Thursday 12 March 2015

Skiing with Alex

Alex Perrinet (mountain guide) said he had a free day and would we like to go to Les Contamines to ski spring snow.  So Gordon, Jonny, John and I piled into his car this morning.  We went up to the top, and did a rather nasty hard, rutted traverse on a steep slope.  After about 4 turns we found some slightly better snow.   We skied all the way down to Haut Luce off piste, with snow varying from hard and icy, to nearly spring snow to rain crust and wind crust.  At the bottom we had to take our skis off a couple of times to cross the road.   I have  also now learnt to ski on grass,  hands forward and lean back.   Might come in useful again. 
The next run was shorter and the snow had softened up so was easier.   The last run before lunch we skied over to the top drag lift which is all off piste.   We did another rather nasty traverse (bits of it were alright) and then skied down, crossing two avalanche falls (very small ones, just where the snow had melted and slipped) and down to a track.  The snow was the best we found and great fun.   We then stopped for lunch.   After lunch, we skied all the way down to Haut Luce again but by a different route.  The snow was pretty good on that, except for a section through the trees which was dire.   Still, as Alex said, we all survived, and it was a brilliant day.  We forgot to take the camera so sorry, no pics.

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