I did try more north-facing and high on Thursday, on the Aiguille de la Grande Sassiere, climbing up the long way up the NW-running Nantcruet valley from near Chanel, descended the same way. (some snow conditions photos below)
Did not find any more than 10cm of new snow up higher around 3500m, but it was decently skiable down to 2000m, then somewhere below that the non-southerly facing slopes were deep mush in mid-afternoon. From the top:
* summit pyramid West ridge (normal climbing route) was pretty much bare of snow. Northwest face (sometimes skied) looked pretty wind-blasted.
* glacier sections seemed well-covered. I could see one or two crevasses across my route whose outlines were visible but bridged with snow.
* most southwest facing slopes around 2000-2500m lacked continuous snow, but had some remaining snow.
* once I made it thru the mush and reached the Chanel access road around 1600m, I was able to ski on the (walker-snowshoer-packed) snow (with some gaps) down to within 70m of the Bourg St Maurice - Val d’Isere road. (I doubt this will be possible this weekend).
southeast up the Nantcruet valley to the Petite + Grande Sassiere—slopes on SW side of valley lack continuous snow
But in shaded slopes low by the Nantcruet creek, SW slopes still hold snow for continuous skiing down the valley to the access trail from Nantcruet village.
Snout of the glacier, which I evaded by going around to climber’s right.
Now up on lower part of glacier, feels pretty comfortable.
Looking up the West ridge to the summit, not what I expected. I started climbing it, but turned back with all the loose rock and lack of motivation to ski the wind-blasted NW face.
My descent and climbing tracks, with Grande Sassiere summit pyramid above—Lack of deep fresh powder at 3400m altitude.
But nice to be able to do a big springtime peak in February.
Ken