J2Ski Forum Posts and Replies by verbier_ski_bum

My friends go to La Grave every year for a weekend but they always take a guide. It's not all extreme, but some lines can be that's why a guide is needed.

No-fall zones happen in many off-piste itineraries. Valle Blanche even that being a relatively easy skiing (the classic route) starts with a no-fall traverse - a fall there will see you rolling probably all the way down to Chamonix, which is about 2500m below, but thousands are still doing this itinerary quite safely every year and it's a spectacular descent, a definite must-do if you are staying in Chamonix. Plus you can ask the guide to take you through some variations of the classic route which involve more steep skiing.

I've never skied in 3 valles but I heard that compared to Verbier or Chamonix it is quite flattering. I skied in Zermatt and resort skiing there is while spectacular, still easy and December is too early for the itineraries from top of Stockhorn to be open. Go to Verbier, you won't be disappointed. They stage xtreme freeride worldtour final for a reason. But you should carry avi gear and know how to use it even if you don't need a guide generally (the guide is still can be helpful as they know the area and can take you to the best snow). but in early December itineraries might not be open. you can probably still ski some (if the lifts taking you back up are running - and they are if the neighbouring ski areas are open) but it may have insurance complications if you have to be rescued. Chaussoure-Tortin is as hard as the mogul runs can be and moguls are guaranteed there - steep, big and rock hard for 700 meters vertical, none of these fluffy bumps seen in instruction videos or competitions. or Gentianes-Tortin, which is even harder and longer and you can extend it more if you start from top of Mont-Fort, another 300 vertical meters of fairly steep bumps and a good preparation to what's ahead. If you land in Geneva at 8am you will be skiing by 1.30. And for 3 days you can do without a guide - you will be plenty occupied with what is marked on the map and will have some left for your next trip.

Vebier has an awesome off-piste terraine accessible from lifts. And if you are up for a hike it's right from the magazine. If you can ski well you won't get bored. The better you ski the more terraine opens up. It has Mont-Gele and it's totally unpisted, with one marked route and some no-fall traverses. It has steeps, couloirs, rock gardens. Chamonix is also well-worth vising. even skiing just what is marked there is a special experience. Blacks are real blacks. And the veiw is unreal. Right under Mont-Blanc. And the guide for a day is a good investment and Vallee Blanche tour. Or La Grave, though I suspect the guide is almost a must there too. at least for a day.

Thank you! Looks like Saas-Fee/Zermatt it is then. Probably won't go there till Monday anyway, hopefully it will be quiter. Verbier is busy too as many people who booked Easter holidays in lower resorts that had to be closed are being bussed here every day to ski.

As for 8/4 being horrible - i think it was horrible everywhere in the area, I didn't even make it to the lift, turned back to the chalet after 10 meters, kind of felt stupid all geared up when it was 20 degrees at 10 am at 1500m:)

I am off to Vebier tonight till the end of the month (season), I looked at the temperatures and I doubt there will be any skiing worth having over there unless you are a tourist :) The problem as I said on the other thread is that the base wasn't topping up during cold months so instead of typical spring skiing (which i like)once it warms up conditions are leg-breaking, water mixed with thing layer of slush over bare rock in many places. Last weekend is was OK and we even found some powder, but two weekes ago there were puddles in the middle of some pistes and warm nights returned so I guess it's similar if not worse now. I totalled about 60 days this season so to repeat it next year I should resist temptation/avoid injury and leave verbier slopes for people who were waiting to get there for a year. However I still would like to ski during my break before packing up for the summer and with Grimentz being basically on the other side of the mountain it seems a good destination.

Bandit, I saw your reports and I know it will be skiable there, but is it worth a drive or should I rather go further to Saas-Fee? What is the snow depth? I have two free days of skiing anywhere in Valais and I want to use it. Zermatt is an obvious choice but I quite like skiing in new places and I've never been to Val d'Anniviers. I will also definitely go to Chamonix regardless of the conditions as food alone is well worth the drive. Maybe Grand Montets will still hold:)

Winter season in Zermatt officially ends on May 1st, so most lifts will be open.

Last 4 weeks??? I had skied 4 different conditions in 4 hours of skiing yesterday:) Ice on groomers first thing in the morning with some pretty awful frozen crud off-piste, followed by some monstrous bumps that I had to ski to get to nice powder, followed by a very degraded run down - some slush over rock and mud. Really nothing to do on slopes anymore after 1-2pm, but bearing in mind it's mid-April, there is still lot of fun to have in the mornings + a nice suntan as a bonus!

This season hasn't been good for snow. Usually March skiing is very good. The problem is not that the temperatures are unusually warm, the problem is that the base isn't thick enough. It wasn't topping up during cold months. In early February I saw enough bare patches for April. That's why conditions are deteriorating so rapidly and spring skiing is not much fun - my friend had a concussion on Saturday after he caught an edge on a rock, which was right under the slush. Some snow is expected this week and typically it would have been great news, but I doubt that it will make significant difference this time as the base is almost gone in many places. But it's not a typical situation. And even now some relatively good skiing is still can be found. For about 2-3 hours a day until it gets too slushy and/or boring. And who wants to ski for hours in this glorious sunshine, when people in the village are wearing shorts and flip-flops, anyway?:) It's fantastic to be able to ski in the morning and have a BBQ on a terrase in the afternoon. This is what April skiing is about, at least this year.

At Verbinet they publish twice a week very accurate description of what the conditions and the outlook are like and provide links to meteo reports, and some of the webcams show village too, though I don't understand the point of showing the village that has been snowless since January. Pistes even now are holding up and you can get few runs if you are up early enough, and from noon it's a good time to sit on a sunny terrase with a beer.

Bad season for snow, no-one argues that. ironically, now it snows every week, though not much and with the freezing level at 3000 meters it doesn't last long. Spring skiing is not very enjoyable this season due to lack of snowfall over winter. Still, I had a couple of hours on Saturday and we did the run from top of Mont Fort all the way down Gentianes-Tortin and it was quite awesome. The run back to the village after High Five was over wasn't awesome at all, but it was stil skiable.

April skiing can be quite sketchy even in better seasons - unless it's on the flat glaciers, so people who are booking that late in the season probably know what to expect anyway, so they won't be too disappointed.

To be honest, I had the suspicion the season wouldn't be great for snow. Summer was bad, maybe 6 hot sunny weeks in total, and it rained weekly from end of July. Last time, 4 years ago we had similarly bad summer which was followed by a fairly bad winter - it was raining on New Years Eve with day temperatures at around 15C. Easy to remember because it was the summer of WC2006, so it happened again after another World Cup as it probably happens from time to time and will definitely happen again. Not the end of the world.