Summer Alpine climbing Season 2015 kicks off

I was joined by Dee Anand for six days. Dee came out last year at pretty much the same time and we climbed Mt Blanc together. The only problem was we arrived on the summit in thick cloud. Well pretty much the same thing happened on this trip every time we arrived on a major summit we saw nothing.

On the Monday the weather forecast was indifferent for Chamonix. But just over in Switzerland it was much better . So we headed up to the Emosson Dam. Parked the car and jumped on a free shuttle bus which whisked us to the other side. [The bus was provided by the construction company who are repairing a leak in the dam wall!

We climbed the Aguille de Van which proved to be an ideal shake down day.

On the Tuesday we did the classic traverse of the Crochue .We did stay dry , but we saw nothing!


Dee had to take my word when I announced we were on the top.


Then on the wednesday believe it or not the sun came out! So we were all psyched to head up the Aguille du Midi. Yet when we turned up the whole world had the same idea and the Que was round the building. Plan B - through the Mt Blanc Tunnel and up the brand new lift at Helbronner. This proved to be a much better bet. The new lift is sensational. As the cable car goes up, it also spins around on its axis. The lift station is like a cross between a 5 star hotel reception/a cathedral. It is jaw dropping. We were able to do the complete traverse of the Aguille du Marbree.


Thursday - we now had a stellar forecast and so we headed round to the Grand Paradiso. We walked up to the Vittorio Emanuelle hut in an easy couple of hours.

Friday breakfast at 4.00 am . We were away soon after. Gradually we overtook all the other parties , not by going quickly but just by not stopping. Yet when we summitted once again the mist had socked in and Dee was once again deprived of a view.



Although we couldn't see much the conditions underfoot were excellent and we charged back down the snow to the hut in 2 hours.

On the Saturday we were a bit tired so we opted to go up to Plan Praz on the Brevent lift where did an excellent but very chilly rock climb .We climbed the Éperon de doite, on the Aiguille Charlanon.

The Ibex of Cingino Dam .

Last week I got a call from the BBC to ask if I could help rig a camera for a unique never been attempted film project.
The plan was to film the Ibex which climb the Cingino Dam in order to lick the salt deposit off the rock. The salt is forced out of the rock by the water pressure .

Rather sensibly it was felt that we should walk up to the dam and make a recce. The plan was to see if we could fix a tensioned cable way across the front of the dam with the intention of mounting a camera.

So I left home at about 5.30am and drove over the Simplon pass to Villa Dollassa in Italy where I met up with Roberto Bianchi who is a wild life photographer and expert on the Ibex.


A few minutes later we were joined by Alex Rankin , the producer of the episode. We all then drove to the head of the Antrona Valley , dumped the car and started the beautiful walk up to our un manned Refuge at 10.00am





It was a fair pull up to the hut taking 4 hours .


We unpacked our stuff and then crept over to the dam which is about 5 minutes walk from the hut we were staying in.

Luckily the ibex were on the dam. The site is simply incredible. I couldn't quite take in how steep the dam wall was and how big the ibex were. Some must have weighed over 300 kg.



We spent the afternoon and the next morning checking out potential anchors and making risk assessments. It was just before we headed down back to the valley that I got to be even more impressed by the ibex: As I stood at the bottom I decided to have a go at climbing the first couple of meters of the dam to see what it was like.

I struggled up about a meter and slipped off!

Still very good skiing to be had - if you know where to look

So Alison, Yvette, Kevin and I parked the car at the Emosson Dam and started walking across the Dam at about 6.30 am.

Our first challenge was to negotiate the building site . We then traversed the Dam and just beside the road dumped our training shoes and stuck on our ski boots , skis and skins. We then climbed the 800 vertical meters to the Col de la Terrace.





At the col we stripped off the skins and were treated to a spectacular view across to the Aiguille du Chardonnet and the Trient glacier.

By now it was about 9.00am and the snow had already nicely softened up. We were provided with excellent spring snow conditions as we headed back towards the reservoir [which seems to be missing the ingredient it was designed to store]



It was then back the way we came , but not before stopping for "brunch" at the excellent cafe just above the Dam.

Just when you thought it was all over... Winter returns.

Steve Callaghan contacted me because he wanted to restart climbing after a long lay-off . He felt he was a bit rusty and wanted to brush up on his skills. We devised a plan through an exchange of emails , met up and headed up to the Mer de Glacé. This is a very good place to cover everything there is to know about ice axe ,crampons, rope work , steep ice climbing and look at how stuff has changed in the thirty years since Steve had last been climbing. However it was difficult to imagine how he had ever been away because he took to it all like a duck to water,

This was despite the weather being more arctic than alpine. Winter had seemingly returned and the temperature had dropped by 30c in a week.


We had the whole of the Glacier to ourselves.

Our first day was a success and so the next day we headed up the Aiguille du Midi to attempt the iconic Cosmiques Arete. Not for the first time the Aguille du Midi was slow to open , primarily because it is run entirely for the convenience of the people who work on it and not the paying public. Eventually it did open and we descended the ridge and plodded round to the start of the route. Luckily there was a party in front of us, I say luckily because it was they who ploughed through the 130cm of fresh snow. Eventually they became exhausted and it was left to Steve and I to gallantly plough the furrow.

Ski Season Ends abruptly.

The weather messed with our plans again. Peter Folkman and I had a plan to traverse the Eastern Oberland on skis. The weather had different ideas. There was just one day of good weather forecast. We decided to go skiing on Grands Montets. The previous day it had snowed and there was the rumor of very good powder skiing high up.
Unfortunately this was just a rumor and the first run off the top was horrible. Luckily the snow softened up and we did end up having several very good runs and certainly better than the skiing parachutist who seemed to have not seen the cliff.


The skiing down the Argentiere glacier was excellent.

This was to be the last of the good weather. We decided on a radical plan. Ditch the skis and head south to Provence for some rock climbing. Four hours after leaving Chamonix we were in Orpierre complaining about being too hot and smearing our selves in sun cream.
Orpierre is one of Europes key place s for rock climbing.

We booked into the Cean Hotel about 5 km outside Orpierre. The hotel is run by the brother of Luc Alphand the famous French ski racer. It is a good place to stay and even better it serves the family beer : Biere Alphand which we road tested and found to be excellent.

The next day it rained. Then some more. This was the start of the rain that caused flooding in the Chamonix area, plus big full depth avalanches which closed the Montenvers railway. We visited Sisteron and took a look around the Citadel. Well worth a visit.

The next day the weather was great and we climbed on the Quatre heures crag.
The desecent involved a free rappel
After the climbing we drove to Buis Les Baronnies. We found a hotel and went out for dinner in the bustling center of town.
On the Sunday we climbed the one of the classic routes of the area Les Trous on the impossing Saint Julien crag which dominates the local land scape.

On the Monday we decided to climb the new via ferrata which had recently been built. It boasts that it is one of the finest in France. Certainly it is well conceived and well built. Plus the views all around are spectacular.
Once we had finished it was back to the car for the drive back up to Geneva so that Peter could catch his flight home. I then drove back to Chamonix [where it was still raining.]

Figure of 8 ski tour around Chamonix& bit of Switzerland

Another fine week of weather allowed us to set up a very interesting beautiful ski-tour where we even met Christophe Jaquet on the top of the Col du Chardonnet. [Christophe is the translator of Mark The Mountain Guide into Marc Le Guide.]

Charles Sherwood and his friend Simon Allen joined me for four days. While I have enjoyed many adventures with Charles , Simon was new to ski touring. So it was necessary to build a trip which would hopefully have all the elements of a ski touring challenge but was never too committing.
SO:

On the Tuesday we met up and went to Stamos Sports in Argentiere in order that we could kit Simon out with ski touring skis and all the other paraphernalia associated with ski touring. We then went skiing at Grands Montets primarily so that we could test out all the kit before heading off into the wilderness.

The skiing was awful, icy and very noisy. In an attempt to find something better we ventured off-piste . This was considerably worse. Simon would have been forgiven if he had packed up and gone home then and there. It was not intentional but it probably seemed like some horrendous initiation test.

At least we established that the kit worked and I ascertained that if Simon could ski this frozen rutted stuff that had once been snow, then he could probably ski anything. We headed up to the top of Grands Montets. After a very good Croute & salad in the somewhat shabby Buvet in the the top station. We then skied down the glacier du Rognons. At the junction with the Argentiere glacier we stuck our skins on and headed up to the Argentiere Hut for the night. The hut was very busy , but mainly with climbers taking advantage of the good conditions on the North Face of the Doites.

Wednesday we had breakfast at 6.30am. It was up to its normal Aregentiere Hut crap standard - luke warm insipid tea/coffee/chocolate and a miserable piece of bread which had a texture and resemblance to balsa-wood.

Leaving the Hut was tricky because the snow had frozen hard over night and a lot of care was needed. We then skied down the Argentiere glacier and searched for an exit on our right so that we could follow our intended route over the col du Passon. Global warming continues to speed up and cause more issues with glacial retreat. Yet again what should have been a straight forward exit off the glacier was instead a sketchy scramble wearing crampons, not skis.

We climbed up to the col du Passon without incident and from this point we only passed one other skier. We reached the Col du Passon at about 11.00am , then headed across and up to the Tete Blanche . On the way we passed a ski plane that was parked up while its occupants sat in the snow and had a picnic.

We got the descent just right and had some excellent spring skiing all the way down to the Albert 1er Hut. This was the first winter it had been opened , few people seemed to know this and it was consequently quiet.


On the Thursday breakfast was marginally better than the day before , but the toilet was back to the bad old days of huts. One squatter for the entire hut population. Pretty much 3rd world standards and not for the sqeamish. If they are going to continue to operate in the winter then something will need to be done.

We left by 8.00am.We continued to enjoy perfect weather and solitude . We climbed up to the Col du Midi. But first we passed the not very well known, but hugely significant point "Signal Reilly." Reilly was an English surveyor who was with Whymper on the first ascent of the Chardonnet. He used this rock to triangulate the heights of many of the peaks in the area.

At the top of the col du Midi the snow had gone and so there was some more thought provoking route finding through some indifferent rubble and broken rocks. [Col du Midi was used for a helicopter scene in James Bond Golden Eye. JB jumps out of the the helicopter with his skis already strapped to his feet.]

It was then around to the Aiguille du Tour.3450m We left our skis and the foot of the couloir , roped up and climbed the north ridge to a perfect windless summit. Simon's 1st alpine summit. It would be hard to imagine a better introduction to it all.


We then skied over to the Trient Hut for a late lunch of Omlettes and beer. The Trient Hut is one of the busiest in Switzerland but not mid week , so we had a very pleasant time. Plus we got to see a very memorable sun set

On the Friday, the toilets were good and so was breakfast. Our plan was to reverse the traditional first day of the Haute Route. We skinned across the Trient plateau to the Fenetre du Saliena. We were confronted with a steep descent. While it might have been possible to ski it later in the day when it possibly might have softened up. But not in the condition we found it. If we had attempted to ski it , we might have ended up in an unwanted , perhaps terminal slide. So we cramponed down the slope,facing in with our skis once again strapped on our rucksacks.

It was then over to the col du Chardonnet.This was a magnificent wild and wonderful place to be. At the foot of the gulley which leads to the col du Chardonnet, again it was crampons on , skis strapped to our rucksacks and a steep climb up to the top where [as I said earlier ]we met the Mark the Mountain Guide translator , Christophe who had just climbed up from the side we were going to ski down.

From this point at 3321meters it would be down hill skiing all the way to the village of Argentiere at 1240meters. Just over 2 vertical kilometers of spectacular skiing rounding off a remarkable and varied 4 days.

Traverse of the Eastern Bernese Oberland

This was an exceptional week of ski touring. Chris Dovell Lia Heisters and I left Chamonix at 6.00am. Chris was good enough to drive. I slumbered and apparently snored in the back. We drove via Bern. It was Easter Monday the weather was beautiful and it had recently snowed a lot. The result was that Grindelwald was packed. It took quite a while to park the car , queue to buy tickets and finally board the world's most expensive train [where all the seats were occupied] and travel up to the Jungfraujoch.
Despite the weather being clear there was a very strong viscous wind which coupled with the new snow meant that there was a lot of wind-slab developing. Our plan was to ski tour to the Hollandia Hut via the Louroiter col 3659m. By the time we reached it the wind was "knock you over strong". Nevertheless we need not have worried about the avalanche risk at the col because all the snow had been blown away!
We skied down the Kranzberg glacier in some difficult snow, before stopping to put our skins on and skiining up to the Hollandia Hut 3158.



On the Tuesday we climbed the Abeni Flue 3924m This has all the hard work of a 4000er with out the glory. It was particularly hard because the wind was still very strong. The other two parties turned back leaving the 3 of us to battle on.

A quick photo on the summit and then we skied down through some tricky crevassed terrain until we arrived on the Aletsch glacier. This is meant to be down hill. but what we soon found out is that its not down hill enough to seemingly ski. We tried poling, skating. All three of us tried a different method because there was not one solution better than the other. Yet eventually we put our skins on for the stretch over to the Konkordia Hut. We stashed our skis under a rock and then clambered up the metal stair case to the hut.[See earlier blog entry] Just then the helicopter arrived with the supplies . The Hut dog was especially happy because his dinner was on board.

On Wednesday we headed up and over the Grunhorn col 3279m and over to the Finsteraarhorn Hut,but not before making a detour to climb the Wyssnollen 3590m. The wind had now dropped significantly but it had done its damage to the snow. The descent in good snow would have been very good. But not for us. It was challenging breakable crust. The Finsteraarhorn hut was very busy but because it is such a good hut everything ran smoothly and we enjoyed a good evening.

On the Thursday we headed to the Oberaahorn Hut 3256m. This was a comparatively short day. We arrived at lunch time . Th In contratst to the previous night We were the only guests. The hut was still in the process of being opened for the ski touring season. Chris and Lia decided to help clear the snow from the deck.

Meanwhile The guardian Christoph managed to drop a critical screw while attaching the satellite dish to the veranda. He got involved in a fruitless but heart stopping search for it.

Meanwhile I decided on some "re-hydration therapy" while admiring the view of Matterhorn:




The reason for the short day was partly because the next day was to be big. Very big. Plus partly because we couldn't safely descend the south facing slopes in the afternoon because of the risk of wet slides.

On Friday we awoke at 5.00am. Chris and I then gulped some coffee left out the night before in a vacuum flask . It was then out onto the hut balcony and immediately on to the climb which would take us to the summit of the Oberaarhorn.3629m. Having zoomed up the peak we were treated to a spectacular sunrise.
Plus the first view of where our ski descent would take us.


It took an hour and fifteen to climb and about half an hour to get back to a delicious muesli breakfast. A quick pack up and then the real challenge of the day started .

We skied down the long Oberaar glacier and onto the reservoir, before deciding that it might be best if we didn't actually ski on its frozen surface. At the end of the lake we had some fun and games negotiating and skiing along the top of the dam



The issue with skiing on the top of the dam was that the railings provided no security due to the height of the snow.

Eventually we made it across and this shot shows the entire descent

The day was far from over. Where as it should have been comparatively simple to negotiate the road to the Grimsel pass,[1&half hours on the summer sign post] it proved to be difficult steep terrain . So much so that we couldn't easily skin and so we had to carry our skis and post-hole across steep ground. A slight change of plan meant we headed for the Sidelhorn pass. Magnificent wild terrain and views over to the Furka Pass and the source of the Rhone where we did not see anyone all day.

From here it was very good spring snow and then as we got lower mushy snow , but nevertheless snow, all the way to within 10 minutes walk of the railway station at Oberwald