I think we slept well last night. ... certainly my muscles were very tight and complaining a lot this morning.. there is that trepidation as we headed towards the meeting in the carpark below the Grands Montets. A second new area for us that would become very well known over the years to come.
Today we also had heavier packs, as we had harnesses, and crevasse rescue equipment (slings, ice screws, and several karabinas).
We took the chair lift up, as Brian had some ideas, and also the queue for the cable car was at over 40 mins. from the top of the chair it is an easy step over to a second chair that goes through the trees to reach a point on the central traversing trails. A quick burst back to the bottom of this to warm up, and get the muscles accustomed to exercise again. Along the way we started a second exercise of perfecting the hockey stop as the culmination to a turn, so effectively turn down the slope and then hockey stop to get out of it ... a very safe adn secure way of controlled descent, one turn at a time.
There would be many occasions in the later years I dragged this out of the kit bag to get down a slope where great care was required.
The second time down we stopped in the trees ... to-day's first lesson was about Transceivers. After the initial overview and demonstration of how the electronics worked .. we went into a series of exercises. Brian started by placing a spare one on the surface of the snow and we walked through a search procedure. These were the days of the old analogue systems - they had only just agreed the global frequency for the systems between the US and Europe!! Later on the arrival of Digital systems and the computerised pointers etc.. would change all the techniques up front. We learnt about staggered searches up hill and listened intensely for the beeps. Then we did a walk through for real with a hidden transceiver, before a full blown high speed search. Several things came out of this ... running up hill in boot is not fun, listening to the beep when your blood and heart is pounding in your ear, when you get close it is complex to pinpoint the actual position with the depth etc., if some B****r switches to transmit by mistake everything goes haywire. digging takes for ever, and whatever you can do to assist the removal of snow is all-round a good thing.
Brian had that smile on his face of the sadist enjoying others pain!.. however I have never forgotten these lessons so they succeeded perfectly.
After the lessons we returned to practising our off-piste techniques, with some of the routes that became traditional for us on a visit to Grands Montets. We dropped right after the Bouchard lift and came straight down.. another memorable one was under the cliffs from the Herse lift - Brian called these the Italian bowls ... Dave ask why, to be told that is was because of a party of Italians who were "lost" there.
Having been totally worn out by this it was time for a break and something to eat. then we were off on the second half of the day... some skinning on the Argentiere glacier.
We took the second cable car (requires an extension to the ski pass). this is very popular and has a queuing system - this was later replaced by tickets, but at this time we just turned up and joined the queue. This was the first time we had been to the top station, and so dumping the skis, we went up to the roof to have a good look around, and enjoy the view in the sunshine. There would be times later one we would be up here in a howling gale, but this was excellent weather.
Tourist things over, we picked up the kit and made our way down the seemingly endless steps down to the col behind the station. going down open metal steps in hire ski boots (we did not have our own boots and it would be several years before we bought touring boots) was not a simple task, and holding onto skis at the same time juts complicated matters.
Down on the col we dressed up and tightened up the skis. The first horror was the exit onto the top slope ... a narrow gouged runnel curving around to the right and deep rail tracks. Once committed no gong back .. we all survived. In the future this would be an enjoyable "fun" hurdle to be taken at speed.
From here we went down the un-pisted, but well tracked route , leaving the ski area just above the grand Rognon. where we headed relatively straight down to the glacier floor.
After the final schuss out onto the glacier, we stopped to put the skins on, before heading across in the general direction of the Argentier hut.
More practice of skinning and also included the first down hill skinning - frightful initially and also a disaster for us all as we sat down in the compression at the bottom of the slope. Again lessons for the future where this becomes part of almost every tour in one form or another.
It was really enjoyable to stroll up the glacier .. looking very benign, with little sign of the potential dangers. the snow was nice and firm to take the skis.
Arriving at the moraine curving behind the Argentiere hut, this would be our high point today, and in some shade from the Aiguilles Verte, Droite and Courtes. Such a fantastic backdrop!.
From here we schussed direct back where we had come to the point where we joined the glacier. From here we followed the obvious trail down the side of the glacier, this was good preparation for tomorrow, but we did not yet know that. The trail was close enough to the crevasses and seracs yet there was a solid trace that weaved its way through the difficulties. At the bottom the trail cut left, over the lateral moraine and back to the piste/ road that lead back to the the middle station.
Completely knackered, but strangely happy with another fantastic day in the mountains, and definitely sold on the concept of using skis to get away from it all in winter.
Tomorrow would just be the icing on the cake.
Today we also had heavier packs, as we had harnesses, and crevasse rescue equipment (slings, ice screws, and several karabinas).
We took the chair lift up, as Brian had some ideas, and also the queue for the cable car was at over 40 mins. from the top of the chair it is an easy step over to a second chair that goes through the trees to reach a point on the central traversing trails. A quick burst back to the bottom of this to warm up, and get the muscles accustomed to exercise again. Along the way we started a second exercise of perfecting the hockey stop as the culmination to a turn, so effectively turn down the slope and then hockey stop to get out of it ... a very safe adn secure way of controlled descent, one turn at a time.
There would be many occasions in the later years I dragged this out of the kit bag to get down a slope where great care was required.
The second time down we stopped in the trees ... to-day's first lesson was about Transceivers. After the initial overview and demonstration of how the electronics worked .. we went into a series of exercises. Brian started by placing a spare one on the surface of the snow and we walked through a search procedure. These were the days of the old analogue systems - they had only just agreed the global frequency for the systems between the US and Europe!! Later on the arrival of Digital systems and the computerised pointers etc.. would change all the techniques up front. We learnt about staggered searches up hill and listened intensely for the beeps. Then we did a walk through for real with a hidden transceiver, before a full blown high speed search. Several things came out of this ... running up hill in boot is not fun, listening to the beep when your blood and heart is pounding in your ear, when you get close it is complex to pinpoint the actual position with the depth etc., if some B****r switches to transmit by mistake everything goes haywire. digging takes for ever, and whatever you can do to assist the removal of snow is all-round a good thing.
Brian had that smile on his face of the sadist enjoying others pain!.. however I have never forgotten these lessons so they succeeded perfectly.
After the lessons we returned to practising our off-piste techniques, with some of the routes that became traditional for us on a visit to Grands Montets. We dropped right after the Bouchard lift and came straight down.. another memorable one was under the cliffs from the Herse lift - Brian called these the Italian bowls ... Dave ask why, to be told that is was because of a party of Italians who were "lost" there.
Having been totally worn out by this it was time for a break and something to eat. then we were off on the second half of the day... some skinning on the Argentiere glacier.
 |
| Towards MT Blanc |
 |
| Petit Verte behind the top station |
 |
| Down to the glacier |
 |
| looking up from the Rognon |
From here we went down the un-pisted, but well tracked route , leaving the ski area just above the grand Rognon. where we headed relatively straight down to the glacier floor.After the final schuss out onto the glacier, we stopped to put the skins on, before heading across in the general direction of the Argentier hut.
More practice of skinning and also included the first down hill skinning - frightful initially and also a disaster for us all as we sat down in the compression at the bottom of the slope. Again lessons for the future where this becomes part of almost every tour in one form or another.
It was really enjoyable to stroll up the glacier .. looking very benign, with little sign of the potential dangers. the snow was nice and firm to take the skis.
Arriving at the moraine curving behind the Argentiere hut, this would be our high point today, and in some shade from the Aiguilles Verte, Droite and Courtes. Such a fantastic backdrop!.From here we schussed direct back where we had come to the point where we joined the glacier. From here we followed the obvious trail down the side of the glacier, this was good preparation for tomorrow, but we did not yet know that. The trail was close enough to the crevasses and seracs yet there was a solid trace that weaved its way through the difficulties. At the bottom the trail cut left, over the lateral moraine and back to the piste/ road that lead back to the the middle station.
Completely knackered, but strangely happy with another fantastic day in the mountains, and definitely sold on the concept of using skis to get away from it all in winter.
Tomorrow would just be the icing on the cake.