Minimum altitude: 1,187 meters
Distance: 89.5 km
Slope Aspect: West
Vertical Climbed: 9,782 meters (32,095 feet)
Vertical Descended: 9,779 meters
We decided to make the weekend of the 17th our final piste outing of the season. A week earlier than usual, but plans for the following weekend and an unseasonably warm April that had been rapidly thaw in the snowpack made the decision an easy one.
As tradition dictates, we headed for one of the big Savoie resorts: Les Arcs. In spring conditions, it often holds up better than La Plagne, thanks to its higher, north-facing terrain and the resilience of its satellite villages. This time, we had an added bonus: the full descent to Villaroger was still open, offering 2,000 metres of vertical from the summit of the Aiguille Rouge.
Starting from Peisey, we parked so close to the slopes it felt like ski-in access, hardly surprising given how quiet it was. From there, we made our way into the main Arcs bowl via the new Transarc gondola, a significant upgrade on the old “eggs”: faster, smoother, and far more comfortable. The plateau beyond was wide open and empty, if a little flat in places, with enjoyable cruising on the blues. By the time we reached Pré Saint-Esprit, however, the snow was already softening noticeably under the April sun.
We pushed on toward the Grand Col, though you can no longer reach quite as far as before. The old drag lift has long since disappeared, another quiet casualty of a retreating glacier.
From there, it was time for the highlight: the ascent to the Aiguille Rouge at 3,200 metres. The views were as spectacular as ever, stretching across the Alps, and the descent to Villaroger remains one of the great runs in the region. Few places offer such sustained vertical, and even fewer so late in the season. We started on the black run: steep, technical with hard snow in places before transitioning onto the red. Eventually, deteriorating conditions forced a closure, and we diverted onto a winding blue through the forest, just making it back to the lift. Seventeen minutes top to bottom, hard to argue with that.
On the return, we were pleased to find the formidable Malgovert black still open, allowing us to cut back toward the Peisey side. It’s always a memorable run: narrow, twisting, and threading its way through ancient cembro pines, some nearly a thousand years old. Their rings quietly recording centuries of alpine history, from the Little Ice Age to distant volcanic eruptions such as Mount Tambora and Krakatoa.
With time on our side this year, we set ourselves a slightly absurd challenge: to make it back to Peisey using every chairlift along the way. We came close, only missing one of the Carreley lifts, and even that ran almost parallel to the one we took, so we’re calling it a near-perfect score.
By the time we returned, the hard, icy pistes of the morning had fully transformed into heavy spring slush. A fitting end to the day and to the season with nearly 90 km skied and just shy of 10,000 metres of vertical in the legs.
Hard, firm snow in the morning depending on slope aspect. Slush in the afternoon except in the shade of trees. Warm and sunny. 20C in the valleys.
