Off Piste Perfection coaching course 2015

An interesting week this week with the Off Piste Perfection course (run in collaboration with Jagged Globe) in the Tarentaise. Our valley base in Bourg St Maurice gave us maximum flexibility to follow the weather and good snow. Despite a high level of avalanche risk earlier in the week we were able to ski great (and safer) snow off piste all week long with a bit of careful route choice.

The camera stayed in the bag mostly as temperatures were very cold (though there are some shots from our days in Les Arcs here), but here are a few shots from our last day in La Rosière/La Thuile. A bit windy, but still some good snow to be found (not to mention great food and coffee over in Italy :-) ) and a ski all the way down to the lower roundabout at Séez in great snow to cap it all off.
Thanks to Tanya, Ben, Jack, Ruan, Chas and Andrew for a great week!

Steep Vanoise 2014 - St Foy

On Thursday we made the (almost mandatory) trip to St Foy for day 4 of this year's Steep Vanoise week. As always, it delivered big style!

A short skin up to the Fogliettaz summit and we dropped in to the North face, and found some good cold soft snow (some might call it powder..!) - even 2 1/2 weeks after the last snowfall!

With such good snow to be skied (all things considered) we hung a hard right traverse below the top face and put skins on again to head up to the Col D'Argentiere and on to the top of Couloir Doudou.

Doudou looked rather unappealing so we headed back to the Col D'Argentiere, where I had spied a totally unskied shoulder line of good looking snow as we skinned up. Good choice as it turned out:

A late lunch in the sun below the Archeboc refuge, and we headed off down a nicely softened 'icy path of doom' and back to the car for a well-earned refreshment at the Monal...

Steep Vanoise 2012

This week I was skiing with a small group from the Eagle Ski Club who had arranged a private 'Steep Vanoise' week basedin Bourg St Maurice. With no new snow for a week but perfect weather forecast conditions were just right for some exploration.

On Monday we were up in Les Arcs:

The team on the Aiguille Grive:



Aiguille Grive North couloir:



Dan:



Secret powder stash:



The views aren't bad!



On Tuesday we headed up to Tignes for some steep spring snow on the South side of the Grande Motte.

Perfect corn in Couloir 3500:







Day 3 was St Foy day, with a skin out to Couloir Doudou. We found good chalky snow in the couloir, followed by great spring snow all the way down to the Archeboc refuge. (Camera left at home so no pics!).

Day 4, La Plagne - still some powder to be found in Les Rodzins & more spring snow in the afternoon in the Friolin N couloir:









Incidentally, the main exit to the Bellecote North face is better filled in than I have ever seen it - the stream bed is completely banked out!

Last day - more great spring snow in Les Arcs with a run down Couloir Genepi, followed by a traverse of the Col de la Luge with 600m of fantastic snow down to the Mt Pourri refuge:






Thanks to Rob, Dan, Steve and Phil for a great week (and thanks to the weather & snow for playing ball!).