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Autumn 2012 Snow Conditions
Posted: 27 September 2012 12:05 PM  
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Heavy rain in the valley last night and fresh snow down to around 1600 meters this morning

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Posted: 29 September 2012 11:53 AM   [ # 1 ]  
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Posted: 15 October 2012 06:49 PM   [ # 2 ]  
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A bit more snow yesterday although it only dropped below freezing at 1500m towards the end of the night.

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Posted: 15 October 2012 08:57 PM   [ # 3 ]  
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just from our balcony, looking towards roc d’orsay and the dents du midi

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20121015-183929 by Ian Spare, on Flickr

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20121015-183945 by Ian Spare, on Flickr

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20121015-183953 by Ian Spare, on Flickr

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Posted: 17 October 2012 08:15 PM   [ # 4 ]  
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I cycled up to the Cormet de Roselend today and took some photos

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The reservoir above Beaufort

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approaching the col

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Cormet de Roselend

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Snow all gone today due to the incredible foehn that has raged all day

[ Edited: 17 October 2012 08:21 PM by davidof]
 
 
Posted: 17 October 2012 08:18 PM   [ # 5 ]  
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very nice, I was up at Isenau above Les DIablerets yesterday ;

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Posted: 03 November 2012 02:20 PM   [ # 6 ]  
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5 SFR for a boat is good value. Very artistic.

After last week’s deep snow in the French Northern Alps the Foeh has blown in today and rain is expected at altitude tomorrow. So we don’t expect much snow to be left by Monday.

However not before we got in a few lift served turns, both on, and off the pistes of the 7 Laux ski area. There was 800 meters of lift served vertical and about 5-10cm of dense powder off piste with about 5cm having fallen above 1500 meters on Thursday night.

Here is some largely on-piste action

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AbMremJTD2E#!

and a few photos

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Posted: 03 November 2012 04:08 PM   [ # 7 ]  
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looks a bit leaky to me, they are having a fire sale though. The cantonal bankruptcy office are flogging a development where the developer went bust and a few (British) second home owners are threatening to sell up if the Isenau lift shuts because it’s where Ollie and Portia learnt to ski (that’s pretty much the flavour of the facebook group) and someone, absolutely anyone will do, should finance a new lift for them.

Meanwhile, Glacier 3000 opened today. There’s a reasonable snow cover and although it’s a bit thin around the main lift complex that’s more to do with wind which we’ve been watching stripping the snow from here. The lift guy was saying it will be open in the week which begs the question why we went today and queued (for a couple of minutes) with the freestylers while they exhaled smoke from their rollups at us.

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You can get some idea of the snow on this photo, it’s the pre-aloes so it’s sub-2000m and there’s not much snow left from the earlier fall at that height. That’s the Jura on the horizon, no sign of snow but apparently the roads were interesting last weekend when people were caught without their winter tyres on.

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Posted: 03 November 2012 09:09 PM   [ # 8 ]  
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ise - 03 November 2012 04:08 PM

That’s the Jura on the horizon, no sign of snow but apparently the roads were interesting last weekend when people were caught without their winter tyres on.

I’ve suffered that in Geneva, the Swiss are a bit slow, they generally get their snow tires done by about January!

 
 
Posted: 08 November 2012 08:18 AM   [ # 9 ]  
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This photo nicely illustrates the snowline at around 1500 meters

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fresh snow fell earlier in the week. About 5cm @ 1500 meters, 10cm @ 2000m giving nice ski touring conditions but with some small slabs in place on north facing slopes - presumably formed by the snow transport last weekend under the influence of the foehn resting on a weak layer created during the cold nights preceding the foehn, but that’s a guess.

 
 
Posted: 10 November 2012 06:07 PM   [ # 10 ]  
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It has been raining since 1700 yesterday. Interestingly it was 15C at 1000 m and 10C at 300 m. - a winter temperature inversion. The zero isotherm has been hovering around the 2900 meter mark today.

Fresh snow 2700m 5cm
2850m 20cm
3100m 40cm

all accompanied by winds gusting to 80km/h.

 
 
Posted: 11 November 2012 12:39 PM   [ # 11 ]  
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The zero isotherm has stayed above the 2000m mark with the exception of the border area with Italy. Briancon got its first snow of the season in town this morning. There is 50cm of fresh on the col d’Agnel at 2600 m so expect to see some ski touring activity over there.

There seems to be some snow down to 1800m in the Belledonne today. Otherwise

@2300m: 30cm
@3000m: 100cm

That’s a lot of snow at altitude now with some strong winds at the start of the weather system so expect some slabs to be in place.

 
 
Posted: 13 November 2012 09:39 AM   [ # 12 ]  
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yesterday morning on the glacier, much improved after the snowfall at the weekend. Some short powder pitches which were nice grin

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Nice morning in the sunshine above the clouds with fresh snow thrown in.

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Posted: 13 November 2012 10:34 PM   [ # 13 ]  
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Nice shots. The valley fog finally cleared out around here about 3pm revealing fresh snow… but only from around 1900-2000m and the cover is only really significant at 2300m. Which is a big change from a week ago when you could ski from 1500m. Some nice tours being done from Val Thorens (why are they not open this weekend like back in the old days), Col d’Agnel in the Hautes-Alpes and Galibier. Here is a video from the Grande Casse, nice line for this early in the season

http://www.youtube.com/watch?gl=FR&hl=fr&v=JYJv9ak5i1g

 
 
Posted: 23 November 2012 11:50 PM   [ # 14 ]  
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Things looking pretty dry on the Belledonne now

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Only really skiable from 2500 m on S. facing slopes, 2000m on North facing slopes. A bit better around Briancon. New snow forecast for Weds/Thurs next week. Wait and see.

 
 
Posted: 24 November 2012 08:50 AM   [ # 15 ]  
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ditto…

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Enough snow even below 2000m to be slightly problematic on foot in terms of route planning. Any south facing slope below 2500m is pretty clear now. Brilliant conditions on foot earlier in the week, probably the last non-winter work day this year for me I’d guess.

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