Champex-Lac

Champex sits at about fourteen hundred and seventy metres on a shelf above the Val Ferret, with a small lake, chalets round the shore and the Grand Combin visible up the valley. It is best known to walkers as a stage on the Tour du Mont Blanc, which passes through and fills the village with through-hikers from June to September. Above the village the Flore-Alpe botanical garden holds around four thousand species of alpine and arctic plants on a rock-garden site laid out in 1927, one of the most complete collections of its kind in the Alps. A chairlift climbs to La Breya, and paths continue toward the Val d'Arpette and the Fenetre d'Arpette, a demanding TMB variant.

What you actually see

• A lake at 1,470 metres - chalets round the shore under the Grand Combin.
• The Flore-Alpe garden - about 4,000 alpine species, laid out from 1927.
• The Tour du Mont Blanc - through-hikers passing all summer.
• The Fenetre d'Arpette - the hard high variant of the TMB above.

When to go

June to September. Half a day, longer if walking.

Honest expectations

Accommodation books out through the TMB season - plan ahead. The garden is seasonal and closes in autumn. The lake is small and the village compact. Weather on the Arpette route is serious and it holds snow late.

Nearby

Val Ferret runs south-east; Martigny and the Rhone valley are north.