This superb route (#33 of Gaston Rebuffat's 100 finest) is best started from the Torino Hut. Back in the mid-1970s our South African friend Richard Wilmott was supposed to accompany us on the route, but he misplaced his ice axe in the over crowded hut, and had to stay behind. On the way down the Mer de Glace glacier I snapped my original pair of rigid Chouinard crampons and I also held a fall by Mark as he almost slipped into a big crevasse. (Click on the picture to enlarge the photograph.)