After several weeks of practice walks and training days to prepare, students from Year 9, 10 and 11 jetted off to Switzerland on 21st June to take part in the 2023 Nord Anglia Advanced Trekking Expedition.
29 students and 4 staff members arrived at Les Martinets, our base chalet for the week, full of excitement about the week ahead. To begin with, each trekking group took to the hills of the Swiss Alps for a ‘training’ day walk to make sure everyone could cope with the terrain and challenges of the trek. The training day was much more of a test than we first anticipated as a 14km / 800 meter climb hike wasn’t the ‘training’ we were expecting.
For the actual trek, the students were split into 3 groups, with each group taking a slightly different route to complete the trekking expedition. One group started in the picturesque area of Leysin and made their way up through the peaks and valleys of the region, through Lac Lioson and Vers L’Eglise to Villars sur Ollon. The other groups completed the trek by hiking the opposite direction, starting at Villars sur Ollon and finishing in Leysin; all groups stopped off at the same accommodation sites, chalets or camp sites across the 3 nights of the trek. No matter the direction, the route was tough with some difficult climbs and tough terrain. Each group walked approximately 65km over the trek and climbed roughly 3,500mtrs in total. An incredible achievement.
On the recovery day, groups visited the famous town of Gruyeres to visit the cheese and chocolate factory of the area and toured the castle remains of Gruyeres. Free cheese and free chocolate samples is always a winner – some students walked off with more chocolate samples than they could possibly manage to eat! Overall, the week was full of laughs, teamwork, tired legs, but most of all a real sense of accomplishment.
Well done to everyone in involved!
The British International School Abu Dhabi
