One of my first climbs. Normal route from the west. However I climbed a long ridge (grade III) to the hut before (left of) the infamous couloir to avoid this dangerous bit.
Picture taken with a fish eye lens (no, that's not the curvature of the earth you can see!). Picture was published in the German Alpen Verein (club) monthly magazine, April 1986 and the year book 1990.

Nuddy, interesting photo. Did you use a special lens or effect to get the curvature on the horizon?

Craig, that's quite normal with a fish eye lens - unless you get the horizon exactly in the centre of the picture - but even then the rest of the picture is still distorted. Sometimes the fish eye will produce an interesting photo, and sometimes an awful one!

I like this image. It's different & imaginative. Well done.

The straight ridge is fantastic with the distortion of the horizon

I personally think the color balance is way too far blue (perhaps when scanning/uploading?) however it does not diminish much what is otherwise an INCREDIBLE photo. Thanks for uploading to UKC!

Your'e dead right Brian - and that's after I've improved the colour a little (but there 'aint much of any other colour in the slide!). Kodachrome always used to do what it felt like in those days - actually often too green, and the contrast too high. Digital is so much better these days. But actually the light up high is in fact quite blue, it's just that the human brain allows for this. And sometimes if you remove the blue tint, the picture doesn't look right.

Another reason the photo is too blue and a bit dark, is that it was taken very early in the morning. They throw you out of the hut much too early, and when I got to the Vallot hut, it was still pitch black, and not wanting to climb Mont Blanc and not see it (as on the Matterhorn too), I slept for an hour or so in the Vallot hut (or tried to, it's b. cold in there). When I came out, the sun was just rising, so I guess the picture was taken an hour(?) or so after sunrise.

Are your legs really that long?

Actually no Sam, but you can't just simply walk up Mont Blanc these days, it has to be something special - cycle up, or with a flower pot on your head, or jump off, upside down, with parachute, or some such. I used stilts.

I reckon I could unicycle it. Just got to learn to ride a unicycle first... Might need a coat too... Hmmm...