Sunday 10 January 2010

Early January round-up

Its been a busy week this week, with cold temperatures, but some beautiful clear days (for once!).
On Wednesday the predicted sea of clouds at 3000m turned out to be at 1500m and I emerged into a day of glorious sunshine and light powder with Andrew, the 2 Marks, Claudia, Delan & Nathan.

Nathan doing a great job in the soft stuff despite a broken toe strap:



That evening I was back up above Meribel with several hundred other instructors all trying to keep warm in -20 and dropping temperatures, for a torchlit descent to mark the Russian New Year - Nastrovye!!!

Lighting up:



On the way to the starting point - anyone know where we're going??:



On Thursday I met up with Harry and Pete in La Tania for a day of off-piste/intro to touring. With the clear skies set to cloud over mid-afternoon we made our way through the Courchevel lift system for the short skin up and over into Les Avals. The first pitches down gave perfect powder, with barely 10 other tracks in the whole place and this set the scene for the rest of the day:



We made a quick stop for coffee and a chat with Lionel at the Grand Plan refuge, and then headed off towards the start of the skin up to the Col des Saulces:





Pete and Harry approaching the Col des Saulces:



And more perfect light fluffy powder in the Combe des Roches - all the way back to Le Biol:



Harry and Pete at the bottom of the Combe des Roches



Yesterday I was in Tignes with James and Chris, dodging the weather and finding some fun powder on the steeo tree runs around laisinant and in the Fornet forest; off to Chamonix this evening for the Alpine Guides Off Piste Coaching week, and with 2 sunny days forecast, it looks like we should kick the week off in good style!

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