Chamonix Mountain Report: 3rd April 2013

The Easter bunny arrived in Chamonix - not with Easter eggs but with snow and lots of it! On the run up to the Easter holidays we had been experiencing winter conditions as opposed to spring conditions in the Chamonix valley and on Easter Sunday it just didn’t stop snowing much to everyone’s delight.

Despite the lack of visibility in the morning and early afternoon there was fabulous skiing to be had. If you were brave enough to withstand the bad visibility then you were handsomely rewarded as the sun made a brief appearance. Suddenly you were able to see the fields of powder, smiling faces and a few upside down skiers who were just checking the snow pack!! It was a wonderful sight to see rows and rows of fresh powder tracks and made you happy to know that some were yours. It really did dump it down - in fact, over the weekend approximately 65cm of fresh snow fell above 1,800m.

Earlier in the week picking the right ski area was the hardest part of skiing. Many areas were on delayed opening due to avalanche control to ensure the pistes were safe to ski. Not only did we have huge amounts of snow to deal with but we also had some interesting visibility to content with. Clients described it as “skiing by feel” as they couldn’t see anything but as usual on the very bad visibility day we made the right choice and headed for the tree lined area of Les Houches and we weren’t disappointed. Quiet pistes meant that we were still getting fresh track into the early afternoon. Staying high was the order of day because as you started to drop in altitude the snow was getting quite wet and heavy but we only experienced this on the home run back to the bottom of the Prarion lift station.

With the large amounts of snow falling the avalanche risk increased. If you are intending to ski off piste, checking the avalanche forecast is vital. Keeping yourself safe and educated in the mountains is extremely important and this is what my group of seasonnaires have been doing over this winter. Apart from their weekly seasonnaire skiing session, they have been taking part in avalanche awareness & crevasse rescue courses.

Over the winter they have worked hard on their off-piste skiing technique and taking part in these courses increases their safety and knowledge of the high mountain environment. Skiing the Valleé Blanche was a goal of some of the seasonnaires so I arranged a mountain guide (Robbie Fenlon of Wilderplaces) to accompany them up high. Unfortunately the group were unable to ski the Valleé Blanche due to bad weather conditions that week but they had a fantastic day of ski education instead. After a recent avalanche in Le Tour they were able to check out the avalanche path and be educated in safe terrain travel and get up close and actually see avalanche debris and see how scary it actually is. They also put their skiing skills to the test and had a few pitches of amazing untracked knee deep powder and it was so great they raced back up to make more fresh lines!

The ski touring season is now well under way and large number of guided groups are setting out on the Haute Route - the high altitude ski touring route from Chamonix to Zermatt. This is one of the classic ski touring routes and on alot of ski tourers' “must do” lists. It starts from the top of the Grands Montets crosses the glaciers and the first climb is up to the Col du Chardonnet. This ski tour is generally undertaken with a Mountain Guide as it crosses numerous glaciers and the weather can quickly change so it’s best to be in the hands of an expert!

On the subject of weather, it is definitely beginning to warm up and it suddenly felt spring like today. Today was also the first day that the local avalanche risk has been at 2 for quite some time. The wind has died down and the snow has stopped falling but looking towards the end of the week, there is yet another change in the weather which will bring colder temperatures back to the valley. With that on the agenda, we may well be skiing powder until the lifts close this year.

Happy Skiing!

NB: Off piste skiing and mountaineering are dangerous. The opinions expressed in these articles are very much time and condition specific and the content is not intended in any way to be a substitute for hiring a mountain guide, undergoing professional mountaineering training and/or the individual's own backcountry decision making.