Le Pilgrimage has led cyclists around the tracks and trails around its base camp in the Écrins massif of the French Alps for two years now. This year, we laced up our trainers and joined them for the first running of a Pilgrimage trail event. 

An intimate group surrounded the dinner table on 1 July, for a briefing and large plates of home-cooked local specialities. Also on the menu: four days, 130 kilometres and almost 9,000 metres of elevation on pristine trails. Thunder rolled around the surrounding peaks, but the weather set fair for what was to come.

Le Pilgrimage is a journey, not a race, and runners were encouraged to look after each other and enjoy the special treats at checkpoints, like Orangina cooling in a mountain stream or “haute dogs” served to hungry mouths at 2,000 metres up.

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Days one and two looped back to base camp, for a communal meal, saunas and swims before a well deserved rest, but the final run was a split stage, breaking at the Refuge du Pelvoux (2,704m). Four days of beautiful trails, good food, tired legs and sunsets between the peaks, all shared with like-minded souls. The mountains are calling, I must go!