Skyway Monte Bianco

Skyway Monte Bianco lifts passengers from the green floor of the Aosta Valley to the edge of the Mont Blanc glaciers in two long swings. The line starts at Pontal d'Entrèves above Courmayeur at about 1,300 metres, pauses at the Pavillon du Mont-Fréty at 2,173 metres, and ends at Punta Helbronner at 3,466 metres, on the frontier ridge with France. Opened in June 2015 after four years of construction, it cost around 138 million euros, making it the most expensive installation of its kind when it opened.

What sets the ride apart are its cabins. Built by Doppelmayr, each holds up to 80 people and turns slowly through a full circle as it climbs, so every passenger gets the whole panorama instead of a fixed window: first the larch woods and the valleys of Val Veny and Val Ferret opening on either side, then the glaciers and granite spires of the massif closing in. Each section takes only a few minutes; the change of world is sudden. The stations, designed by the architect Carlo Rossi, are sharp glass-and-steel volumes that read as instruments set into the slope rather than as mountain huts.

At the top, a circular terrace hangs over the ice at nearly 3,500 metres. Mont Blanc itself rises close at hand, and on clear days the view reaches across the Alps to the Matterhorn and Monte Rosa, with the whole frontier ridge of the massif spread out in between. An exhibition of crystals from the massif shows what generations of local mountaineers and crystal hunters have brought down from its faces. The middle station has its own attractions: restaurants, a wine cellar of the Aosta Valley and a botanical garden that gathers around 900 species of alpine plants.

Punta Helbronner is also a threshold for mountaineers. A tunnel and lift connect the station to the Rifugio Torino, a high mountain hut used by climbers, and from here a separate cableway crosses the glaciers of the Vallée Blanche to the Aiguille du Midi above Chamonix — making it possible, in season, to travel from Italy to France over the roof of the Alps.

Getting there

The valley station is at Pontal d'Entrèves, about 5 km from the centre of Courmayeur; a bus runs from the centre of Courmayeur to the station, with extra shuttles at peak times. The regional capital Aosta is about 29 km away, and Martigny in Switzerland lies some 33 km away beyond the massif. The nearest airport with regular flights is Turin (TRN), about 87 km away; Annecy airport in France (NCY) is closer, about 68 km in a straight line, but on the far side of the mountains.