Peasant Lore

Followers of PisteHors will know we are big fans of peasant lore. Consulting the Almanac Savoyard gives the following dictum…

Tels Quatre-Temps, Telles saisons.
Si les Quatre-Temps amènent le mauvais temps, il y en aura pour longtemps.

The Quatre-temps are four groups of three days (Wednesday, Friday and Saturday). For the spring they follow the Carême feast days, for the summer Pentecost, autumn the 14 of September and winter, the 13th of December. Anyone who followed the rule this year would have known that ski season would be warm and dry.

PisteHors webcam this afternoon

Gardeners swear by the ice saints: St Mamertius, St Gervais and St Pancras which fall from the 11th of May. This year they have been as punctual as a British railway train - a day late. After a hot weekend temperatures have dropped 10C today and snow is falling down to 1600 meters.

Freshies on the Rochers de Bruyant

Unfortunately, unlike last year, this won’t mean a bonanza for skiers as April was more than +4.3 °C above average in France making, relatively, the third hottest month ever recorded by Meteo France. There was almost no rain or snow. The periods 12 to 17th and 22nd to 30th of April were even warmer with some days more than 10 °C above average. All of this has left the mountains bereft of snow below 2000 meters, even on sheltered north-west aspects. Anyone prepared to climb could be treated to a powder feast, especially at high altitude. However, watch out, wind gusts reached over 160km/h today and new snow slabs will have no doubt formed above 2500-3000 meters. We have already had a late season avalanche on the north face of the Mont-Blanc.

Early May 2006 @ 1500 meters

Further Information

Ne’r cast a clout
The Ice Saints Cometh