Back to powder ways

Thurs 27th: Second day of Euan's visit. Hoping to show him better than yesterday's s**t show. Up early to reserve Midi tickets just in case. Got first bin... but couldn't find a third person and didn't feel comfortable doing it just the two of us. Such a shame. He was up for a fun cruisey day anyway so instead we headed off to Le Tour. We were up in Vallorcine by 9:45 and after no queues up at Tête de Balme. A lap under the chair had pockets of great snow, lots of wind lips, but also lots of crust beneath. Still fun bouncing down although the snow wasn't decent enough to just do it without regard.

Le Tour beautiful as ever with features everywhere

We bumped into Liam and Sonny and decided to hit the bowls skiers' left of the chair past the cornices. Snow was awesome. Lots of playful turns, rollers and general enjoyment. After another lap of the same we dropped even further left. Some deep and some crusty snow and some big tree deposits. Snow between the trees still had an icy crust below though so we skipped the majority of it, just choosing the good stuff. We shot off for another of the same whilst Liam and Sonny waited for more people. Moved off into the main face to see what it was like. Hardly any tracks down the bowls to mid-station although the snow wasn't nearly as good. Dropped in for a quite bite to eat and a coke then decided to find what was left on the main bowl.

Messing around

The main bowl is a bit mellow but surprisingly, at 2pm, the snow was still soft and untracked if you knew where to look. After a few more mellow runs the clouds rolled in so we headed back to Vallorcine. One final run down Tête de Balme with some decent fresh pitches and we were down.

Still loads of untracked by 2pm... what...?

Rollers everywhere

A really nice chilled out day. I really enjoyed it as it was the first in ages I wasn't carrying a rope / harness and could just relax. Amazing how the snow didn't deteriorate like usual, even on the South facing aspects. Also really glad to finally show Euan a good time after having talked up Chamonix so much.

Epic day riding...

Weds 26th: Ok so the title is a little (read massive) lie. Pretty big anticlimax of a day. My big cousin Euan is down for three days; the one who I used to look up to (hah) and made me jealous with his antics during years in Deux Alpes... Who's laughing now you're married and living in England eh, eh!

Anyway... We got ready and left for Brevent... well until we realised his £600 board had completely delaminated and was useless. After a trip to LOCAL to rent a replacement we headed to Concept to try and get it repaired. The tech kindly told us it was completely f**ked and that any repair wouldn't hold.

Hmm... £600 board shouldn't look like that

We finally got up Brevent and sampled the rather poor snow. Harsh sun and high freezing temperature had ruined everything. A quick lap of Bozon and Cornu confirmed this. Piste fine. Off-piste refrozen lumpy crap. We were on the magic carpet chair back home when we saw a guy hit the features just above the track from the Brevent bubble. The snow looked OK so why not.

Our playground of late (Midi) poking through

Over the rockband

Untouched lines left of photo

It was powder... Oh yes! Few nice little hits and lines. Awesome. We headed down for lunch.

In the afternoon we headed up to Le Tour as Euan had (rightly) heard good things about the natural features. We made it up to a complete whiteout. Even I, having skied Le Tour endlessly, almost got lost on the traverses. We made it round to Tête de Balme and on the way up the vis closed in again. Home for beers.

Not sure those two tiny lines counted as a powder day, instead it was the first poor snow day since January. It's a hard life in Chamonix... Unlucky cousin. At least we have something to look forward to tomorrow.

Tomorrow... YES!

Steeps!: Glacier Rond

Mon 24th: Our original plan yesterday was to ski the Glacier Rond before it got skied out but for various reasons we ended up touring. Last night Ryan and I decided to just go for it and we persuaded Tom Tom to join us. None of us had done it before but we were sure of the route. We knew the conditions would not be ideal but that we could rappel if necessary. I managed to beg another day off work (still worked the evening). Yes!

Target no. 3

Met them at the Midi at 8:10 (agreed 8am) to find I was late... What? They haven't opened it that early in months. We got on the second bin of the day along with Seth Morrisson and Nate Wallace. We headed straight off and started bootpacking to the Simond refuge. Whilst we were getting ready Seth, Nate +1 shot past. A brief chat revealed they were off to ski the untracked West couloir, a different exit to the standard Rond exit couloir. They said something about giving them some room although the speed they skied it meant we didn't need to bother.

Getting to the top wasn't too bad although it is pretty exposed. Had to kick turn above a massive drop. Then the first traverse was... very sketchy. No fresh snow was left at all from yesterdays dump, it had all sluffed off. At this point I really wished I'd sharpened my edges and that my skis weren't fully rockered. Made it to the spine where we slowly made our way down. Turning at 45-50 degrees on boilerplate with the occasional morsel of fluff was interesting. After a few turns my confidence was up so I pushed on ahead. The snow skiers' right looked far better so I traversed over -  again sketchy as. The snow was soooo much better. Nice linked turns without fear. Not untracked, but great snow.

Exposed entrance

Not an ideal place to kick-turn

Almost bulletproof first traverse, edging HARD

Spine

Tom Tom traversing back to the exit couloir

After a quick 15m rappel into the couloir we were left with refrozen cut up crud. But everyone's confidence was sky high having done the hard part. We made our way down, occasionally finding some shaded aspects that were still good and exited over the Bergschund and avalanche debris. 

Ryan at the top of the exit couloir

Quick rappel in

After that it was a matter of working our way through the Bossons glacier. Fresh, soft snow everywhere and an easy exit. The only hitch was a short rappel off an Abalakov thread from a serac. The exit couloirs and trees had some fantastic untouched snow and some fun pillow lines. My legs were knackered from yesterdays tour but they were too good to pass up. Had some fun popping off them until I could no longer turn. Made it back down the icy track to town. Easy.

Mini rappel down a serac

Tom Tom checking out Bossons glacier

Fun pillow lines 

All in all it was a massive confidence boost. That said I definitely wouldn't ski it again in conditions like that. It was a fun adventure once but it's not worth the added risk. It also left all three of us completely knackered. Amazing how much energy focus and tension saps.

First tour up the Midi

Sun 23rd: Second powder day in a row... Missed the first due to it being a Saturday - seriously every Saturday is a Bluebird / powder day I swear.

Up at 3am for my only transfer of the day, knackered but happy to have the day to ski. After an hour of sleep I ran down the Midi gear-less to meet the others and check reservations. Standard shit show. One woman was demanding passes for every ticket, the other was just giving them out left right and centre. I didn't have a pass so I joined the huge queue, majorly pissed off and pretty ratty. After 5 mins Ryan at the front got a reservation for me... awesome. Ran back home to get changed and ready. Also bought some new poles en route and made an awesome sandwich.

Busy arête is busy

Red our improvised plan, Green where we skied down 

Up the top Ryan and I split off from the others and waited for Dave, Emily and Mad Dog who were a few bins behind. Our aim was the Col du Tacul, a 900m vert tour skiers right of the Seracs du Geant. We headed off down Petits Envers finding fresh powder most of the way. In places it was too deep to move, others the tracks from yesterday were very visible although still great to ski over. Emily was nursing an injury so decided to split off and head home.

Ryan and the Seracs du Geant

I started the skin first as I knew I'd be struggling. I had my fat skis on, almost 3kg on each foot over Dynafit setups. Doesn't sound like much but my god... Ryan passed me after a while, Dave followed soon after (that man is a machine - put both of us to shame) and MD stayed behind fighting with his own fat skis. After about 350m vert the others stopped and waited. We decided to go for the alternate Col. MD was done. Said he'd wait for us for an hour or catch the next group who skied past. The three of us carried on up to around 610m vert where another group passed us. They said the other side was a 50m rappel. Our ropes weren't long enough, MD was still waiting and we didn't feel comfortable with him skiing down alone. We chose to ski down rather than doing anything stupid (lucky because I was knackered). Unfortunately MD had already started off on another route but got down fine.

Ryan and Dave above

Skinning from the seracs left of photo

Instead of retracing our steps along the glacier we chose the steep faces skiers' right. The first pitch was heavenly. Did a mini traverse to the steeper section. The snow was unbelievable. Could bounce turns so easily. This is what makes it all worthwhile. All the exhaustion was gone and replaced by sheer joy. Another few pitches and we were down on the mer de glace. Awesome. It was even more fun because we were all comfortable enough to do long pitches and so it was less stop-start than usual.

Only tracks with Ryan on his way down

Our exit - tracks furthest left of the right exit

Happy days!

Col de Berard

Thurs 20th: Made plans the day before to tour either Col du Passon / Glacier du Mort. Snoozed my alarm in the morning as I assumed Liam would sleep in. For the first time this season he beat me up and and got me out of bed. He was also ill and had been up most of the night. Double respect.

After mounting my bindings onto my Coreupt's for the first time since I bought them, we headed up to Brevent en route to Flegere. En route Liam informed me he'd forgotten his pass... I wasn't overly thrilled about this, we were already late. I went up for a few laps and bumped into Sunny, Dan and Gibbs.

Did a quick lap of top bin and the snow was actually pretty soft, then a lap of Cornu which was pretty slushy. Liam caught us up and we headed off. Sunny had done Mort earlier in the week and said it was awesome so tagged along.

By the time we'd battled the queues to the top of Floria and the start of the tour it was getting late, around 12. Sunny and I bootpacked the first couloir, whilst Liam toured up to get used to his skins. Some slight wet sluff had come down as we were going up. There was also evidence of slides everywhere regardless of aspect. Our original plan of Mort was looking unlikely so Col de Berard became the backup.

Bootpack up above Floria

Liam finally arriving

Snow down to the couloir below Mort was wind-crusted on the North aspects and refrozen on everything else, nothing special. After a traverse we made it round to our objective. To me I thought it actually felt fine, the top layer had slid two days previously, refrozen and started to thaw, there wasn't much free snow. I was actually more worried about traversing under NE slopes that hadn't slid en route to Col de Berard. I went with the majority though so Berard it was. After the traverse I opted for skins as it is a pretty steady incline. It was a nice stroll in the end. Great.

The long traverse

Skinning up

After a break and some photos at the Col we headed off. Snow at the top was surprisingly good until we made it out of the shaded aspects. In the sun it was crusty but untracked, so it was still enjoyable.

On the long, icy exit track I gave my poles to Sunny. Found him stopped half way along the track with one of my poles... snapped in half... just from poling... Wasn't annoyed at him, more the lack of quality as they were bloody expensive. Oh well, they agreed to a refund so can't really complain.

On top of the Col du Berard

The reward...

The f...

Half term is 'awful'...

Mon 17th: After a broken 4 hour sleep I was up at 7am, completely knackered for fresh Midi laps. After shouting and bullying Charlie and Liam to get up I went and booked tickets - third bin of the day, the earliest possible as the first two were saved for guided parties. Unsurprisingly the CDMB were at it again. Sparky and Steve were in the queue 10 minutes before me got tickets for 2 bins later than us. Fairness is clearly not their aim. First bin was at 9:30 so in the end we were up the top by 10:15.

I'd been pushing to do Grand Envers for weeks and decided today was the day. Charlie and Liam were both nervous and pushed for the normal route but I was having none of it. I desperately wanted to ski something a bit steeper, felt confident with the route and knew this was the best we'd get the snow. That said I didn't want to lay first tracks on a route I'd never skied. Luckily some guys off our bin shot past. Cool.

We got to the second arte and Liam was quite literally bricking it. Bless him. Admittedly I was the good kind of nervous. After hyping him up I dropped in quickly to stop the two locals behind us snaking our line. There was a 20cm+ layer of perfect snow but it immediately became clear to everyone that below was ice. The top layer was good enough to make some nice deep turns and not to worry too much so I skied it quickly and retreated a safe distance. Charlie followed down the face with no worries, but not used to using his 'skinny' 112mm skis, managed to dig the tips on the runout and frontflip. Liam followed tentatively, carefully making his was down the 40-45 degree slope. He was fine on the steep but sat down just above the Bergschund. He got back up quickly though and skied down to meet us with the biggest smile on his face, proclaiming how awesome that was and how his 'butthole was still twitching'. He also told us the two locals had opted out after hearing my first turns so all the more respect to him for coming down anyway.

After a couple of nice pitches of untracked we came to the second steep section. This time the snow was perfect and there was no nasty base. Lots of face shots and smiles were had. Too much fun. More untracked and we made it down to the exit couloirs which although slightly more tracked were excellent. After a few snaps we were on the long exit down to the James bond track, which was in fantastic condition. Back home for lunch.

Perfect morning!

Nice vertical mile fall on the left down Plan d'Envers

Deep on top of ice

So much sluff

Charlie on the arete, me at the bottom

Liam killing it

Fresh smiles

Charlie and I were back at the Midi for 2pm to meet Jason, Andy, Greg and Ryan for another lap. Jason, Charlie and I waited at the bottom of the arete for the others who didn't make the same bin. The sun was going in and it was actually starting to get a little chilly. Eventually they made it down. Ryan put his skis on half way down, lost one first turn and had to clamber back up to it. 

We headed off to Petit Envers for another new route, choosing lines away from the main traffic. With some careful route selection there was still lots of fresh snow to be had. Where the route met Rognon we ran into a refrozen top layer, but only in certain places. It caught a few people out. The rest was pretty uneventful apart from the idiotic tracks you could see through the Seracs du Geant. People were cutting lips and landing just on the edges of holes. Others were cutting into the edges of crevasses to get fresh snow... One track highlighted what you ski on on the glacier. Someone had cut two metres to the right of the main path and broken through a snow-bridge leaving a gaping hole below. Luckily his tracks continued the other side... 

Great afternoon!

Deciding on a route

Routefinding

Cant complain with first tracks at 3pm

As soon as we got home we were showered and ready to go for half price chicken wings at MBC with Liam, Rachel, Roberta, Jenna and Tanya. It's official. I AM BORED OF MBC CHICKEN WINGS. I know, who'd have believed it. Think I'm done with them for the season.

After half an hour at home we walked over to Tom Tom / Andy / Robyn's place for a little get together. A night of great company with their English and French friends, along with plenty of alcohol and some pretty competitive beer pong. Even better, and if you know me you'll understand why, was the incredible food. Thanks Robyn for the 6+ delicious chicken parmijianas and other nibbles I ate. I left stuffed.

Brilliant night!

MBC again

Zak's got a big ego

TIGHTEN YOUR DINs, G.N.A.R. and Ueli Steck

Fri 14th: Up ridiculously early to go to Courmayeur with Andy, Tom Tom, Robyn, Ryan, Charlotte and Ruslan. The resort didn't open until 10:30 and Gabba and the top lifts never opened. Still we made it into the first Gondola of the day. Expectations were high.

Got up to find it dry-hailing. Really weird snow. Super heavy although soft in places. Felt like heavy windcrust. Double ejected first run down the Peindeint chair. Standard. Moved over to Bertolini. Dropped down directly underneath then down by the avalanche barriers. Snow was great fun when un/hardly tracked but pretty hard to manage when it got tracked. Tight trees were difficult due to the heavy snow. Took a big branch smack bang to the face leaving me a bit rattled.

After a few laps of untracked we dropped in for a hot chocolate (in Italy it's just basically melted chocolate) and some of Robyn's home made brownies. Awesome. Went back out, did a few tree laps and a few more down by the breakers.

Dropped into the bowl between Gabba and Bertolini with Ryan. Lost another ski. This time it was nowhere to be seen. NOT COOL. Ryan was already out of the bowl and hadn't seen. I started digging like a maniac after trying to guesstimate where it had come off. After half an hour of hard work the others saw me in my huge hole from the chair and came down to help. Was looking like we were never going to find it but eventually after half an hour Robyn found it. It was less than 10cm from where I'd dug to in the first 5 minutes. Gutting but seriously glad to have found it. Many thanks to all the guys for wasting part of their day helping me.

The search - 3 hours of manpower

Me hugging Robyn after she found my ski

By this point all my gear was soaked and my goggles were covered in snow. I double ejected AGAIN within 50 metres off a drop I couldn't even see. Eventually got to the piste to many laughs. Was told I'd lost many G.N.A.R. points. Decided I may as well make light of the situation and to regain some points so did a (mostly) naked ski.

The weather was... brisk. It was snowing after all. After a lot of wolf whistles, cheers, shouts and cold nipples I made it down to the bottom. Even managed a drop off a shed. Surprisingly only my hands were cold...?

I'm seriously glad I didn't stack here... although
I suspect that's what everyone wanted to see

Business as usual

Had a pizza, did a few cruisy runs (no way I was dropping off piste again with the form I was on) and then headed home for work.

NOTE TO SELF: TIGHTEN UP YOUR DINS.

In the evening Tom Tom, Ruslan, Ryan and I attended the mountaineering seminar on Annapurna featuring Ueli Steck. For anyone that doesn't know about him, he's probably the fittest and most resilient man on the planet. The things he's achieved are beyond comprehension. Talk was a bit of a farce as the promised translation was poor, but I got most of it and Tom Tom translated the bits I missed.

PS. If you haven't seen G.N.A.R. then watch it. IT IS AWESOME. Also the last two photos were taken by Tom Tom... the dirty pervert