After some horrendous weather over the weekend, Emma and I figured that there must have been some fresh snow up high, and so decided to get the first bin up the Grand Montets to have a look. Well, we didn't quite get the first bin, but went for the second one - you need someone to set off all the avalanches and in Cham there's never a shortage of volunteers so we let them get the early lift!
We had planned to ski straight down the front face, but the initial few hundred metres looked pretty dodgy and loaded, so we skied down towards the Argentiere Glacier and then turned left and emerged onto the front face about 2/3 of the way down. Happily enough, the snow was excellent all the way down, and whilst it would have been nice to do some lift served skiing in July, I'll settle for the last day of June!
The last day of June!!!
Emma happy with the conditions
Me heading for the Argentiere Glacier. Photo Emma Jack
Me on the front face. Photo Emma Jack
Today I went for a look at the Aiguille de L'M, but baking temperatures and a snowy approach sent us home empty handed. Conditions are frankly quite poor up high, with this huge amount of fresh snow not yet stabilised, and not many rock climbs completely snow free. As a result, finding objectives over the next few days could be tricky, but things should improve by the weekend as there is wall to wall sunshine forecast from Thursday onwards. In the meantime, I'd go for the ever reliable Aiguilles Rouges, or maybe a bit of cragging.