Guy had taken the gang on the back of La Tour where they found great snow, and then on Tuesday a sneaky Crouche-Berrard tour. All where raving about fresh tracks in good snow when I met everyone on Wednesday morning for the last 3 days of the course, I was feeling the pressure!!
The first day I was with Larry, Simon, Torri and Becca I had decided to go to the Grand Montets and spend a little bit of time on crevasse rescue before a short skin in search of fresh snow. We skinned for about 1.5hrs towards the Col Du Passon, we were behind a number of other teams so there was a good track in place. Becca showed her fitness and set a good pace up to the lunch spot.
Not many folk come back down the same way on the Col Du Passon but that's exactly what we did and despite some poor visibility we had a great run in nice snow laying fresh tracks all the way down.
Thursday was pretty poor weather, in fact it was worse than that. I opted for a short safe ski tour in the Contamines area. The skin up was in total white out and then to add insult it started to snow. Finally we made the Col and sat to eat a chilly lunch. It was Torri who said that she heard voices first and then a head popped over the cornice, it was the first of 24 French Soldiers who had skinned up the way we were to ski down.
The snow was good but the visibility was terrible, everyone did a great job getting down in one piece. As we got into the trees there was at last a little contrast and we all made the most of the spring like snow, before a cheeky drink in the little rustic cafe at the bottom.
The last day proved to be the best. We had booked the Midi Cable car and at 9.40 we were whisked up to the heady heights of the Valley Blanche, the world's most famous off piste run. We started with a Vrai Valley Blanche, which isn't often done and so we had fresh tracks down it which put smiles on the faces of everyone.
After skiing down through the Geant Icefall we put skins on and spent an hour or so heading up to the Col Du Tour, despite being beaten to the first tracks back down I think we can sum up the run with what Torri said..."The best ski run EVER"
A quick ski down the rest of the Valley Blanche saw the team in the bar at the bottom, the final verdict on the week....."The best"...."Awesome"....Bloody Brill" Thanks to Becca, Torri, Simon, Larry and Guy for making it so good. Take Care KC
