"Welcome to Winter 2015"

Thurs 15th: Brevent - 30+cm fresh powder (wind affected off the Cornu)

Tricky decision where to go with all the new snow and low visibility. GM top in limbo, Flegere info at 9:30, Le Tour closed and Brevent top open for pedestrians. Eventually chose Brevent... And what followed was one of (/the?) best days I've ever had.

Oscar was running late so I did a few runs on my own. Only a handful of people had beaten me up the mountain so I skied down in soft powder to Cornu... which was open early. What? Dropped straight off the back of Cornu skier's right into untracked but heavily wind affected powder. Good fun opening up a bit, fighting the snow. Continued straight underneath the Charlanon chair to deep, soft powder. Clearly anything East facing had dodged the violent winds and at this point I was praying that the top bin would open... Another quick Charlanon then back to Cornu.

Moody weather to begin with

I'd eyed up the couloir furthest skier's left under the chair earlier, but decided it could wait. It was still untracked... Over the crest I see a boarder cruising towards it, clearly with the same thought. I headed down second. The coverage was good, snow pretty wind affected and I released a small amount putting in some jump turns before opening up on the slope below. Met up with Oscar and Greg for another few laps skier's left off the back of Cornu in more wind affected snow. Dug a tip on the landing jumping off a rock and catapulted down. Snow everywhere, but funny. At the bottom we heard some people talking about top bin opening at 11... So up we headed to queue.

Arrived at 10:50 to Retro Steve's powder goat face greeting and no queue... Seriously what was going on? At 11 they opened the lift. On time... The first lift was half full with tourists so only half of the people waiting got on. Steve was eying up the same lines so we partnered up for the first time this season. We dropped into a short couloir skier's left of the main bowl. The snow was sublime. You would never have known the wind had been howling for days. We continued hardly stopping, not crossing a single track and whooping with delight then walked straight onto the next lift. By this time the sun had broken through.

Second lap we took the couloir to looker's right of Frison-Roche that exits onto the main face. As I was entering the couloir the same boarder from before rocked up behind us - 1:1 sir. We continued hard skier's right of all the tracks for another untouched descent.

Steve retroing it up

We headed back up in agreement to put the track in for Hotel face as no one had skied it yet. We made it 2/3s of the way before two guys flew past us. Shit. So close. To our amazement, and incredulous delight, they dropped into the gully closest to the face... We had the whole of Hotel face to ourselves. Steep, deep and completely untouched. Sublime. One of those moments you dream of.

Two guys rushing past only to drop into the main bowl

First.

I think Steve turns more...

Knowing it would get skied fast now there were tracks we bombed it back up and after a quick traverse dropped in skier's left. We found a nice entry and a shaded gully. Lower down we hit a handful of tracks but there was plenty to go around. Steve found a nice line with a nasty entry and carved a nice line.

Steve's line lookers right
Mine over the features

I'd planned to go home after this run as I had work but I couldn't resists another cheeky lap. We rushed up and were the last two onto the top lift. Another lap of the same, following Steve's line from the last run. The snow conditions up high had changed slightly with the wind and our tracks had filled in. The bottom was still soft. I did a mini tomahawk up high, no idea how, again pretty funny.

Navigating the rocks to get back in to Steve's line

Ran home and made it to work just in time. As close to a perfect day as I I've had in Cham. Not the best snow (how can you beat the midi?) but there was no effort/waiting. It even got the powder goat seal of approval.

Powder goat finally satisfied