VIDEO. “I have a lot of respect, a lot of humility in the face of the mountain”

We are in the Hautes-Alpes (Provence-Alpes-Côte d’Azur), near Briançon. Jeff is a high mountain guide and offered to follow him on an icefall. He is notably accompanied by Pierrot Boucher, also a high mountain guide. “He’s been doing ice for 30 years, he’s climbed extreme stunts, he has experience, an ice analysis that’s just phew“, he says. This passion that Jeff has for the ice was transmitted to him by a friend and partner climber. “He was a very strong ice climber at the time, and on each cliff outing, he told me about his travels, he told me about his ice climbs and he put so much enthusiasm, so much passion“, he recalls.

Jeff finally decides to take up ice climbing after his friend dies during a race as a mountain guide. It begins as a beginner with small waterfalls ranging from five to ten meters, equipped with fairly rudimentary equipment. Since then, the athlete cannot imagine spending a winter without taking out his ice axes. He even confides that he likes to go beyond his limits, “be on edge“When on a lane, Jeff is always looking for a solid hook before he can move anywhere.”This dizziness, this apprehension of emptiness that many people have, we have learned to dominate“, he confides.

As a child, in the 1980s, Jeff left not far from the Chamonix valley. “We walked five minutes, ten minutes and we found ourselves on the bottom of the glacier, we put on the crampons and we attacked our session”, he recalls. Today, it is clear that this is a place where the ice has completely disappeared. “I have a lot of respect, a lot of humility in the face of the mountain, in the face of the ice.”