Short ski tour to check out the conditions. Not too bad in the end. Destructured snow where it is shady - west bowls of the Grand Rocher. NE face of the Grand Rocher.

Mike was keen to explore the Beaufortain, the snowiest mountain range in France at the moment with some 3 meters since the 1st Jan at 1800 m.

There was light snow forecast for Wednesday with a return to good weather for Thursday so I made sure to leave the day free.

From the Recoin (Chamrousse 1650m) climb to the top of the ski pistes (Croix de Chamrousse). You can generally avoid most of the ski open ski runs. Descend the run to the lac Robert.

Classic ski tour when it is high risk in the mountains. The day started at 9am with 400 vertical meters of trail breaking in snow up to my knees and at times much higher.

Low cloud was clagging up the valley but a quick check of the les 7 Laux webcams revealed sun from somewhere around 1800 meters. I spoke to Mike who'd wanted to go to the Belle Etoile.

Despite three snow episodes (dumps as they are called on the anglo fora) over the last week the conditions are not great and a couple of days of foehn could wipe out any gains.

A little afternoon tour to test the fresh snow and gear. There is no base in the snow pack below 1700 meters but still some rocks below 1900 meters.

It seemed like the east side of the Belledonne had been much less wind affected than the west (avalanches yesterday at the refuge d'Oule, col du Mouchillon and Couloir de Pertuis).

I heard that my Thursday meeting was delayed which gave a chance to do a quick tour between two weather fronts on Thursday morning. Snow was still good above 1600m - fresh powder on a firm(ish) base.