Big Kids Off Piste Safety Talk

I gave the inaugural "Big Kids Off- Piste Safety Talk" last night at the Church Hall in Chamonix to a lot of children and their parents and it seemed that it was a great success judging by the amount of questions I was asked.


The idea of this talk came from concerned parents who's children are good skiers and are more than capable of skiing off -piste. The problem is that A they won't listen to their parents and B although they are good skiers they think that is a giant Disney Land where nothing can go wrong.

The aim was not to tell them not to do it[ because they won't listen] instead my aim was to at least give them a rough understanding of what they are getting into. [Most people who have accidents do not realise it was dangerous]

The talk covered the piste signs and what they mean. Why for example skiing down a closed piste is never a good idea.

The flags which indicate the risk.

What Pisteurs do to make the resort safe and how they do this looking at Catex & Gasex. and helicopter bombing

How avalanches are formed. Most skier avalanches are triggered by their victims

How to read the signs that nature provides. Avalanche conditions need not only snow but wind. Reading where the wind has come from is critical to understanding the risk.

Obligatory Equipment for skiing off piste.

Safe skiing practice [ How to ski a slope to minimise the risk]

What to do if it all goes wrong [ie how to conduct an avalanche search]

Too Cold For Comfort

Generally it is possible to cope with very cold conditions, the issue is when it is windy and cold. I was up at the top of point Helbronner on the Italian side of the Valley Blanche. The plan was to take a group of Bankers for an introductory walk around the glacier. Even getting the rope uncoiled inside the building was unpleasant on the fingers. When we went out of the door and were faced with an icy blast, but I thought if we can get down onto the glacier we might escape from the wind. Then suddenly this guy came staggering towards me with half his face frozen. He looked like a zombie.His skin looked like melted candle wax. I turned to my clients and one of them had a big white blotch on his cheek. I turned around and rushed back inside. We had been out side no more than five minutes. I said to the other Guide I was working with "Its too cold and dangerous we need to go down."
No one seemed to disagree.

Really Really Bad Snow

Well finally it happened. So far until today we have had great skiing. All that changed. Chris Dovell and his pals joined me for a days ski touring. The weather was crap. Rain and snow mixed with very strong winds[which further west claimed 45 lives in France] But not to be put off we left France and went to Switzerland. Our first plan was to go to a very small village called Mex. But the road was blocked by wind blown trees. We quickly came up with a plan B which was to climb the the Dent des Valerette high above Monthey. Strangely the sun came out and the wind dropped [for a while] and we had a pleasant ascent and great views all the way to lake Geneva. However the ski down was horrific. Breakable crust covered porridge like snow. The only person who managed a series of half okay turns was Dovell who was cleverly on fat skis. I was not on fat skis and kept sticking my head in the snow and then blamed my equipment. For Dovells friends it was; shall we say an unforgettable day out.

Mixed weather but always good snow

I believe the quality of the snow is always the most important requirement for great skiing. If there is a choice between beautiful sunny days and crap snow or blizzards and powder I will take the later. providing A, I am not ski touring and B, there are trees to ski in.
This is exactly how it was last week with Reuben and Fiona Berg. We had good skiing but not always perfect blue skies.

Cruising the Resorts

I spent the last week skiing various resorts in Chamonix and the surrounding areas with Maighread. She is equally keen on finding good places to eat. On our last day in Combloux we were joined by Laura and Marco. It just so happens that Laura has here own blog dedicated to Alpine Eating! www.alpineeating.blogspot.com

Happy Valentines Day

Skiing up at Brevent on what must be the busiest day of the season as it was the start of the school holidays and perfect blue skies and great snow.

Three different days

Stephen Yeates John Donner and Mike Woolford came out for their annual trip to Chamonix to ski with me. On Our first day we struggled to see a thing, thick mist but at least it was snowing hard, We did eventually find some very good tree descents undrneath the Flegere cable car.
On our second day we went to Combloux and hit the jack pot- knee deep untracked fluffy powder on steep terrain all to ourselves.
On our third day we went to Les Contamines and while the snow was not as good as the previous day we did have some long remote descents with a lunch which was very bizzarre. It was as far away from a mountain restaurant as it is possible to get. We eat in some grumpy women's kitchen!

Great Snow in the low resorts

The theme of these last few blogs is stay low. It has been very cold and the snow in the lower resorts has been as good as it gets. However high up the wind has been wrecking the snow making it heavy , dangerous and difficult to ski. With this in mind I travelled again to St Gervais with Susannah Frieze and many of her friends. Susannah apparently won a chalet holiday in a raffle!! We skied in the trees [and sometimes just over the trees.]
Yesterday we skied in Les Contamines where we had a very good morning and then after lunch the sun came out contrary to all the weather forecasts which was wonderful for the visibility but it got very hot and wrecked the snow a bit.

Lots of different stuff

The weather continues to bring lots of cold snow which is great. On Thursday I was out in the thick of it with Nick Rowles learning about snow safety at Le Tour. It was bitterly cold.
On Friday Chris Boulton returned with eight of his pals and we went to Combloux and skied [and fell in various streams] the beautiful valley to Gietaz before having a late lunch at the Christomet.
Overnight it snowed a lot. So much so that everything was closed in Chamonix. We headed to St Gervais where not only did we have fantastic snow but the sun came out and we were able to get first tracks off the summit of Mt Joly in near perfect deep light powder.

Six days with the Flying Grannies

Once again the Flying Grannies have totaly shattered me. They have an average age of 70 years, they are out of the door at 8.30am and don't stop skiing until it goes dark. They hate skiing on the piste [too icy and too crowded] instead they like nothing better than "zooming" around in the trees, or completeing long remote descents in un tracked snow.

What a Day.

Chris Dovell and Simon Warren and I went to explore behind Les Marcottes. We took the lift up to the top of the resort and then climbed up to the La Golette in just over an hour. At the top we were greeted with a spectacular view of the Dent du Midi. We skied down to the lake in powder over fabulous undulating terrain. We then stuck the skins on again and climbed up to the Col d'Emaney with Chris ploughing a track for us.
We were greeted by another jaw dropping view. We then skied down some complicated terrain into a deserted valley. Getting out of the valley was not without interest, but just added to the adventure. A brilliant day in the wild mountains where we saw no one.

The best turns so far this season

I was back in Les Contamines today to ski with Simon. In the morning we skied off piste in very good powder. In the afternoon we hopped over the Col de Fenetre and skied all the way down the Gorge to the car.

Come To Megeve and ski for free

BUT only if you are a women. Megeve had what I consider a bizzare promotion where by on this particular Sunday if you were female you could ski for free. But there were apparently going to be no free skis days for males planned. Anyway we skied off piste in snowy conditions and had a very good time. We finished with an excellent late lunch at the Christomet.

An Introduction to Chamonix on Snow shoes.

I spent a couple of very pleasant in the company of Nancy Cooper wandering around the quiet forests of the Chamonix valley. Walter joined us too and loved it.

Above the clouds

As so often is the case you make your own luck. We left Chamonix in thick mist and slippy roads and headed for Verbier. We headed for the Savoleyers side. As we rode the tiny bubble we popped out of the fog to clear blue skies. I called Air Glacier and they sent a helicopter to take us all to the summit of the Rosa Blanche where we landed in perfect conditions. We skied down to Siviez where we had a late lunch before picking up the lift system that took us back over to Verbier and back down into thick Fog.

Florence gets 3rd Place in the Anglo-Sottish Championships

Florence took two days off school to compete in the Anglo- Scottish Cup on Monday and Tuesday. The races were held at Les Houches during a heavy snow fall. There were two sets of giant slalom races. Florence came third in both races.

Stranger than fiction

There is a great story in to days Guardian about a guy hiding from the police in the Val Ferret. I passed this guy first in the middle of Septemeber and then in October on the way to climb the route Genepi at the head of the Val Ferret. I thought he seemed a bit of a hermit but it never crossed my mind that he was on the US most wanted list. Click on the tittle to read the link.

If you are coming all the way from Denver to ski it better be good

Don Hazell brought his family all the way from Denver to ski in Chamonix. They arrived to a perfect script of cold snowy weather. But all that changed as a vicious Foehn kicked in and closed the lifts. So on our first day we headed to St Gervais. Where we found some heavy but un tracked snow and importantly an excellent lunch at the Ravoire.
Overnight the temperature shot up and it lashed it down. We arrived at Les Grands Montets to find the normal chaos of no one knowing when or if it was going to open. So we canned the day.
Don Nick and Merisa were disappointed because they had heard so much about the mythic status of Grands Montets.
The next day we reconvened to try again and were rewarded with untracked snow all day long and they left feeling well skied.

Skiing with Florence

Florence teacher was ill to day so she got the afternoon off school and we went skiing at Grands Montets. I needed to take some photos for a mountain safety talk I am working on. Florence was the ski model!

The Skiing has started!!

Andrea Florence and I went up to Les Grands Montets this afternoon to find our ski legs. The snow was great which is more than can be said about the lift. Same old tired cable cars, same old queue, [forty minutes to wait at the bottom] No thought about opening the adjacent chair lift. But despite all this we had a good time.

50 cm of Snow last night and today

This was the first significant dump of snow this year and it is just what is needed to get everyone excited about the forth coming season.

Mark the Mountain Guide British Tour

I spent last week back in the UK visiting some schools and talking about how and why I wrote the Mark the Mountain Guide books. I used real pictures to show the children where I got the inspiration for the stories. I finished each talk by showing them all how an Avalanche Beeper worked. I got the children to pass the Beeper around rather like pass the parcel. When I said stop the child who had the bleeper was asked to hide it up their jumper with out me seeing it. It was then up to me to search for the hidden bleeper.
I visited five schools: Folds School, Deepdene and West Hove Infants school [all in the Brighton area]Next I visited Thorngrove School near Newbury and lastly I spent the day at Brookham School in Liphook.

Giant Black Pudding spotted over Chamonix

So I was out cutting the lawn for probably the last time this year when suddenly a giant black pudding passed over head.

Our new Crag that seemingly appeared overnight

The other day I was out walking the dog on a path I have used for the last eight years when suddenly I noticed a sign post pointing to a "Site d'escalade." I duly followed the sign into the woods and sure enough there was a giant boulder the size of a house. The boulder had been scrubbed clean and a couple of belay bolts drilled into its summit.
It was as if the boulder had fallen out of the sky because I had never noticed it before.

Making the most of Autumn in the Alps

After our day above Champex Reuben and I drove through the Mt Blanc Tunnel and went to climb in the Val Ferret where we did the long route Genepi. Due to its southerly aspect we were in the sun all day ... until we started the rapell descent when it started to drizzle. We just managed to make it back to our rucksacks before the rain settled in for the afternoon.
Next day again the weather was good so we went back through the Mt Blanc tunnel but this time took the cable car into the Valley Blanche from where we climbed the Aiguille du Toule.
Thursday - the forecast was not great so we decided to brush up on our Ice climbing Skills by heading up to the Mer De Glace. The rain did hold off until mid afternoon but when it started it chucked it down.
Friday was again back to the standard we expect. Cold and clear. We headed up to climb above Argentiere. No trip to this area would be complete without an ascent of the Aiguillette de Agentiere.