A couple of weeks ago, Sharon + I drove to Chamonix to do a backcountry tour in one of the south-facing side-valleys by the Argentiere glacier. Other times we would park at the base of the Grands Montets around 8:00, buy a single-ride ticket, take the first lift (for “ski mountaineers") up to Lognan and the Grands Montets, ski down to the glacier and start our tour.

On that Friday it came out way different for us and for several other disappointed ski touring parties. Key problem was “reservations”.

We parked at 8:00, I took a few minutes to put my ski boots on, walked to the Caisse desk—and there was already a long line. Not just touring skiers, but snowboarders and pure downhill freeriders. Every transaction ahead of me took a long time - (I guess because there’s so many ticket options to explain). The sign above my place in line said “10 minutes” wait, but really it was like 25 minutes.

Of course after that there was already a long line for the lift up to Lognan. After enduring that we got to the real problem: the line for the upper lift to the Grands Montets. The new experience for me was that the long line I was in said “Standby”. There was this other line for people with “Reservations”. With each tram, sometimes the our Standby line made progress, other times very little—it all depended on how many people had Reservations to get on first ahead of us.

Finally we made up to the top around noon, skied down to the glacier, and started our tour—but by then the south-facing snow was getting heavy from sun, then the clouds came in. We talked to the guys who had broken trail ahead for us and thanked them. They said they had to cut their tour short because they had to start so late—sounded disappointed.

By the time Sharon and I made our descent, some of the lower south-facing fresh had formed a sun-crust (? from cooling when the clouds arrived ?), which was not fun to ski. Later I looked up and saw ski tourers still only half-way up climbing to the Col du Chardonnet at 15:30 in the afternoon (very late for trying to reach the Trient hut).

So what I want to know is:

Reservations—how can I avoid getting stuck in the Standby line next time?

Looking on the website, it wasn’t clear how to do this with a Single-ride ticket. Maybe the only way is to first purchase a more expensive ticket, then spend another 10 EUR for a Reservation?

Thanks for any clues about this.

Ken

P.S. A previous time I was visiting there, they shut down the upper lift for some electrical problem. So I decided to just skin up the piste from Lognan to the Argentiere glacier. Then saw a sign saying that climbing up the groomed ski trail during normal operating hours was illegal. The piste was not wide, and lots of skiers were coming down (from the chairlift) at speed. But since the upper telepherique was not “operating”, I declared it to be OK, and nobody stopped me, and I looked back and saw other ski tourers following.

When the lift lines are that long it is ofter quicker to take the Herse Chair and a high traverse round to the Point du Vue and start to skin from there - especially if you are doing the Col du Passon.

In order to make a reservation you need a lift pass and you must register it on line. For the GM each reservation has to have a registered pass, for the Midi you can reserve up to 5 places on one registered pass. You can charge up passes on line but doubt this works for a randoneurs ticket.

Hope this helps.

Thanks for the ideas.

So do you think they would accept my single-ride upper-telepherique Grands Montets ticket for use on the Herse chair?

Ken

You will have to ask the lift co.

Regarding back country access, there is a bit of a conflict at the moment between ski tourers and the lift co. As I think you told me but I have confirmed, there is a bye-law preventing ski tourers from climbing up pistes in Chamonix. It obviously makes some sense not to have people going up at the same time as people are coming down and slope preparation work can also be dangerous with piste bashers whizzing around in the dark, possibly hauled by cables.

Anyway there is talk of allowing ski tourers access to certain slopes between fixed hours of the morning and evening, once the slopes are closed but before or after any piste preparation, avalanche control work etc is carried out. There is also talk of constructing or at least signposting access routes that ski tourers can take which don’t concern either skiers or piste preparation.

The official view from the Grand Montets is that there is no problem if you are there early! The first five bins to the top are not subject to reservation and the queue clears quickly.

The reality on powder days is often different with long queues, especially at weekends and it can take hours to get to the top using the bins.

The one-way top ticket is not normally valid on the Herse chair except when the top bin is closed because of wind etc.

The best way to avoid the queues is to have a smart card, cost €3, which you can charge on the internet where you can also make online reservations for the top bin. Unfortunately it is not possible to buy a cheap one-way ticket online - these are only available from the ticket office. If the queue for tickets is out of the door there is a ticket machine just outside on the left but it only sells all day tickets and not cheap one-way tickets.

As an experiment this morning I compared the time taken to get to the glacier using bins v. chairs. There were no queues this morning and using the bins I got down to the glacier in 55 mins. I then repeated the experiment from the bottom using the chair to Plan Joran, then the Plan Roujon chair skiing down the piste to the Herse and then traversing round to the Pont du View piste 36 mins! I reckon on a busy day I could be skinning on the glacier using the chairs before you had even got on the bottom bin. Obviously if you were headed up the glacier it would take longer using the chairs but would you rather be skinning or freezing in the queue?

To use the chairs you would have to buy a day pass, “Le Pass” being the cheapest option, available from the machine outside the ticket office. This pass is also valid at Le Tour, so if the Col du Passon is your objective you could carry on using the lift system to Le Buet or Vallorcine coming back on the train. Or even one of the routes down to Trient coming back on the Navette.

As for skinning up the piste, everyone does, it is not a problem! Occasionally people using snow shoes get told it is not allowed but in reality nobody cares. The Pierre a Ric is used for training all the time, I counted at least five folk skinning up this morning as I skied down. The cat track at the bottom of the Pont du View piste is narrow and you have to keep well to the left but otherwise it is not an issue.

Skiing down after the pistes are closed you have to be careful as the steeper sections of the Pierre a Ric are pisted using the winch and the cable is hard to see after dark! My experience is that the guys driving the piste bashers are relaxed as long as you give them a wide birth.

Thanks Alan, that is some of the most useful information that I’ve read on a forum in quite a long time.

Thanks for all those careful instructions.
I won’t get caught that way again next time.

The only other trick I’ve learned for those of use driving from “outside” is to consider stopping first at the Aiguille du Midi and buying tickets there—because the Midi office opens earlier than GM.

Ken