French Alps Photographs by Thomas Tourral: Galibier, Écrins and Mont Blanc

Some photographers chase the famous summits; Thomas Tourral, who shares his work as Septmai, finds the French Alps in their quieter moments too. A self-taught amateur living near the mountains, he photographs the high passes of Galibier and Lautaret, the lakes and autumn slopes of the Hautes-Alpes, the Écrins and the Mont Blanc massif, and he loves, in his own words, “the contrasts between the rock, snow and the colors of the trees.”

The Galibier and Lautaret passes

The Col du Lautaret, at about 2,057 metres, is the southern starting point for the climb to the Col du Galibier. At 2,642 metres, the Galibier is one of the great passes of the Alps, joining Saint-Michel-de-Maurienne in Savoie to Briançon by way of the Col du Télégraphe and Lautaret.

Cyclists know it as a legend of the Tour de France. The race first crossed it in 1911, when Émile Georget was first to the top, and a monument to the Tour’s founder Henri Desgrange, inaugurated in 1949, stands by the south portal of the old summit tunnel. That 363-metre tunnel opened in 1891 and was the only way over the top until 1976. Like most high passes, the Galibier is closed in winter.

Lakes, larches and Serre Chevalier

Tourral’s lake pictures are the calm between the panoramas: a long lake mirroring a jagged skyline, and conifers glowing beside the green water of Lake Poursollet. In his Serre Chevalier view, bands of golden autumn trees become the whole subject.

Serre Chevalier stretches up the valley from Briançon through the villages of Chantemerle, Villeneuve and Le Monêtier-les-Bains. In winter it is a major ski area, with about 250 km of slopes between roughly 1,200 and 2,800 metres; in summer and autumn the same slopes are walking country. Tourral also turned his camera on the nearby Clarée valley in his Clarée Valley autumn cinemagraphs.

The Emparis highlands and the Écrins

On the Emparis highlands, two walkers on a grassy track give the snowy peaks their scale. Close by rise the mountains of Écrins National Park, created on 27 March 1973. It covers 925 km² of the Dauphiné Alps between Grenoble and Gap, with glaciers, alpine pastures and lakes, and its highest summit, the Barre des Écrins, reaches 4,102 metres.

Evening is Tourral’s favourite hour, the moment “when the sun colors the clouds” and the light shows them moving between the mountains. His Écrins series catches exactly that.

Aiguille du Midi and Mont Blanc

The collection ends in the Mont Blanc massif. The Aiguille du Midi (3,842 m) is reached from Chamonix by a cable car opened in 1955. It climbs more than 2,800 metres in about 20 minutes and still holds the record for the greatest vertical ascent of any cable car. At the top, the glass box called Step into the Void, opened in December 2013, looks 1,035 metres straight down, with Mont Blanc to the south. Our story Aiguille du Midi Through Jakub Polomski’s Camera spends a whole day up there.

Mont Blanc, on the French–Italian border, is the highest mountain in the Alps at about 4,806 metres; its snow cap changes height slightly with every survey. It was first climbed on 8 August 1786 by Jacques Balmat and Michel-Gabriel Paccard.

Visiting these places

• Best season for the passes: summer and early autumn, since the Galibier closes in winter.
• Bases: Briançon and the Serre Chevalier villages for the Lautaret and Galibier side; Chamonix for the Aiguille du Midi.
• Evening light: follow Tourral’s lead and stay out for the last hour of sun, with a head torch for the walk back.

For another photographer’s view of the same mountains, see Lukas Furlan’s mountain photographs.

Related reading

• Highlining Between Vanoise Express Cable Cars
• The Scale of Nature: Jakub Polomski’s People in the Alps
• Courchevel’s Cable-Car Bedroom: An Alpine Airbnb Competition Concept
• Aiguille du Midi Through Jakub Polomski’s Camera

Sources