Sunset from the Torino hut.
The Summit of the Tour
Rond is described in the Alpine Club Guidebook as follows, "As a viewpoint it is probably one of the finest in the range, standing opposite the full sweep of the
Peuterey Ridge and the magnificent
Brenva Face".
Well with a description like that it really has to be a must for anyone....let alone a Journalist from the Finical Times. I've worked with
Tarquin Cooper a couple of times in the past and jumped at the chance of spending a couple of days in the hills with him.
We wanted a summit that was going to be climbable in a quick weekend hit from the UK and the Tour
Rond seemed the prefect fit with a testing North Face, low(
ish) altitude, easy approach and quick descent....what could ever go wrong!!
The lovely Jazz drove us round to Le
Palud lift in Italy, we had a coffee in the sun watching some film being shot in the car park, before we caught the lift up. We had a tricky hut approach of approx 25m from the lift to the hut....it was a killer.
Tarquin approaching the narrows.
The old
Torino hut is lovely with a nice warm wooden main room and comfy small
dom rooms.
Tarquin and myself took some great pictures of a stunning sunset on the terrace before we had a lovely meal, tucking ourselves up in bed before 10pm!
Alpine breakfast starts are never that good, but 6am is pretty mellow and by 6.50 we had climbed the stairs to the main Hut and had strapped skis on. The ski to the face was easy and before long we were crossing the
Bergschrund.
The upper slopes of the North Face.
The Classic North Face is graded II D 350m and provides a good intro to the classic N Face routes of the alps. The conditions were fantastic and we were quickly up at the narrows where I put the first belay in. Here there were a couple of moves on mixed ground that were great fun before we popped onto the upper slopes. We stuck to the right side of the face and I found good runner in the rocks so we simply moved together to the summit blocks. Here a wee traverse to the left put us on the std route a a quick romp to the summit.
The views didn't let us down...it was simply stunning!!!
Summit Success WOOHOO
The descent is pretty straight forward and we walked back to our skis in less than 2hrs from the summit.
Not much was left other than an enjoyable ski down the
Vallee Blanch to that much deserved beer in town!!
All in all a fantastically enjoyable day in the hills. Look out for a piece in the FT How to spend it magazine sometime in the summer for a full write up by
Tarquin.
View into Italy from the top...stunning!
Sunset from the Torino hut.
The Summit of the Tour Rond is described in the Alpine Club Guidebook as follows, "As a viewpoint it is probably one of the finest in the range, standing opposite the full sweep of the Peuterey Ridge and the magnificent Brenva Face".
Well with a description like that it really has to be a must for anyone....let alone a Journalist from the Finical Times. I've worked with Tarquin Cooper a couple of times in the past and jumped at the chance of spending a couple of days in the hills with him.
We wanted a summit that was going to be climbable in a quick weekend hit from the UK and the Tour Rond seemed the prefect fit with a testing North Face, low(ish) altitude, easy approach and quick descent....what could ever go wrong!!
The lovely Jazz drove us round to Le Palud lift in Italy, we had a coffee in the sun watching some film being shot in the car park, before we caught the lift up. We had a tricky hut approach of approx 25m from the lift to the hut....it was a killer.
Tarquin approaching the narrows.
The old Torino hut is lovely with a nice warm wooden main room and comfy small dom rooms. Tarquin and myself took some great pictures of a stunning sunset on the terrace before we had a lovely meal, tucking ourselves up in bed before 10pm!
Alpine breakfast starts are never that good, but 6am is pretty mellow and by 6.50 we had climbed the stairs to the main Hut and had strapped skis on. The ski to the face was easy and before long we were crossing the Bergschrund.
The upper slopes of the North Face.
The Classic North Face is graded II D 350m and provides a good intro to the classic N Face routes of the alps. The conditions were fantastic and we were quickly up at the narrows where I put the first belay in. Here there were a couple of moves on mixed ground that were great fun before we popped onto the upper slopes. We stuck to the right side of the face and I found good runner in the rocks so we simply moved together to the summit blocks. Here a wee traverse to the left put us on the std route a a quick romp to the summit.
The views didn't let us down...it was simply stunning!!!
Summit Success WOOHOO
The descent is pretty straight forward and we walked back to our skis in less than 2hrs from the summit.
Not much was left other than an enjoyable ski down the Vallee Blanch to that much deserved beer in town!!
All in all a fantastically enjoyable day in the hills. Look out for a piece in the FT How to spend it magazine sometime in the summer for a full write up by Tarquin.
View into Italy from the top...stunning!
