Courmayeur Skiing Advice and Off Piste Guide

Hi All,

I'm new here and making my first ever trip to Courmayeur. I'm having a difficult time getting a grasp for my options once there and would love some advice.

We will be there for three days and we are advanced skiers (comfortable skiing most terrain but definitely not total experts) who enjoy off piste so long as it isn't overly technical (don't want to need gear like crampons, rope, axe etc) and we are very safety conscious so preferably in areas very low in avalanche risk. If we go off piste, we will rent a guide or preferably join some kind of small group to reduce costs so the two of us don't need to pay for a private guide. Do you have any advice on where to go to make this possible? Any links or recommendations?

I am looking at a trail map and it appears that you can get from Courmayeur to Aiguille du Midi via gondola or cable car. When I do some googling, however, it seems unclear whether the lift actually goes up to the same summit that the Chamonix cable car reaches or if it stops in Punta Helbronner (if so, what is the difference and what would we miss out on?). We are likely to hire a guide or join a group just one of our three days there so we want to try to make it special. Would it be possible to go to Aiguille du Midi from Courmayeur as a day trip with a guide or group? Any advice on doing so?

Finally, for our other two days where we will need to stick closer to the pistes since we won't have a guide and aren't knowledgeable/comfortable enough to really head into the back country on our own, do you have any recommendations on where to ski at Courmayeur? What lifts would you take and where would you recommend spending our time? Ideally we could find some really nice terrain just alongside the pistes somewhere, and if the conditions are okay, get some nice powder turns in.

Let me know what you think!

Hi, when are you planning on going?

So the Helbronner lift (3470m) takes you to the Southern Side of Mt Blanc, with the classic route down being the Toula glacier. Whilst this is not that steep, it is proper mountain terrain. High, glaciated and and big big slopes if something were to slide. My advice would be to use a guide here unless you have a lot of experience. Recommended would be Northern Mountain Sport or High Mountain Guides. Both Chamonix based and can guide you either in Chamonix (VB) etc or Courmayeur (Punta Helbronner or within resort).

As for the resort itself yes there are offpiste possibilities, especially off the Arp. Again I think a guide would be beneficial if as just opens up so many more possibilities.

Thanks a lot for the info. We will be there March 20th. I've heard a lot about the Aiguille du Midi run from Chamonix. Do you miss out on anything significant leaving from Courmayeur and skiing from Punta Helbronner or do you have access to the same terrain as from the summit of the Aiguille du Midi lift? We would hire a guide if going there and hopefully they could lead us to some places with good skiing and a little steepness.

As for skiing at Courmayeur, how would you recommend spending a day or two there? How does it compare to Grands Montets? I'm a bit confused looking at the trail map and I'll admit I'm slightly worried that the skiing and vertical are a lot less varied and high when compared to Grands Montets but hopefully I'm wrong.

Also, is a day trip from Courmayeur to Chamonix really easy or is it a hassle?

Piste skiing in Courmayeur is pretty good and fine for few days. Transfer to and from Chamonix is via a bus which can be booked online, so simple. Personally if I had the means would do 2 x days with a guide. A classic Valley Blanche from Chamonix (first day) and if everyone is happy something steeper from Italian side 2nd day. Even if weather ended up being bad there are many good tours from Italian side e.g. Punta Croce.

So you would recommend taking a bus to Chamonix in the morning to ski Valley Blanche rather than taking the lift that goes from Courmayeur to Punta Helbronner? If you were to join a group or get a guide for a second day aside from Valley Blanche, what would you recommend on the Italian side? Is it easy to join a group the night before when we are there or does this involve a lot of advanced planning?

Aguille de Midi and Punta Helbronner are not linked (about 2-3km and few 100m vertical apart). If you speak with guide they will arrange to collect you, or make a plan around bus times (no big deal). Really is for guide to make recommendations based on your level of experience and snow conditions. At least some routes of VB are a gentle ski, with some intrinsic danger so you have to be able to ski in control offpiste (20-30deg, can be anything from icy moguls to 50cm of powder). All routes on the Courmayeur side are steeper, 25-40deg which is pretty steep in some conditions.

I suggest giving a call or dropping a note to people I recommended. Very friendly and will help arrange a few good days for you.

Do you guys think buying the Ultimate Mont Blanc Ski Pass is worth it? (http://www.compagniedumontblanc.co.uk/en/lift-passes/mont-blanc-unlimited) Do you buy tickets in advance online or just when you get to the mountain?

Or is it more economical and simple to just buy a ticket in the morning wherever you are skiing that day? If we have three days, we'd expect at least two to be in the Courmayeur area with a chance of one day in Chamonix or ending up in Chamonix if skiing off piste there and needing to return to Courmayeur in the evening by bus.

I'm having a bit of trouble finding good guiding options. I've emailed here http://www.guidecourmayeur.com/montebianco/home-guide-alpine-courmayeur-english-programs-winter-ski-snowboard.html but they have limited options and only could offer a group on Vallee Blanche. My main concern with that is that they might be skiing the Vallee Blanche classic which I have heard is very flat and probably not the most fun way to spend a day and they can't comment on the quality of the others in the group so I can't know if they can take a more fun way down than the most flat route.

Any other ideas where to turn for a good guided group? I've emailed both the suggested places here but one hasn't gotten back and the other was almost 500 euro for a day and only wanted to do private guiding. In no way am I suggesting that is overpriced but it's just out of budget for us so we'd rather find a small group to share costs.

I'm also a bit worried the conditions will be deteriorated quite a bit as I see the forecast for the next five days is warm and sunny. If that is the case, some alpine touring could make for a really fun way to explore the mountains. Any suggestions for doing that specifically or is that just as easy to do with any guide as anything else?

I'd really love to get one or two days with someone with inside knowledge there but it seems quite expensive if you can't find a few other people to join up with. Is there any easy way to do this? Any place in town to link up with people or resource to do it online in advance? I am not totally opposed to a private guide but it would be much more ideal to split the costs with a group of 4-6.

I'd love some more names of people or companies I can email for guided days to try to get this ball rolling because I am really struggling to organize the off piste situation. I wish we had more time, but with only two days to really make this happen (21st and 22nd), I don't have the flexibility to just figure it out when I get there. All suggestions welcome :)

The more I look at the weather report (warm and sunny most days of the next week), the more I am hoping we can do some alpine touring. Is the process of finding a group or a guide for that any different than for general off piste skiing? We don't want to do anything at all on the dangerous side, but would be happy to hike 1500m and ideally get some great views, some good turns, and have a fun tour.