Snow cover has been a little thin recently after some early falls followed by a dry spell. The reporting of this must be bewildering for people back in the UK, major news outlets have cut costs so much that they’ve no reporters on hand that understand alpine conditions nor any to do any research. Instead, they’ve picked up reports from the dire ski websites with their google search results news coverage and ‘expert’ analysis by a guys who’ve only just discovered that ski lifts run outside of the package tour New Year to Easter timetable. As a result they’ve gone seamlessly from “the best season start – ever” to “Xmas skiing ruined” passing through “who hyped up the snow cover?” (A, You did, you idiots, last week).
Anyway, although the ski conditions are a bit thin they’re just fine for snowshoeing particularly as we’re expecting to walk and know the area well.
We kicked of our winter snowshoe program last week with a trip to Pierre du Moelle above Leysin. There’s a number of ways we get to Pierre du Moelle but on Friday the best way was to take the car around to the nearby village of La Comballaz where the road is fairly clear giving good access to a forest trail taking us straight up to the col.
Over the weekend we took the first trip to the col du Grand St Bernard and stayed overnight at the hospice. This was another great couple of days and probably one of the best locations for snowshoeing over this weekend. As usual it was cold right up on the col and there was a fierce wind on the Italian border. Food and hospitality from the hospice was just excellent as usual.
Tuesday saw us over in the Chamonix Valley on the Aiguillette des Posettes above Vallorcine. Again cover was thin for the skiers but we had a great day finding some soft, light snow on sheltered north slopes.
Snowshoes are such a handy tool in these conditions. There’s patches of ice around with exposed rock and grass and the spikes on the snowshoes give a great, safe grip we’d not get with boots alone and the snowshoes are robust enough not to worry about damaging them. This is Dianne, a Chamonix based IML, and Jamie, an IML aspirant visiting from Scotland, moving down the Aiguillette des Posettes.
Talking of snowshoes, as we came off the mountain I called in at Vieux Campeur getting some of our Mammut Pulse transceivers upgraded to the new software, and picked up a new transceiver to add to our stock along with some new MSR Evo Ascent snowshoes for me to replace some I broke back in the spring.
Je lève mes yeux vers les montagnes – I lift my eyes to the mountains
This little cross is on a small peak on the Col de La Croix. It’s one of the best snowshoe routes in the area, there’s amazing scenery and the predominantly north aspect slopes hold their snow giving us some great sport in light powdery snow descending through the forests and meadows.
oh, they’re our tracks!
Down at the bottom we found these hoar crystals, they’ve come out nicely on the photo showing their delicate structure. They’ve been formed in shaded, cold places as the snowpack evaporates heat into the cold air. They’re also exceptionally dangerous, if we have new snow fall on top of them it creates a buried weak layer in the snowpack that can take a while to clear. Unfortunately, that’s exactly what we’re expecting to happen in the run up to Xmas so some real caution and skill in evaluating snowpack stability will be required over the holiday period.
