⛷️ ❄️ Skiing and Snowboarding 23-24 🏔️ 🏂

In Montriond now, first day up at Avoriaz today. Pistes in good shape above about 1600m though could do with a good freeze to set them up as was getting very choppy this afternoon. Looks like it’ll cool off tomorrow with some snow so hopeful for a good day.

@jamesmio just arrived in Tignes VC.  Snowing gently and feels cold. Doesn’t feel enough for pow turns tomorrow but will likely mean good groomers.

Forecast is generally light snow and cold temps all week so you shouldn’t need to worry.

First day on the Les Gets slopes today.

On arrival yesterday it looked scarily green, but nice amount of snow overnight meant skiing to the village, even Les Perrières was fine.
Mixed snow low down made it interesting / challenging, but this morning higher up was 6-8” of fresh (reasonably powdery fresh) over piste.

Off piste was a low odds gamble – new board, interesting fall, or get away with it. But such is late season.

Not to bad so far.

PS – and quiet. There’s no one here. A lot of the time the only other people I could see were my wife and sons.

Yeah absolutely dead in Serre Che today. Better conditions than yesterday (there was an event on yesterday so pistes got cut up)

Above 1800m was great today, lower down a bit more hit and miss.

Mixed day in Menuires with a bit of fresh, plenty of cloud, wind and sun in the afternoon.

Small pockets of powder where the wind had blown the fresh snow were fun, but if you chose the wrong bit yesterdays tracks had frozen solid. Pistes held up better today than be last couple of days due to it being colder.

We’ve moved the van up to VT for the next few days 🙂

@creepers – ace, that’s very positive sounding news indeed!

Well, my newbie experience at Passo Tonale is proving a challenge.  Day one today and I just couldn’t get it. Took many tumbles and had the indignity of walking down the “steeper” sections of a blue run. Daughter tweaked her knee annd have a massive confidence meltdown and was skidood off the hill so I’m hoping she’s ok for the rest of the week.  The only, and I mean only, consolation is that the rep said it has been the worst day this season for ice. So hoping it gets better or it could be a disaster. Day two of ski school tomorrow . Full of trepidation. It wasn’t supposed to be like this.

Not sure if it helps much, but steepness is relative, ski across the piste at an angle and you remove the ‘fear’ from it , that and do the opposite to your instincts, lean forward and downhill!

Hope your daughter gets past the injury ok too.

Oh no rockhopper. That sounds mince. Hope it improves.

Finished up a leisurely three days skiing Avoriaz. The new snow yesterday definitely helped and conditions high up today have been great. But get lower down and it’s getting scrappy again. I think some of the lower runs will not last out to the end of the season unless there’s more snow and it stays cool. The Super Morzine to Avoriaz link is looking especially fragile (from my two hours in a deck chair at the top of Zore chair today). Anyway, the wife has had a great time and it’s improved her confidence lots which can only be a good thing.

Les Gets fantastic this morning (mainly off the Ranfolly and Chamoissiere lifts). Yesterday’s snow had stayed cold enough to piste into firm not hard pistes that ran well and gripped superbly.  Much coaching of variations on carving ensued.

Got soft in the afternoon and to be fair some slopes are not even good enough to be described as bad – but overall a good day.
Weather a bit hit and miss for the rest of the week, but I’ve seen worse.

Day two done. Twas light night and day. I was ready to throw the towel in after a disastrous attempt on a kiddie slope first thing then spoke to our instructor and we got back to basics, which clearly I needed notwithstanding what was learnt at Xscape.  Bizarrely, and with a complete lack of any sort of coolness, I interpreted the teaching and adopted a “I’m a kettle teapot short and stout” posture to get the hips and leaning in check and was able to (in my opinion) absolutely tear up the lower blue runs! 😂😂😂.  And the daughter was able to ski through the knee tweak. And there wasn’t a single cloud in the sky so that ticked off my bucket list.   It was a great day, absolutely buzzing with even getting down, even with a degree of carving.  It got a bit slushy after lunch which was a little difficult to ski, and I had one “ohh sh!t” moment but managed to recover ok.  Snow forecast for tomorrow.
Also took the cable car up to the glacier at 3,000m. They ski down from that, which appears insane.
A great day. Knackered. Even if I had to leave tomorrow, I’d be satisfied.

Well done Rockhopper 🤟

Replied in the other thread, but YASSS @rockhopper70!

I’m not out today, bad nosebleed has meant I’ll probably hide in the van for the day. Wife’s gone out, hideously windy, hard scoured pistes apparently so I don’t feel like I’m missing much.

She’s heading to Meribel to get lower to try and get out the worst of the wind, hopefully the link back over stays open…

Powder day in Montgenevre and it’s still dumping.  Hope you’re on the mend asap Phil…. I’d drive straight up here if I were you!

I’m fine now cheers, used to it tbh.

Looks like we might’ve made a bad decision this trip, not snowing properly here yet although 10cm+ forecast for tomorrow 🤞 and no wind.

So… your educated thoughts for Scottish skiing over Easter weekend and beyond? Keen to get out for something before the end of the season but the current snowfall doesn’t look to have made any significant changes (yet). Forecast is borderline into next week, but given the starting point is this just wishful thinking? (touring/similar at the usual suspects east or west FWIW).

We have snow. Not much but it’s a start!

Vis not so good 🙈

We have had an absolute dump here, still going and total whiteout! Just about to drag myself out of bed.

Heading to Les Deux Alpes on Saturday. It’s getting absolutely hammered with snow although the wind is looking a bit spicy!

So… your educated thoughts for Scottish skiing over Easter weekend and beyond? Keen to get out for something before the end of the season but the current snowfall doesn’t look to have made any significant changes (yet). Forecast is borderline into next week, but given the starting point is this just wishful thinking? (touring/similar at the usual suspects east or west FWIW).

Glencoe has got battered with fresh snow. As always with Scotland you’ve got to play it by ear and forget planning ahead.

Yes Glencoe looking great at the moment, but as Bob says it’s difficult to plan.

Keep an eye on the Facebook pages for updates the day before you want to ski.

“your educated thoughts for Scottish skiing over Easter weekend and beyond? Keen to get out for something before the end of the season but the current snowfall doesn’t look to have made any significant changes (yet). Forecast is borderline into next week, but given the starting point is this just wishful thinking? (touring/similar at the usual suspects east or west FWIW).”

The problem is, that on top of the normal problems, such as:
Will there be snow? ,(yes)
Will there be too much wind? ( no)

You also have to contend with the Cairngorm bit of a mess, which screws up the lift/ capacity situation.

DOH, just remembered that you said touring….

Hmmm. I think it would be worth it this weekend or next. Seems to be a lot of snow forecast and not too much wind. Dodgy Vis as well though.

If you would be up for meeting for a tour, I’m thinking of heading up from Manchester either this weekend or next.

Are you on the FB backcountry conditions group,?

I’d be keen to hear how the lower slopes are coping in Deux Alpes @BoardinBob, thinking of heading there for a last gasp weekend at the end of April. I get that the stuff up towards the glacier will be absolutely fine but it would be nice that the runs back to the resort are likely to hold up and stay open for a few weeks (I’m looking at 18-22 April).

I went out somewhat under-skied yesterday. I normally quite like being in the powder rather than on the top but yesterday was deep heavy fresh snow so I kept grinding to a halt with snow over the knees. This morning I went out and tramped around in the stuff for a few minutes which was enough to make the decision to go ride a col on the roadie instead.

Apart from school groups the place is almost deserted, the locals have hung up their skis for the year.

I’d be keen to hear how the lower slopes are coping in Deux Alpes

I’d say it’ll probably be best to download rather than do anything at the end of the day below the cretes. Going for an end of season jolly ourselves, but we’ll also bring bikes because they’re opening the Venosc DH on the 13th.

@BoardinBob, @phil5556, yeah Glencoe is as usual best bet for lift assisted, not quite classic late season cover though.

@thegeneralist – cheers, I now can’t get out in the next few days but I’ll keep an eye on the usual places for reports this weekend. Reading between the lines of the SAIS blogs don’t suggest there has been significant changes on overall cover thus far. The forecast suggests some useful snowfall next week so I’m hoping i might get either a skive late next week or get out next weekend instead. Fingers crossed everything aligns for then. Post up if you manage to get out, and shout if you’re up for future trips.

https://www.instagram.com/p/C5DhiUlMEO9/?igsh=MTh0cWkwb3c2dTc0bQ==

snow day today in Tignes ( again!)

Pretty hard to see at times but some really deep turns to be had.

So 3 days out of 5 in Les Gets in late March I’ve left fresh tracks. So far (but I don’t think there’ll be any more tomorrow).
Some of it was fairly heavy new snow, but some just about qualified as powder.
One slushy day and the other one was nicely pisted from the day before’s fresh.
Not bad, though they could have done with a lot more weeks like this this year I think.

Toying with North America in April next year (school breaks up on 5th).
Any recommendations for a family of 4?  Banff looks a possibility, but it’s not cheap. What are the pluses and minuses over just heading back to somewhere in Europe?  How do we maximise the value?  Book everything separately? And good tour operators? Any hints / tips welcome..

Choose a resort and buy early bird season passes in the summer. Way cheaper than buying once you are there.

You’re at one of the lowest resorts, igm, try a higher European one. Heavy damp snow at 1500m is nice powder beyond 2500m.

@tuboflard if you’ve booked accommodation through the L2A website, lift passes are currently reduced 40%.

@ceepers – thanks, I shall cost in on that basis

@edukator – indeed, but I like the village, we know folk here, and we drive over so it’s easy to nip to other places. (And I like tree lined runs.) Tomorrow will be a little higher in Avoriaz. But to be honest, the snow has been good this week – I’ve sat in the rain in Courcheval in February and this week has been the antithesis of that.

PS – @edukator and others, feel free to recommend me a good high choice in Europe for a family with mixed snow needs – father competent but not expert on a board, elder teenager pretty good on skis or board, younger teenager pretty good on skis, mother gone back to skis and competent in good conditions, gets by in poor conditions.
And I hate riding open areas in flat light. My eyes let me down and I tense up. Tree lined far easier.

Another powder day in Montgenevre, essentially zero visibility though unfortunately today, and much of the mountain was closed.  Got a few nice powder turns in before managing to put a 10cm core shot in my board!  9 years old now, and I don’t ride freestyle really these days, so a new board may well be purchased for next season.  That’s it for us for this season, my wife is suggesting trying to do a month next winter, which sounds pretty awesome to me!

Similar to Tom; a nearly powder day in Montgenevre Les Menuires, essentially zero visibility though unfortunately today, and much of the mountain was closed. Mega windy, and some heavy snow in places.

Was having mega boot issues today – my old boots are shot, too soft now and slightly too short. The new ones have too much volume, so had really sore feet today from them flapping about 🙁 Will be in the old boots for the last day of our season tomorrow I think.

That’s a difficult one, igm, trees don’t grow at altitudes with better snow in theAlps. Though the tree line is rising locally (Pyrénées) as the climate warms. Tignes and Val Thorens are my usual suggestions for high resorts with a personal preference for Tignes as I like doing a bit of X-C sking and having a swim. There are many resorts with high pistes but not many with good snow out of the door.

Thanks @ocrider, not booked accommodation yet so worth knowing.

@igm, some places stateside do spring lift passes. Timberline for example are a complete bargain at under $200 for unlimited skiing for about two months. Other option is to buy very early (early bird deals) but check out blackout days which aren’t included on the cheapest tickets.

Looking absolutely glorious weather over Glencoe and much of the Cairngorms this morning. Even if the cover isn’t incredible seems a good day to be out.

@igm worth also remembering that many North American resorts don’t have much accommodation at the lifts and you often stay in the closest local town and drive up each day.

In My dated  experience this was generally no problem but I am hearing reports of big queues for lifts and parking at some of the bigger resorts so worth lots of research!