Holiday time

Work has now officially finished for the winter, so its 'feet up' time... first the right foot, then the left foot & repeat until you get to the top..

Today I met up with Will & Gilles, and after many rearrangements of plans we finally headed over to Val Thorens for some couloir action...
A quick skin up to the Mont de Gebroulaz, and we were peering into a slightly misty Couloir en Z. A seriously nasty entry involved ice axes, ropes, and an awkward cornice - 10cm of tips and tails touching, while feet bounced about over the couloir, abit like this:



Gilles negotiating the entry:



Will abs in:



The top of the couloir was quite steep, with firm but grippy refrozen snow with a thin soft layer on top, but round the corner was a lot different:










A quick skin back up to the Col de Gebroulaz, and we set off for our next objective, the Couloir des Seracs, with some nice powder along the way:



Stepping up to the entry:



Will checking his sluff:



The couloir was full of great powder, and a fine place to try out my shiny new Mythic Riders (sorry about the rocks!), despite a close encounter involving Gilles' sluff and a big patch of blue ice...



Its not called the couloir du Serac for nothing...:



A nice gully lower down:



Gilles below one of the exits:



With ever worsening weather we refitted skins, and flogged up to the Col du Souffre, but finally admitted defeat on our final objective of dropping over the Col du Borgne for some last powder turns due to zero visibility and instead slogged our way out of the bottom of the Gebroulaz valley & finally back to Mottaret to wrap up a 10 hour day...happy holidays...