Booking huts and nights
It is often the most stressful part of preparing: huts have few beds and the TMB is very popular. With the right method, it takes one evening.
Updated
When to book
July – August
As soon as bookings open, often between January and March. The most popular huts fill within weeks.
June and September
One to three months ahead is usually enough, but weekends go sooner. Check opening dates before booking a night.
Last minute
Possible outside peak season, or by sleeping in the valleys (hotels, campsites). Cancellations happen: calling the day before sometimes works.
The 4-step method
- Build your plan. Set your stage ends with the planner, keeping one or two nearby alternatives for each.
- Start with the scarce nights. Isolated high huts with no nearby alternative first: Refuge des Mottets, Rifugio Elisabetta Soldini Montanaro, Rifugio Walter Bonatti, Refuge du Lac Blanc.
- Fill in the valleys. The villages (Les Contamines, Courmayeur, La Fouly, Champex, Trient, Argentière) offer more choice and more flexibility.
- Adjust and confirm. If a night is impossible, move the stage end in the planner: everything else recalculates. Note the booking references in the roadbook.
Where to book
Many huts and hostels can be booked on the official Tour du Mont-Blanc platform; others by phone, email or on their own website. Contacts found on OpenStreetMap are listed on our accommodation page and in the planner.
montourdumontblanc.com · All accommodation and contacts
A deposit and cancellation terms are common: read them. And always warn the place if you are late or cancel: they can release the bed, and will not start worrying about you.
In Switzerland (La Fouly, Champex, Trient) some places charge in Swiss francs or do not take every card: carry cash.
A night in a hut: what to expect
Half board
The night, dinner and breakfast are included. You arrive late afternoon, dinner is at a set time in the early evening and lights go out early: you rise with the daylight.
Sleeping
Mostly dorms, with blankets provided but not sheets: bring a sleeping-bag liner. Boots stay at the entrance and earplugs help.
Packed lunch and water
Tomorrow’s packed lunch is ordered the evening before. Water can be refilled at the hut; ask whether it is drinkable. Showers are sometimes extra, sometimes absent.
Customs vary from hut to hut: hut etiquette