Chamonix Snow Report: 24th February 2008

Just after mid day even the mythical car park 15 was full and the car park attendants who don't seem to have been on the American styled customer care course the lifties have been on, were reduced to directing cars to odd places they had spotted, but credit where its due they were still on station and doing their best.

Up on the mountain things were going well. The pistes were busy but coping, the snow was good in parts, with still a bit of soft snow about over the hard base, but inevitability as the day wore on the snow on the piste was getting a hammering and getting down to the hard base in places. The high capacity lifts were also coping well with the numbers with no excessive queues.

There was evidence of a lot of effort from the piste bashers to keep on top of the conditions; snow had been scraped onto the pistes in a number of places, from the sides. It is a good idea to look out for this when venturing off the side of the piste as the areas it is scraped from, can be lumpy.

Off piste was quieter than usual. This may have had something to do with the emergence of oceans of gnarly moguls. The whole of the off piste now seems to be sporting them. They are large but still relatively soft.

The home run is also holding up well, and even if late in the afternoon the number of skiers and riders was a tad intimidating, the snow was still good.

One area of snow reporting I have been slacking on is the Nordic tracks in the valley. My house mate has been off checking these out. The long period of warm sunny weather has taken its toll on the Chamonix tracks, while they are still open and busy they are quite icy in places and looking slightly brown. The Argentiere tracks are fairing much better although the link between the Argentiere track and the Chamonix ones is closed due to lack of snow.

The state of the home runs in the valley is that, at Grand Montets as mentioned above the run is open and in good condition, at Le Tour it is open but getting a little heavy in the afternoon, at Valorcine it is open but with warning signs of poor snow, and the home runs a Brevent and Flegere are both closed for lack of snow.

The avalanche risk continues at 1, low. The forecasted light snow for Monday seems to have been postponed until at least Wednesday, with the long term forecasts predicting a major change from the warm sunny weather we have been enjoying to cold and snowy for the first week of March, fingers crossed.

Check out what to do around town once the lifts have closed with our latest Apres Ski Report - a weekly round up of what's hot and where to party in Chamonix!

Useful Information
Cross-country skiing is Open
Piste Maps for Chamonix (pdf format), Les Houches (jpg format), Cross-country skiing (pdf format), and Mountain-bike trails (pdf format)
Current status for opening of Pistes & Lifts
Chamonix Webcam Index

We will be keeping this Chamonix snow report updated often during the season, but if you want even more up-to-date news on the ski conditions, why not sign up for our Dump Alert? We'll email you each time it snows enough to significantly change the skiing conditions. It's great to know that the snow is falling in the run-up to your holiday, and it might even allow you to book a last-minute weekend when the snow is particularly good. The service is free, and you can unsubscribe whenever you like.

Useful Links
Swiss Federal Institute for Snow and Avalanche Research
French Avalanche Research Institute
Meteo France - Mountain weather and avalanche conditions bulletins (in French)
Henry's Avalanche Talk - popular avalanche training sessions based in French Alps as well as translation of current avalanche conditions
PisteHors.com - Backcountry Skiing and Snowboarding News in English for the French Alps. Excellent coverage of avalanche safety and advice.

Additional snow and weather information provided, with thanks, by meteo.chamonix.com and the Tourist Office