Candanchú

Yesterday was bright and clear but not very hot. We took the car to the ski resort of Candanchú and climbed up the Pista Grande. The wild flowers were delightful. Then I spotted edelweiss flowers, which I had never seen in the wild before; climbed up a little bit to take photos and see them better. After that, we saw lots and lots of them; anywhere there was a flat horizontal place.

In general, flowers up there above 2000 metres above sea level are short and small. They have a relatively short growing season because the mountains can be covered in snow from November to as late as May or at least April. I saw white campion, forget-me-nots, lots of little yellow flowers, I think some were "lady's bedstraw" (galium verum) and potentilla but I'm not sure of the variety.

Not all the flowers are short. every now and then there were lovely irises. I didn't get a good photo; this is one I googled. 

This is some kind of Alpine primula

The blue one is Round-headed Rampion

In this photo you can see my trekking poles which were absolutely when we had to go down a steep scree slope. 

If this photo had higher resolution, you might have been able to see a "sarrio" standing sentry on the high rocks. We watched a flock of them run down one side, up the other ahead of us. They made moving around the mountainside look so easy! Sarrio is a local name for chamoix.

The last stretch of the way down.