With a day free in the middle of the week, sunshine forecast and plenty of fresh snow on the ground, I wanted to go for it today and ski myself into the ground.
First up I went up the Grand Montets with Matt, Tom and John to check out the Pas de Chevre. We had a look at the Rectiligne couloir entrance but it looked pretty wind blasted so we left it and went down the normal route, where we found some decent snow but a fair bit of crust too. However, the skiing is always secondary whenever I do the Pas de Chevre because the scenery and situations are just so incredible. Every time I do it I wonder why I don't ski it more often - it really is an amazing place to ski and if you get good snow it's even better.
The lads at the top - beautiful cloud inversion behind.
Matt finding the good stuff.
More goodness.
Nearing the bottom. Photo Matt Livingstone.
Well it wouldn't be the Pas de Chevre without a bit of messing around in a rocky gully! This was actually much trickier than it looks here.
Safely down on the Mer de Glace and skiing amongst some amazing ice formations.
From whence we came.
Next up, Tom and I went up the Midi with no fixed plans but keen for some nice snow. We skied over to the Grand Envers but it looked a bit wind buggered so we dropped into the Petits Envers and found some brilliant snow. As with the Pas de Chevre, skiing the VB is always amazing but today felt even better than usual for some reason. Probably a combination of the best mountain scenery in the World, great snow and Tom's awful banter.
All Midi shots Tom Moores.
Me loving it in the Petits Envers.
Dwarfed by the scenery.
Me loving it again.
After a second run down the James Bond track we found ourselves back in town and still not satisfied so we decided to do a final run down the Plan de L'Aiguille.
Not often you have this much space in the Midi cable car.
Somewhat surprisingly, conditions were poor and there was evidence of a lot of avalanche activity so we pieced our way down the safest route we could find and retired for a well earned cup of tea.
Chamonix beckoning us down after a long day - one of the best sights in the World. What...a...day.