In the weeks prior to leaving, I was beginning to have a few doubts about the skiing we were about to spend a whack of Canadian pesos to do. Europe was experiencing extremely warm temps and It looked like the snow was disappearing fast. I tried not to let it get to me and went ahead as planned having faith in the snow gods who've treated us so well in the past.
When we arrived in Geneva the temp was in the upper 20s and it looked like full on summer. Upon arriving in Cham, we found ourselves digging out our shorts and enjoying beers outdoors in the sun, looking up at the sparse and rapidly disappearing snow......UGGGGGGHH not at all what we were hoping for. To top it off, everyone we talked to kept going on about how the season was over and that it was the earliest ever and so on. All this information at the end of close 30 hours of travel and jetlag to boot and we weren't particularly happy honeymooners.
Feeling much refreshed after a good night's sleep, we awoke to another bluebird day so we headed straight for the Aiguille du Midi and had an awesome day skiing the Valley Blanche in the scorching heat:
Lunchtime is one of my favourite parts of skiing in the Alps:
The trip up the Midi renewed our faith a bit as there was still ample snow above 2000m and even if we spent most of our time touring the Mt. Blanc massif the skiing looked acceptable. The next day was bluebird again, so we spent the day corndoggin at Brevent and Flegere and had a ton of fun on the rapidly dwindling snow:
The next day it was overcast and started to rain a little...the forecast was calling for it to continue raining for a few days and the freezing level was supposed to drop...hmmmmm..this looks better. Well it didn't let up for like 5 days and by the 3rd morning Chamonix looked like this:
The skiing up on Grands Montets looked like this:
There was up to a meter of new snow up high and when it finally cleared this is what it looked like on the top tram at Grands Montets:
The next day Denise slept in and I had a quick blast down the Rond with a guy named Matt from Oregon:
Then we headed off to the Argientiere hut for a couple days ski touring:
Then another major system moved in and we decided to use the weather days to travel to Engelberg:
Like all of the latest ski mags and vids will tell you, Engelberg was awesome. We found affordable accomodation, a quiet town where most of the ski bums had gone home, and spring passes on sale for less than the price of a 4 day pass...ohya and it was dumping...big time. So we spent a few days skiing incredibly light deep snow in varying degrees of whiteout:
During these days we were two of only a handful of actual skiers on the mountain. The majority of the people riding the lifts were Asian tourists many of whom had never seen snow or skiers before. At first it was kind of entertaining watching them marvel as you step into your skis, but it got old pretty fast:
Then it cleared and we got to sample two of the classic runs that E'berg has to offer (The Steinberg and the Laub):
The Laub....simply one of the most incredible ski runs i've ever seen:
I can only imagine what it must be like when there is deep light powder all the way down this thing. When we skied it there was nice snow about half way down and then it turned into something that looked a little more like this:
After about 8 or 9 days in Engelberg we were ready to try somewhere new. Following a little internet weather check session it appeared that we might be able to score a few powder days at Andermatt. We hopped the next train and were standing in downtown Andermatt in the pouring rain by about noon. It certainly looked like the skiing would be good over the next few days, but nothing seemed to be working out too well (all the affordable accomodation was shut for the season, ski passes at full price for 2 lifts, rude people, and to top it all off, a pay toilet ate one of our francs). So, we took it as a "get the hell outta here you dirtbags" omen and hopped a train back to Argientiere at about 2 oclock the same day we arrived. Well, as it turned out, there was a reason....the next day at Grands Montets was unreal....25cm fresh, blue skies, top tram rides free, no crowds:
An afternoon weather check revealed that there was finally a bit of a window of clear weather in the forecast, so we decided that it was now or never for the Haute Route (one of our goals for the trip). A few phone calls to the huts and we were good to go. We organized all our gear, bought maps, and were off the next morning. We did the Verbier variation (not as technically demanding as the classic route) which i'd recommend based strictly on the quality of the huts. The weather held for the whole trip and we had a positively outstanding time....definately the highlight of our whole trip:
We spent one night in Zermatt and went out for dinner with all our new friends (two other unguided groups that we teamed up with and had a ton of fun). I imagine they are probably used to it there, but it was good humor going out to a fancy restaurant and walking around Zermatt wearing touring boot liners instead of shoes. We took the train back to Argentiere the next morning and finished off our trip with...you guessed it....more powder days and the season end party at Grands Montets:
