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Chamonix Rockfax Review

© Rockfax
Chamonix Rockfax Cover  © Rockfax
The original 2016 edition of the Rockfax Chamonix guidebook offered a unique range of routes and grades condensed into one book, providing a single resource for nearly all climbing in the Chamonix valley. This best-selling guide has now been expanded and improved upon with a newly published 2022 edition.

Co-authors Luke Davies and Charlie Boscoe have accomplished an impressive job with the new edition, which readers will note has an almost entirely new set of action photos, giving it a fresh look. It's not trivial to write a guidebook for the Chamonix valley, with the sheer number of routes, conditions that vary throughout the weeks and years, and more recently the very apparent effects of climate change in the high mountains. However, the guidebook strikes a very useful balance with plenty on offer across the climbing disciplines from high alpine, snow, ice and mixed mountaineering to trad and sport multi-pitch, single pitch valley sport and even a smattering of bouldering. The guidebook also covers the spectrum of difficulties across the alpine and climbing grades, with something for everyone from snow plods upwards. As well as the classic routes you'd expect in such a guidebook, readers will also notice its range of more modern, three-star climbs which provide great alternatives, giving a wide choice of objectives in this ever-popular venue.    

Many new routes and topos added  © Rockfax
Many new routes and topos added

The 2022 edition is a step up from the original version, with an extra 50 pages of route descriptions. Throughout the book, existing areas have been expanded with additional routes, and some completely new areas are now included too. It's very welcome to see a new section on the Vallorcine area to cover many high-quality routes on the Perrons and the secluded Berard valley, along with a section around the Charpoua hut to cover the South Face of the Dru, Flammes de Pierres and Moine West Face. The sport climbing aspect of the guide has also been extended to cover Coupeau, Roc Dement, and Gietroz, all of which are decent venues for lower altitude valley cragging days.

Writing such a detailed and comprehensive guidebook to so varied a mountain area will have been a mammoth task. Taking into account the changes wrought by global warming, the 2022 edition provides a valuable up-to-date insight into current glacier and mountain conditions, and offers a particular focus on improved descriptions and topos.

Amazing new 3-D maps with relief added  © Rockfax
Amazing new 3-D maps with relief added

Rockfax Chamonix 2022 is a refreshed, improved and expanded update of the original guide, and remains a strong choice for a single book to cover all your climbing activities in the Chamonix valley. Whether you're going on a climbing holiday or live full-time in the area, this attractive new guide is well worth getting your hands on.

Guidebook

Chamonix Cover
Chamonix

A single publication from Rockfax with hundreds of routes ranging from short sport ticks to the best multi-day adventures. It is illustrated with some amazing photo-topos, superb maps and with excellent detailed descriptions.

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25 Sep, 2022

Or correction of all the errors in the previous version which only came out 6 years ago

Can we get a discount by trading in previous version?

25 Sep, 2022

chose the worst year possible to bring out a new alpine guidebook edition... virtually everything above 2500m will be obsolete after the damage of this summer!

26 Sep, 2022

The old approach to the charpou on that map doesn’t exist Anymore?

26 Sep, 2022

not just the approach - the hut doesn't exist at the moment either! That is the fundamental problem with these written alpine guides.

26 Sep, 2022

Actually, the 2016 edition sold out more quickly than we had expected so this new edition was to keep up with demand.

Luke has done a great job of adding some new areas to this and making the changes necessary due to the glacier retreat.

Alan

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