Well I guess it is about time to start a new thread. I’ve been moving house this last week so little time for skiing but I’ve been around the Haute-Savoie/Savoie/Isere quite a bit.

Despite all the ski business hype snow conditions are pretty average. Ski resorts have done 30% better than last Christmas. Over the French Northern Alps there has not been any significant snow since the second week of December. There was about 20cm in the Belledonne range on New Year’s eve and we got some turns in on the north-west face of the Bartlett, a mountain about 30km from Grenoble. However conditions were pretty sketchy, we had to change our plans during the climb as south and west slopes had been loaded by a north-east wind which left slabby snow at altitude sitting on a hard base. We heard of a lot of activity on south facing slopes with some quite substantial slides.

There was a rare incident in the Vosges

http://pistehors.com/news/ski/comments/0792-vosges-climbers-injured-by-snow-slide/

although the Falimont (Hohneck) couloirs are known for their avalanches. This slide seems to have been the result of warming temperatures.

The start of January started fairly calmly but on Thursday we had strong foehn (southerly) winds. These were gusting to 120km/h in Switzerland. In the Hautes Alpes they were enough to close the Grenoble <-> Briancon trunk road with snow drifts and couple with a 10cm of snow they formed new slabs on north facing slopes and raising the avalanche risk to Considerable (3) in the area. The foehn is a warm wind which brings high temperatures to lee slopes and melts snow. Conditions in many north facing valleys today were more like the start of the season. Skiable but stark with lots of visible rocks.

A couple of ski tourers from Volopress had a lucky escape today in the Vercors range.

http://www.volopress.net/volo/sortie2591.html#pic

They triggered a slide that took the whole of the north-east bowl they were climbing to a depth of 50-80cm. They noticed a number of woofms on the descent.

Today has been warm, the zero isotherm around 2000 meters with light rain. Tonight heavier rain is expected over the whole massif with the snowline at 2000 meters. The snowpack will be water logged below this altitude with the risk of natural snow slides which will decrease over the course of Sunday. Higher up there will be a lot of slabs and large cornices in place. The wind is strong from the south-west to west which will load many east facing slopes. The risk is greatest outside of ski domains (off piste areas have been heavily tracked over Christmas and New Year) and on little skied slopes. Risk estimate from Meteo France for the French Alps and Pyrenees is from Considerable to High above 1800 meters. Probably a day to stay in bed.

Heavy rain overnight in the Haute-Savoie/Savoie with the snowline at 2000m dropping, expected to drop to 1200m today. There has been 40-50cm of fresh snow at 3000m accompanied by high winds. The avalanche risk is high above 1800 meters across the Savoie, Haute-Savoie and Southern Alps. Meteo France has issued an alert to Monday night warning backcountry travellers of extreme prudence.

Just to round up, one avy death in the Hautes-Alpes on Saturday:-

http://pistehors.com/news/ski/comments/0793-ski-tourer-killed-by-hautes-alpes-avalanche/

risk 3 (Considerable) but largely shallow wind slabs in place.

and an avalanche in the Vosges just before New year

http://pistehors.com/news/ski/comments/0792-vosges-climbers-injured-by-snow-slide/

reportedly heavy snow sitting on a poor base. Avalanche fatalities are in line with last year which was the lowest on record so conditions have been fairly stable till now.

Update on the conditions. The rain has hit pretty hard with not much snow below 1200-1400 meters. In the Savoie the zero iso will be at 2300 m tomorrow dropping during the day to 1800m. Skiing is not great at the moment, some windblown powder on north facing slopes and crusty hard snow on south aspects. South facing slopes look more like mid March than early January. Ridge lines and summits have been stripped off snow, however bowls have reasonable depths and conditions have improved above 2200 meters. In summary, not great conditions.

There was a lot of heavy snow in the south over the weekend. Isola reported 150cm of fresh at the top of the slopes and looking at photos there was certainly around a meter on cars in resort. The result was that the road was closed due to the avalanche risk. Not really a surprise as it is possibly the most dangerous roads in France with with a lot of avalanche protection. This trapped visitors in the valley and gave skiers an extra 24 hour holiday - not exactly welcome as the slopes were largely closed. The road reopened on Sunday afternoon. The avalanche risk was at High (4/5) over the area.

There was 50cm of snow further north with the snowline down to 600 meters on Saturday morning. Snow was described as very heavy and waterlogged although colder temperatures have helped a bit with stabilization at lower levels. There was an avalanche in the Combe de Tardevant in the Aravis range on Saturday and two ski tourers were killed, apparently by an avalanche in the Belledonne.

http://pistehors.com/news/ski/comments/0798-avalanche-hits-belledonne-ski-tourers/

We were ski touring on Sunday - The weather in the Aravis was perfect. A lowish risk tour from the small ski station of Orange up to the Sur-Cou (1800 meters) with a traverse down the east face. The damage done by the recent warm weather was obvious. 30-50cm of fresh powder sitting directly on grass. A good base for the future but ski levels were around 1250 meters. I noted a point avalanche on one of the steeper slopes, probably a natural slide during the snowfall on Saturday. Other than that conditions were fairly stable with some minor surface sluffing as the south face heated under the sun.

This morning we made a trip or was it a Pelenerage, to Le Môle in the Faucigny range above the Arve valley. It inspired Bruno to poetry

Maudit, doit-être, le valeureux Pïerre.
Malheur à lui,
Lui, qui choisit
De sortir hier.

Bien heureux les trois genevois
Qui gravirent le majeusteux Môle
Et non la dent de Crolles
Au contraire de tous ces Grenoblois.

Au lieu de l’infâme croutasse,
Ils n’eurent que de la bonnasse,
Sur ce doux tapis de blanche lave.

En gravissant ce sommet mythique,
par la face sud tout aussi esthétique,
Ils ne peurent que reconnaître sa domination sur la vallée de l’arve.

http://www.skitour.fr/sorties/le-mole,9379.html#sortie

A reference to Pierre’s sortie last night and the poor conditions he found.

Agnes and David on the climb

There had been a further 5cm of snow overnight and a lot of black ice about. I saw the second 4x4 in a ditch in a fortnight - a Wrangler, with an embarrassed looking peasant on the dog and bone trying to get help. We offered to drop him somewhere but couldn’t help move his car, too heavy. Agnes had a couple of scares in her ZX but the snow tires seemed to grip pretty well.

In the forest there was a lot of powder but higher up, on the south-west face, it was a wind crust with a bit of fresh on top. Great for climbing, we did the 700+ meters in an hour and half of not too strenuous skinning, but not good for skiing. Overall the snow pack seemed pretty stable on this slope - the yoyo temperatures have transformed the snow. We tracked over to a valley which had better conditions and gave me a chance to practice my windscreen wiper turns - Sylvain Saudan style (the only thing that seemed to work in the conditions). Temperatures are expected to rise over the weekend - zero isotherm above 2000 meters with snow around 1800 meters so the conditions below 1500 meters are still not wonderful this winter but are good to excellent higher up.

Our route choice was partly constrained by work (45 minutes from Geneva City) and partly by the bulletin. Risk 3 (Considerable) at all altitudes with winds from the south to south-west. Our slope faces into the wind and up to 1550 meters was tree lined. The slope was also not too steep limiting the risk of slides and the recent temperature swings couple with a cold night and a 6.30am start mean the base was stable and well bonded to the slope. Well that’s the theory anyway, it is about limiting risks.

This is what Henry had to say in his newsletter today:

Reading the report from Andreas and the bulletin, it seems like we still need to be careful on slopes over 30 degrees especially above 2400m where the base has not been humidified and refrozen.  There are places where it is safe but without good local knowledge about the structure and stability of the snow base, it is hard to predict which slopes are OK and which are not.  The guides are finding great snow.  You need to get good advice from them if you are to explore steeper untracked slopes.

Another clue about safety can be deduced from any lifts that stay closed.  For example during the last week around La Plagne the Traversee chair and the Cretes drag lifts stayed closed.  This was more about keeping riders away from unsafe off piste.  In this case we were being steered away from 40 degree Northish facing slopes where the piste patrol thought that there was some danger.

http://henry.skioffpiste.co.uk/

The weekend was very warm with some spring skiing conditions on south facing slopes but a lot of crust on north slopes with just a few pockets of powder. Yesterday we were in la Clusaz, the forecast was for snow overnight at 1500 meters, still very warm for January. La Clusaz occupies the first couply of Aravis bowls with some excellent off-piste skiing (and like all bowls avalanche risk under certain conditions).

When we got to the village at 9am it was raining (1000 meters). Not a great sign and the south facing slopes below 1500 meters were pretty ropey. High winds also meant that the lifts into the bowls were closed (and there was zero viz. so it would not have been interesting skiing.) Off piste was unpleasant except for some very hidden tree runs - the area had obviously been pretty much tracked out over the previous days leaving frozen ruts which were barely covered by the fresh snow. In the end we found a “secret” piste served by a single chair lift which had about 10-15cm of powder on a good base to get a bit of vertical in.

The fresh snow has pushed up the avalanche risk above 2200 meters to considerable in the Savoie, overall I felt the conditions were pretty stable below this altitude yesterday. A snow pack that has undergone a number of freeze thaw cycles. It is just a shame the conditions below 1400 meters are not better.

Agnes posted some pics from our Mole trip here:-

http://www.lamarmotte.info/photos/catalog.php?dir=.&#x2F;Sports&#x2F;Ski+Rando/2008+01+17+Matinale+au+Mole

very artistic

Just a one letter change this morning from la Mole to la Dole

There was snow from St Cergue at 1000 m on a north-east slope. I toured from 1100 meters to climb “Hot Frying Pan Peak”

http://pistehors.com/backcountry/wiki/Jura/Pointe-De-Poele-Chaud-East-Couloir

and ski the east couloir. Snow conditions were a dusting of fresh on a hard base but fairly good grip. The couloir had about 5cm of fresh on hard base, this slide straight off as I skied it creating some small sluffs. Something to bare in mind where there are maybe bigger accumulations of snow. I’m thinking of higher up on North facing slopes loaded by the strong southerly wind of Tuesday. Sluffs are not too bad if you have the space to ski in sideways steps leaving the slides to whizz passed you… but even a small slide can be dangerous where there are cliff bands.

We are coming to the fag end of what has been a very hot January - nearly as hot as last year, we were just lucky to go into the month with slightly more snow. Conditions are good above 2000 meters, okay in the 1500-2000 meter band and poor lower down. East to South slopes have really suffered over the month.

This weekend I toured in the Bornes mountains on Saturday.

http://pistehors.com/backcountry/wiki/Haute-Savoie/Pointe-Du-Midi-South-west-Couloir

The snow is very hard in the morning and ski crampons are necessary. Don’t drop anything or it will slide a long way. Despite the sun being low in the sky there were spring skiing conditions from 10.30am on south-east facing slopes. However the snow on Tuesday has left some powder on sheltered north facing slopes above 1500 meters.

The avalanche risk was 1 (low) in the morning… a reflection on the good freeze thaw cycle. However the hard snow will form a sliding surface for the fresh snow that will fall later in the week. We are expecting a return to winter and unsettled weather at the end of the week to take us into February.

On Sunday we were in the Jura. There is not a lot of snow on the east side. Skiable conditions only begin around 1100-1200 meters which only gives you about 400 meters of vertical. Snow is spring like.

Was in the Jura today. The snow is now very hard in the morning, transforming around 9-9.30am on sunny east facing slopes. I didn’t bother with ski crampons but you have to be a bit careful climbing steeper slopes as ice is not far away.

Yesterday was a record breaker - +25C in the Alpes Maritimes in the Southern Alps at an altitude of 700 meters. Not great for the snow but warm Januaries seem to be getting pretty normal over the last few years so no cause to panic, yet.

I’ve just posted the Google-Earth file for Saturday’s tour to the Pointe du Midi in the Bornes range

http://pistehors.com/pistehors/google-earth/Pointe-Midi.kmz