and inside a little hut. We only met 2 hikers on our route.
The hike from the parking starts with a rather steep descent following a forest path with many tree roots. Soon after our departure, we came across a sign to a viewpoint. If you plan on doing the loop hike, I don't think you need to visit this viewpoint. However, if you plan on taking the same route back, I think it is worth going there. Tourist websites describe the route to have 4 ladders - those are staircases with barriers / chains, but the width of each step is shallower than common staircases. There are also steps from stone - some of them were wobbly, but there is a chain, which is fixed to the wall and acts as a handrail. We were stunned with the platform walk along the gorge towards Nymph's cave. The platform was set back from the rock wall slightly, leaving a substantial, continuous gap. We could see Nymph's cave from the top platform, but there were additional steps going underneath a huge rock (unfortunately we couldn't go there). After our little deviation, we joined back to our loop hike. The possibility of walking in a loop is not indicated well at this junction, however we saw only 2 tracks to follow - the route we came there by and 1 other path - making it an easy choice. After a while, signs for the path to follow started appearing, so it was easy to find the trail back. Since the hike was quite short, we decided to extend our walk towards Finhaut. The walk was interesting until reaching the first bridge. There were many blueberry plants (I think those were the plants) around us and we saw a nice waterfall. However, the path to the second bridge didn't look very appealing visually. Majority of the climb back was quite steep. Perhaps the last third of the way back follows an old trade route between the valley and Chamonix, opening up to pretty viewpoints at the mountains. The last section of the walk is right next to the main road. You should follow the route (not the road itself) and it will take you back to the parking.
This loop hike also had signs for a snowshoe (racquets) path in winter.
More information about this hike, a short video and another GPX file can be found on ValleeDuTrient website here.
The pathway:
Left and middle: The 'ladders'.
Right: Stone steps with chain handrail.
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