More fresh lines in untouched powder!

Very weird day yesterday!

With rain in the valley and moody skies things didn't look so good but after a night of rain down here things would obviously be good high up so we headed off to the Grands Montets to join the masses battling it out for fresh lines off top tickets.

With 30 to 40cm of fresh up top this must surely be the day everyone has been waiting for and so I expected big crowds and big queues.

So I was pleasantly surprised to find no queue and so thinking maybe things weren't so good after all we headed up top. Poor visibility was obviously keeping most people away but with my bad vis sensor on we headed left of the Rognon for a blast down the Lognan's Glacier in amazingly deep snow and no tracks. Amazing!

Again no queue at the bottom, weirder and weirder, run number 2 had good vis with the sun coming through and again no tracks and no people?

I began to realize that this was a very special day when run number 3 again provided fresh lines for all and again no one around!

Its a rare thing to ride laps on top tickets all day with no queue and still be getting fresh lines right into the afternoon!

An amazing day and totaly unexpected so how do I top that?

Well today with clear skies in the morning and storms forcast for the afternoon we headed up for a tour over the Col des Autannes. There aren't many tours you can do with the present conditions that ride into the lower altitudes or the valleys and still have snow, I had thought to do the Col du Passon but at the last minute I went with my instincts and changed to the Autannes which proved to be the right choice as there is no snow towards the bottom of the Passon anymore, just what looks to be a heavy commando finish even by my standards.

There's not much snow up at Le Tour anymore either but for our day it was perfect and with everyone else riding the icy piste and no one else touring we headed up in to the peaks.

Tell tale storm cloud cap Mont Blanc as we head into the peaks.

We made very good time up the initial slopes in split mode with couteau (ski crampons) for the steeps. the snow got progressively deeper as we gained altitude and by half way I was doing some serious trail breaking and working hard.

nearing the top of the middle couloir, some of the guys are just starting up the boot pack below.

At just over half way we gained the steep couloir and put boards on out packs and donned our crampons. A good half hour of steep trail breaking later we gained the upper slopes where the going got too deep for on foot and so we went back to skinning on the splits.

The snow pack was getting a little precarious up high so I followed an old avalanche path upwards for a while until it again got to steep and we went back to crampons again.

A weak layer of Graupel in the snowpack sounds the warning bells!

With some seriously weak layers in the snowpack and a perfect layer of Graupel (hail) I decided to avoid the exit couloir and head up for the safety of the rocks above which added a spicy ending to our climb, made all the more atmospheric by the rapidly approaching storm.

Just starting the steep spicy exit up the rocks, very atmospheric!

Once over the top it started snowing a little as we changed back to riding mode but the sun came back out as we got our boards together and the descent looked perfect.

I was a little wary of snowslab into the intial steep slope and so made a fast cut across to a safe zone to check stability and then dropped in for yet another amazing untracked powder run!

I stopped off to get some shots as the guys flew past and then we charged into the valley below with no other tracks anywhere to be seen!

Craig charges the upper slopes, full on fresh!

Carl in powder heaven!

Simon getting his fill!

Frodo (phil) a long way from the shires!

Still a long way to go and no tracks to follow!

It got a little sticky down low and the exit road is starting to get a little bare in patches but we pretty much rode all the way to just above the village of Trient with out problem.

As we rode out we looked back up at 'Glacier Midi des Grandes'. Its a long time since I last rode that big descent, in fact I think I was with Keith (rip) the last time I rode it so it must be 2 seasons ago and we got the shot that is now heading the home page on the web site!

It looked amazing today, unmissable infact and so the heli is booked for tomorrow morning Finhaut to Trient plateau at 8:45 and fresh lines will be ours from top to bottom.

It's raining outside right now, so snowing up high! A little powder top up won't do any harm up there!!

Bring it on!!!

All is good!

Neil.