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Chamonix Snow Report: 9th February 2010

featured in Snow report Author Kieran Sharp, Updated

More snow has been passing through the valley although not to the same amounts as the last dump, but a lot of backcountry routes will still be in condition for when the sun comes out later this week, and with minimal amounts of snow falling added with larger February cues, its time to get touring! Personally I don't like cueing much so when it gets busy I will get one or two lifts up in the morning followed by walking the rest of the way up, over, or round something to get to somewhere with un-touched powder or just be in the mountains with no one else around, or even session and build a jump for a day somewhere soft. Until the sun comes out fully I shall be making the most of the trees or any inversions in the weather system like the other day in Le Tour.

After a fair amount of snow had fallen over the weekend it was a good idea to get up no matter what the weather was doing and It looked like we had the best opportunities in Le Tour so we headed in that direction, to take advantage of the weather which was blowing in and out all day. It has been getting noticeably cooler over here and the Foehn wind (a warm wind from the south) which was blowing had died down, and seemed to be taken over by a wind from the North blowing the clouds in and out of the valley all day. With the cooler temperatures the snow pack seemed to have strengthened so we where keen to take a look at some of the normally avalanche prone routes if the clouds let us have the opportunity to do so! We headed round the back of the resort where most of the trees are to have a look at one of the bowls round the back, however the weather round here wasn't in our favour and the clouds seemed to be hanging around this part more, and with a bit of route finding at the end of this route necessary, we chose not to take this option. We where planning on doing a short hike up from the top of the back chair to get a long really good line down to the man made reservoir followed by traversing back to the chair lift. The snow was really good between the trees and quit grippy on the nice easy blue piste runs so we took a few runs through here before heading back round more to the front side where it was a bit clearer. The easy blue runs round the back of Le Tour is great for beginner skiers with some great views and pretty chilled out routes passing through the trees, and if you are a little more advanced its wicked for Jibing around the side of the piste with lots of natural hits, rollers, and drops, to throw yourself at or spin around.

Once we had our fill of Jibbing round the back we got off the back chair lift and headed down one of the gulley's through a nice bit of pow back to the cat track which joins the front of Le Tour to the backside of the resort. From here we headed round the track back toward the button lifts just before the backside, where we intended on hitting a route back down to the car park. The snow round here was nice, not to deep and felt pretty stable so we felt confident in having a good safe run, but it should be noted that this can be (especially in the spring) a very avalanche prone route as the whole area is grass filled making it easier for the entire snow pack to slide off. From the top of the button lift we took a left and headed underneath the rope traversing far until clear of the cliff band and pretty much in line with the bottom of the bubble station. We picked a good line with few tracks down it but as we began to set off the clouds came in, which made it difficult in choosing our route, but we managed to get a good rip down the face when the cloud allowed us heading straight back in to the car park, where we unfortunately noticed a lot more cloud coming in so on that note we headed back to Argenitere for some Après ski at the Office bar!


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

Stats

Avalanche Risk
  • Level 3

Snow Report
  • 1

  • Total Pistes: 75

  • Alt. Resort: 1972

  • Alt. Summit: 3233

  • Alt. Last Snow: 1500

  • High Temp.: -1

  • Alt. High Temp.: 1050