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

Week of big wind

John Young arrived at the start of the week with a really bad forecast. Typical of the change in the equinox. There was 50cm of snow very strong winds which all added up to a very high avalanche risk. The net result was that most of the lifts in the Chamonix Valley were shut. So not for the first time we had to drive through the magic weather tunnel to Courmayeur.
On the Monday we skied off piste in the trees. In some very good snow.

Tuesday we drove to La Thuile. The weather was clear but there was a ferocious wind blowing which shut a lot of the lifts , but we still had many good long runs.

Wednesday we headed to the Petit Croix Baulet above Combloux. The weather was better and crucially it had got a lot colder.
From the summit we skied all the way down to Geittaz always on excellent snow but there were a few interesting streams to negotiate, some giving one or two comedy moments.

Thursday we headed back through the Mt Blanc tunnel where the weather was perfect. This time we climbed Punte Crocce.

Friday: Funny how these things work out but Friday was the stand out day of the season. We did the traverse of the col du Crochue col du Berard. Everything came together. Some fresh snow over night which critically fell with no wind. Hardly any other parties on the route .

Once we passed over the col du Crochue we were treated to some fantastic skiing.

Followed by another skin to the col du Berard



It was then that we were treated to the best yet: No one had been down the valley. There was 30 cm of untracked light fluffy snow..

We quickly made the transition from skin to ski mode because we were conscious that with the good weather the snow ould deteriorate. We skied down until the snow changed from powder to spring snow. We stopped had a bite to eat and then continued on down the valley and still continued to find good skiing.

La Vallée Blanche

The Vallee Blanche is famous for many things but what most people skiing it for the first time remember is the ridge at the start. This misses the point because the best skiing is actually from the Italian side. So with this in mind Richard Lewis and I started in Chamonix skied down to just under the Pyramid du Tacul. Here we stuck on our skins and climbed up to Helbronner. This gave us access to the comb de la Vierge and some fabulous skiing.

The Escape Tunnel.

Imagine you are in the mountains,the weather is horrible,the visibility is at times zero, the avalanche risk is high. Wouldn't it be convenient if you could just escape inside the slope and get away from it all? Well in a nut-shell this is what we did:
Needless to say this was only part of the adventure which Bill Mills Greg Knott and I had embarked on. The story started on the Saturday morning where we took the mountain train from Grindelwald, through the Eiger before disembarking at the Jungfraujoch station. We stuck our skins on our skis and headed up to the Monchjoch. From there we skied down the very long and flat Emig glacier underneath the Fiescherhorn. It was bitterly cold, yet wild and spectacular - we could just as easily have been in the Antarctic.

Finally the glacier steepened as we skied off the toe of it and joined the main Jungfrau glacier and soon arrived at the steps to the Konkordia Hut. These steps provide no finer example of glacial retreat and global warming because , when the hut was built it was at the edge of the glacier.Its now a lung busting 200 meter vertical ascent.

The Hut wasn't busy just another team of 4 French with their Guide Nicolas from St Gervais.

The next day[Sunday] the weather was cloudy and it was snowing lightly , yet there were holes in the clouds so we decided to head over the Finsteraahorn Hut. Roughly after 2 and half hours of steady ascent we arrived at the col. We skied down the other side and into thick mist. You couldn't even see your feet. Finding the Hut perched on the other side of the moraine was a navigational challenge.

The hut wasn't busy - just the French team and us.

Monday the weather was bad. Not a great amount of snow but still the visibility was poor. The forecast wasn't good for the next 2 days. The problem with the location of the Finsterahorn Hut is that it is remote and there is a real chance of getting stuck there if the weather deterioratesand it snows a lot. So we decided to get out while we could and head back to the Konkordia Hut.

The hut wasnn't busy- just us . The guardian cooked us a giant pan of Rosti Cholesterol

Eventually another Guide from Romanche arrived and we all huddled around the fire in the Kitchen.

Tuesday: We needed to leave - Bill and Greg needed to get home. Still the weather was poor After much debate we decided we would ski down the longest glacier in western Europe the Aletch glacier, with the aim of getting to Fiesch.

Again this is utterly spectacular and wild but it was not long before the weather socked in again and it became necessary to ski roped up in case I inadvertently skied into a crevasse because I could not see a thing. We navigated our way off the glacier and headed up a valley to where we had been tipped off that there was a secret tunnel.
The tunnel was not easy to find , but find it we did and there was s sense of job well done.

The tunnel was about 1200 meters long. I dug out my head torch and lead off while Bill &Greg followed. In the middle of the tunnel we came across a weird shrine with lots of burnt out candles. I couldn't see any sacrificial body parts lying around but there again it was very dark.

We exited through a door into the next valley

We put our skis on and skied the best snow of the trip down a beautiful valley before making a critical right turn up what in the summer would have been a simple path , but in the current conditions was a precipitous traverse above a big cliff. Still there was a track made by other skiers so how hard could it be?

Well it was a few minutes later that we rounded the next corner to come face to face with the two men who had made the track. One of them, seemingly the "fuhrer" was shouting into his phone. It transpired that he was in the frantic process of calling for a helicopter because he and his friend and decided to go on an off-piste "explore" with no idea about anything and had consequently got them selves into a nightmare situation of carrying their skis through waist deep snow and were utterly knackered.

Having established that the helicopter was defiantly coming for them , we bid them Good Afternoon and continued on our way eventually we traversed into the lift system of Fiescheralp [where we somewhat ironically got lost] Anyway a very nice man let us on the chair- lift and we skied into the resort proper. We stopped out side a Hotel where the hotelier was seemingly touting for customers. He offered us for to stay in his Hotel,in the "Fritzel style" dungeon. After an excellent meal in his very fine restaurant the next morning we were back on the slopes , this time with beautiful weather and good powder skiing. We rode the cable car to the top of the resort and finally got to see where we had actually spent he last 4 days.

Walter the Bernese Mountain Dog goes for an Italian ski Tour

Peter Whelan joined me for four days off of piste skiing and ski touring around Chamonix. On our final day we were joined by Walter an ascent of Punte Crocce in the Aosta Valley.

Big Snow

The big snow fall which Chamonix and the surrounding area has desperately waited for finally arrived. It was the sort of season saving snow fall that put down about 100cm in our garden. The immediate result of this was that Chamonix skiing stopped because of the high avalanche risk.

Always in this situation , the solution is to jump in the car and head for Megeve, St Gervais , Combloux where there is always acres and acres of powder skiing through the trees. Pretty much always there is no one else around.

Yesterday 7th Feb I went down the Vallee Blanche for the first time this season with my Icelandic neighbours. We arrived at the Aguille du Midi station to find it deserted. This might have had something to do with the sign which stated that it was -30c on the ridge!

In actual fact the conditions were very good, although there was surprisingly little depth of snow on the Mer de glace. We skied all the wsy to Chamonix.

Back on Skis

Just had two very good days with the party which has been organised with Chris Boulton and friends in one form or another for 20 years. They are creatures of habit. They always stay at the Hotel de la Couronne. They always eat in the Office Bar [at least twice] and they always hire their skis from Stamos Sports. Finally they always engage my services for at least two days. Chris,Kevin,Peter,David,Adam,James,Peter,Steven.

On our first day we skied off piste where James Mitchell took this remarkable photo of me on the piste at Le Tour

On the Sunday they all agreed that some skiining was what was wanted in an attempt to burn off some of the 10 tons of cheese they had eaten. So at 8.00am we squeezed everyone into the Land Rover and drove through the Mt Blanc tunnel and then over to Punte Crocce which over looks La Thuile. Here we enjoyed possibly the best weather day of the season

Finally from the summit you are treated to as a good a view of Mt Blanc as any.

African Odyssey Part 1 Kilimanjaro 5894m

The trip did not get off to the best start. I was delayed twice and missed my 1st two flights due to fog in London. Finally arrived at Heathrow eight hours late. Eventually with great help from HRG travel agents I found a flight to Kilimanjaro International airport via Amsterdam and via Nairobi and actually arrived before my partner in crime for the trip Charles Sherwood.

My Next problem was I did not have the required $50 for my Tanzanian entry visa. I was told to go out side the airport withdraw unfathonable amount of Tanzanian shillings [about 80,000] from the ATM , then go to some dodgy guy who would then convert them into Dollars. All while the immigration officer would "look after " my Passport until I returned...

Unsurprisingly the ATM was not working , so back I went , then a very strange thing happened: An American over heard my disagreement and just handed me a $50 dollar bill! Problem sorted.

Charles arrived from Doha we were picked up by Rift Valley Safaris Ltd and driven to fantastic Moivaru Lodge which appeared to me to be in the middle of the jungle. Here we got the first sight of Kilimanjaro which was on the label of the beer bottles we supped.

Our plan was to climb Kilimanjaro as a way off getting some solid acclimatisation for the real challange of making the complete and rarely achieved traverse of Mt Kenya. We were to start our trek on Kilimanajaro by the Machame park entrance. This is apparently considered to be one of the most beautiful routes. We left the Hotel and gradually picked up people who were going to help us , firstly the cook , then the guide Onex and then a second guide JV [never really sure why we needed a 2nd guide] Then we stopped for an hour so they could all have breakfast , then we arrived at the park gates where we went through a mountain of paper work , met our porters [8 of them] and finally set off around mid day.

We trekked up through an area of forest called the Montaine forest. This is of course rain forest and it lived up to its name by raining torrentially. Fortunately this coincided with lunch and as we rounded the corner our rather Colonial looking Tent had been erected , table was laid [complete with table cloth ] tea was served with sandwiches and hot soup.

All this rain did create a load of thick mud so when we arrived at the Macheme camp 3000m we were already filthy. The camps on Kilimanjaro are somewhat busy and seemingly chaotic . There must have been about 250 tents.

The next day our destination was Shira Cave campsite at 3850m. It wasn't long before it was raining again, it was cold wet and pretty much like the average day in the Scottish mountains. The weather was shaping up to be exactly like it had been 13 months previously , when Charles and I had last been on Mt Kenya, namely crap.
However in the late afternoon the weather did clear to reveal impressive views towards Meru peak and behind us the first real view of Kilimajaro. This was more like what we had hoped for.

The trek form Shira camp to Barrunco Hut 3950m involved firstly walking up to the Lava Towers at 4600m before descending down to the Barrunco camp. This was all part of the well tried formula to aid acclimatiastion "climb high - sleep low"
Still after the initial hour of glorious views , it wasn't long before the mist socked in and it started to rain hail and eventually snow.
At least it cleared up in the afternoon to reveal what a fantastic spot the Barrunco camp is. It is situated bang slap under the giant Breach Wall of Kilimanjaro [until 20 years ago some of the finest ice climbs in Africa.]

The next day it wasn't raining and we set off up the steep scramble towards Barafu Hut at 4800m. The first part of this was really enjoyable and my favourite part of the trek so far. Yet as we got higher the landscape changed and it became very lunar looking. The challenge of this day lay with the porters because there is no water at the Barafu Hut camp and so it all has to be carried. This was mostly done in 20 litre buckets. A grim and herculean task balancing 20 kilos of water on your head and struggling up hill at over the height of Mt Blanc.

Rather embarrassingly we had to wait for them to catch up and so we were forced to stop for an extended lunch in our colonial tent. Fried Chicken and chips and several cups of tea [or in Charles case "Milo" his new favourite African drink]

We arrived at camp late afternoon. It was over dinner that Onex our guide broke the news that our next breakfast would be at 11.00pm. We would be out and on our way for our summit attempt by 11.30pm.
This was to be a big day . 1300 meters of ascent. Unfortunately after an hour it proved too bigger day for our 2nd guide JV who was complaining of a "splitter" - altitude headache.
Onex Charles and I continued , overtook everyone on the mountain and arrived on the summit well before dawn and well before all the other parties.

It was super cold. Full Mt Blanc style clothing , duvet jacket and toe warmer T-bags. Plus big boxing glove like mitts. What I had not anticipated was just how fantastic I would find the summit 5894m . I have been lucky enough to stand on a lot of summits , but the top of Africa ranks amongst the best.

After a lot of photos it was back the way we came , firstly around the giant volcanic rim to Stellar Point and then back down the track to the campsite where we arrived at our tents at about 8.30am.
Charles and I were feeling tireder than we had wanted to be.
After a couple of hours lolling in our pits we had brunch. After which was the next challange of the day was the 4 hour descent to Mweka camp 2950m. Again this was a seemingly endless luna like scape which was made even less inviting when it started to rain big time.With this came mud. Lots and lots of mud which made the campsite like something a battle field.
During the night the rain stopped and there was real alarm that a lion was loose in the campsite. This in fact was me snoring. I was tired.

11th January. This was to be a big logistics day and so an early start was needed. We set off for the road head at 6.30am and arrived at the Park Gate at 8.30am. We signed out of the park and collected our Kilimanajro summit certificates. Our pick up arrived and took us to a hotel where we showered and repacked. It was then to Kilimanjaro International airport for our 2.00pm flight to Nairobi.

It was here while waiting for our flight that we learnt about the terrorist attack in Paris. [The last time were in Kenya we were caught up in the fallout from the Westgate shopping Mall atrocities]

At 2.00pm We were told we could board our flight. We went out on to the runway but it took us several minutes to find our plane which was not a tall what I had anticipated but instead a single propeler engined 15 seater Cessanna Caravan.
There were 4 passengers.

The flight was brilliant.

The plane didn't climb higher than 2000 meters during the whole flight and bounced around in the thermals as it flew across the savannah. Nor did it land at Jomo Kenyatta International airport , but instead at Wilson aerodrome. After filling in the Ebola forms and passing through immigration our taxi met us and whisked us to the wonderful Fair view Hotel. The day had run pretty much perfectly. In addition we were greeted by Eddie our guide for Mt Kenya who I have known for over 25 years.

Part 2 to follow!