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Chamonix Snow Report: 15th February 2012

Queue dodging in Chamonix. Not always a bad thing

featured in Snow report Author Helen McGrory, Chamonix Reporter Updated

It’s the school holidays!! Hurray!/Boo! (*delete as appropriate). If you’re coming out here on your holidays then it’s certainly “Hurray!!” If you live here then it’s most likely going to be a “Boo!”. School holidays mean two things – crowds and queues – but if you live and work here then you’re also likely to be pretty busy which means that you’re probably best to suck it up and face the fact that you’re not likely to ski that much for the rest of the month. Or you’re going to really get into cross country skiing.....

However, if you’re coming out on your holidays well, that’s very exciting, and so you need to make the most of your few precious days here by dodging the bulk of aforementioned crowds and queues wherever possible. How is that done?

Well, it’s too late for this year, but you can help do your bit to reduce the crowds on the piste before you even get here. When planning your trip, instead of coming with ALL of your family or really good friends (and their respective kids!), just choose a couple of really close friends and only come with them! The rest of your social group can then be rotated around subsequent visits to Chamonix – perhaps during the longer summer holidays – when the flow of visitors is less intense. Simples!! ;O)

However, for those of you raring to go en masse this year, here are a few tips that I hope help to make your ski holiday less of a bun fight:

Timing is everything: either you need to get out at the crack of dawn and make sure you are on one of the first lifts up to your chosen ski area for the day, or you should kick back with a leisurely breakfast and go up for 10.30-11am when the masses have gone. I did a perusal of all the base stations yesterday around 11am to see what the queues were like and they were all probably between 10-40 minutes (least in Brevent – longest in GM & Flegere). Between 9-10am, you can probably double that, certainly next week when the masses really do arrive.

Make the most of lunchtime: this is such an easy way to maximise your time on the hill, either eat early (if you were on the first lift) or eat late (if you started skiing at 10.30am). Either way, try and avoid having lunch between 12-2pm when the restaurants are all chocca and the queues for the lifts are at their smallest. I know it’s been a bit cold for picnicking recently but stuff a sandwich in your pocket and you can eat whenever you want and choose your view.

Take the train: people often forget about the train, automatically piling onto the rather crowded ski buses instead. However, if you’re going to Flegere, Grands Montets or Le Tour* then the train is still very handy for the base stations if you are OK with a 5 minute walk. Unlike the buses which are free with your ski pass, you need to have your guest card on you when taking the train or you will have to pay. Your accommodation provider will normally give you one of these upon arrival. If not, ask at the Tourist Office. They will also be able to give you a timetable for the transport system while you are there!

Fill up the chairlifts: sadly Chamonix has not embraced the North American trend for singles lines or pro-active lifties jovially organising the queue into 4s/6s etc before you get on the lift. Instead you are left cursing and fuming as you see chair after chair going up not fully laden. Do your bit! The chair lifts only take a few minutes – do you REALLY need to all sit together on every single lift?? (Parents and kids obviously excluded here.) Fill up the gaps and everyone gets to ski more!

For specifics on each of the areas try these:

Flegere: The cable car from Les Praz is a miserable nightmare during peak season (unless you get in early!!). It’s generally quicker to take the Brevent gondola up and ski across from there rather than wait the hour and a half in Les Praz that it can sometimes be.

Brevent: Last year, parking at Brevent shot up from €1 per day to about €12!! Take the bus there or use the drag lift on the Savoy nursery slopes for a free tow up to the base of the gondola. Once up top, the 4 man Parsa chairlift is a notorious bottleneck; I know many people don’t like them but the Stade drag lift that runs alongside it is much quicker and generally doesn’t have much of a queue.

Grands Montets: Instead of waiting in the (often lengthy) queue for the cable car at the bottom, walk the 100m up to the base of the Plan Joran chairlift and you’ll be off and away much quicker. Plus it’s much nicer to be in the fresh air and sunshine on a chairlift than packed in like cattle in the cabin. The Bochard gondola tends to have longer queues than the Herse chairlift, plus the Herse moves fast so the wait isn’t generally very long. It’s also worth doing laps of the Pierre a Ric piste early in the day when it’s normally nicely pisted and everyone else is waiting at the Bochard! If you want to take the Grands Montets cable car right to the top, plan ahead and book your cabin so that you only have to rock up a few minutes before your allotted time. You can do that on-line on the Compagnie du Mont Blanc website or at the cash desk at Lognan.

Le Tour: Parking is a bit of a nightmare here during high season and you can end up with a bit of a long (uphill) walk to the gondola. Definitely take the bus and avoid going there on Sunday morning because ski school and the whole world go there then and the queue can be horrendous. *Alternatively, you can also take the train round to Vallorcine where the queues tend to be much smaller but you access the same pistes!

It’s a very grey day this morning, the clouds gathered in last night and it is currently trying very hard to snow a little. The forecast is promising that we might get 15-25cms at 1500m in the next 24hrs and the sun is taking a well earned break for the day. Whilst there isn’t significant snowfall on the horizon at the moment, the roof clearing teams have been out in force this week, clearing off some of the feet and feet of snow that is now weighing down the buildings. I saw a car parked in the Flegere car park that the owner might have wished they’d kept a bit clearer of snow. It’s now totally wedged in and the weight of the snow on the roof has blown out all the windows!

Whilst I appreciate that you are all coming here to ski, do remember that you’re also on holiday so if your legs are aching, you hit the après ski too hard the night before or you quite simply can be bothered - take the day off! There are loads of lovely relaxing things to do in the town – spa, massage, “do lunch”, shop, or join all the locals on the cross country ski slopes!! Happy holidays everyone :O)

Stats

Snow Report
  • High Temp.: -6

  • Latest Conditions: Early morning low cloud, vanishing - mild on sunny slopes in the afternoonSKY CONDITION : early morning stratocumulus cloud between 1500 and 1700 m, vanishing soon - otherwise clear or partly cloudy. Period of sunshine close to 85%. PRECIPITATION : none. WIND - ground level : variable light. WIND - mid mountain : variable light. WIND - high mountain : N moderate -> NNW light to moderate. TEMPERATURE : low -3

Location

Map of the surrounding area