Downhill All The Way

 

  January came around, and I packed away my skins to make the best of the pistes and easy to grab off piste that is all around the Anniviers. Had a great drive down across the Jura on the way out, stopping briefly in Kent to give a lift to a pal who was staying in Zinal for a week.

We got stuck in to the unpisted areas within the resort boundary and had a blast. The conditions varied widely, some slopes had breakable crust, though anywhere in the shade stayed powdery. 

It was cold again, so I was back wearing lots of layers, only this time I found myself having to say to Andy, no, wear more! We still saw skiers with no hats or goggles though, they must be more hardy.

Having been cruising in the back seat, Andy finds some Breakable Crust and decides to take a rest, and why not, he's on holiday!

My friend came round from Zinal, and brought all his friends with him, we had quite a crowd. We took them onto the same slopes we'd been skiing, smiles all round.

Most days we took a picnic and stopped at one of the Mountain Huts as the sunshine was glorious.On one occasion we had a visit from a confident local bird!

Spent a day in Zinal where there was still plenty of good skiing, though the bottom of the Freeride area was a little thin with a couple of streams showing through. Easy to avoid though. The main part of the resort had some Paragliders practicing for the Mauler Cup, which is a pretty big competition, so standards were very high.

The air was so clear that we were able to see the Cabane Becs des Bossons from the Corne du Sorebois in Zinal.

 A day in Vercorin offered us this great view across to Chandolin and the Illhorn drag lift, which is quite steep, and not just from this distance.

Back in Grimentz we'd been watching television and web reports on how bad the snow conditions were in France and Switzerland, um okay, if you say so.

There was a Skier and Boardercross competition in Grimentz, which also brought in the Freestyle skiers to the 6Park. Standards were quite high. You won't catch me doing this stuff!

 I took my Stockli's into the local ski shop for a service, and needed to sit down when the technician told me that the edges were so thin, the shop could do only 1 more service before they were scrap. I love my Stockli's so this is bad news. They also now seem to attract stones, and I spent several evenings with a P-Tex candle repairing the day's dings and holes.

I've not been counting my days on skis this winter, but in case you are wondering, it's 24 so far, more to come, hopefully.

Powder Daze

We are often asked if we are lucky with our snow when we visit the Val d'Anniviers. This is how it is most of the time, we respond. I guess it's just as well that we like skiing off piste and in powder.

An opportunity to revisit classic runs that we enjoy, which seem to change just slightly each winter. Once the Itineraries are declared open, there is a rush to ski them, which left us with chopped up powder, still fun though.

One morning we headed over to Zinal to watch some Parapente competitors in a local competition. The objective seems to be to touch down in a marked box on the snow and fly on to the next checkpoint. It's good to have some entertainment with lunch and this checkpoint was just outside a cafe.

Andy has some new skis, and was busy getting the feel of them. After a day or so, he declared that he liked them. Just as well really!

Crossing the valley to St Luc and Chandolin we decided to try an Itinerary down to one of the base lifts. The top was glorious, the bottom was icy moguls, refrozen snow, rocks and trees!



We headed up a little higher to find some softer snow!

Over in Grimentz, we kept missing meeting up with a member of the Anniviers Facebook Group. Maybe next time, we will be more organised. We did bump into a group of friends off piste, not literally, but they were skiing the same pitch, it was quite surreal!
Grimentz was starting to get busy. We got the picnic habit again!

Headed over to Zinal again, in the hope of a quiet day. We had some good snow in the Combe Durand area, and then skied down to Zinal, which was a bit mogully.

We made a tactical error in skiing down, as we saw hundreds of children queueing for the cable car. It took perhaps 20 minutes for the line to go down. Whilst waiting we bumped into another member of the Anniviers Facebook Group, quite unexpectedly, took the chance to catch up with news and then we went for a welcome coffee at the top.

Back to Grimentz to have a look at the Skier Cross and Freestyle competition. The competitors in the park were getting some serious height.

Our last day was pretty snowy, it's just possible to see the sun in this photo.



Our journey home was quite snowy too. We crossed the Jura in a snowstorm and saw our last snowplough around 30 miles from Calais. Here's the view through the windscreen just south of Reims.

Big Snow

An amazing two weeks, skiing more fresh snow than I have ever encountered before. Day after day the snow was topped up, and I hope I might just have improved my skiing!


As usual, I'm playing catch up, but I did get a good opportunity to try out my new Scott Punisher skis.

Another superb powder day saw us meeting up with friend JT from Snowheads and along with a group of his friends we found some very dry, light and wonderfully fluffy slopeside powder.
JT was using his new Movement Gladiators and says he likes them, though I did catch him digging a snow pit with his head!

In his defence, he says, that it's a nice straight line (as far as it goes).
Andy, who only likes skiing on groomed pistes, has discovered that it's fun to ski the fluffy stuff.


Of course, all this fresh snow has it's downside when you want to use the car to visit another village.

The digging took a while, but afterwards, we managed to get over to St Luc to meet and ski with another of the Anniviers Facebook group members, Rodney and his wife Pam. Rodney likes to ski quite fast, and is discussing with Andy how to get to the bottom of the Prilet piste in St Luc in sub 4 minutes. I let them go ahead, it's probably a man thing.


We made a couple of visits to Zinal during our stay, and the resort was quite busy with a Parapente competition. Here is one of the sponsors with a little airship.


The slopeside powder in Zinal was well worn, but I still enjoyed myself anyway!


Back over in Grimentz,I tried this shortcut on the run down to the village,  I made good use of it, and so did lots of other folks.

We discovered a little chute after picnicking nearby, it was just waiting to be skied. Well actually others got there before me, and identified the rocks!

I did manage to lure Andy into Abondance, and we had a close up view of some avalanche debris. It was very close to the route, and it's easy to see why this Itinerary gets closed for days on end.


We made a day trip over to Vercorin, which was very quiet, and quite cold. There was a fog in the Rhone valley which looked quite spooky.


Zinal in the sunshine, provides a good counterpoint....

It's not often that powder is the predominant type of snow for a holiday. We feel very fortunate to have had a whole 2 weeks of the fluffy stuff.

Great Snow in the Anniviers

Just back from a terrific fortnight on and off-piste in the Val D'Anniviers. The slopes were mostly uncrowded, the company was good and the sun shone at lunchtimes. After seeing Andy glance into the Abondance itinerary twice when on the draglift, I lured him in.

This was his first day back on skis this season, so probably like jumping into a cold bath, the snow was good though.
We had some fresh snow to play in, though it did hamper the visibility a little on one day.

This is the view down to the Bendolla Gondola station with the restaurant on the right. We also briefly met up with our friend ise at Bendolla, he was quite tired from a trip on skins to one of the mountain huts for lunch. We managed to get one run completed together before the day closed.

I managed to hook up with friend JT from Snowheads, who was skiing with a group of friends, Yve, Tony, Bevis and Robin. I dropped into Abondance (again),with JT and friends and Andy took a cruise and met us at the bottom.

The snow conditions were excellent and several of the steep black runs were open and complete. The next day we went to Zinal and skied the Chamois piste which leads back to Grimentz. It's a long black slope which ends in a long itinerary path through the woods, quite a long route.

During our stay we also visited Vercorin, which has lots of tree lined runs, and some which are surprisingly steep, for what looks like an easy cruising area.

We spent a day in St Luc on the opposite side of the Anniviers. It's a lovely sunny area with a good range of slopes. We both wanted to try out climbing on skins with touring skis, so went up to the Hotel Weisshorn for a long lunch after an hour's climb. Apparently it should have taken us half an hour, but it was the first time!

There is no road to the Hotel Weisshorn in the winter, so it'skis and skins, raquettes or hiking boots. I managed to slice open one knuckle trying to fit the skins, so after leaving lots of blood on the Prilet slope, the skis/skins/rucksack...etc Andy had to finish the job. The food was great and it was well worth the climb.

Andy had rented touring boots, which started out feeling comfortable, but that feeling soon wore off, and he had sore patches on his feet next day. I tried to get touring boots, but the only hire pair in my size were much too big, so I climbed in my alpine boots, with the clips undone.

Andy discovered the value of locking the heel down on the bindings when making a descent on skins.

The snow conditions were good enough for finding uncut snow right through our stay. We found plenty of good powder terrain in the Orzival area, though finding just the right time of day to ski it, could be tricky as conditions were quite warm on some days and the snow could be crusty.

We hooked up with ise and fellow Facebook Anniviers Group member Rej B to find some hidden stashes, Skied right through lunch, stopping just before 3pm.

The only downside to the trip was me catching a cold. All that healthy mountain air and I get a cold!!!