Ski touring the Haute Route - Day 2b
Grand Montets - Glacier d Argentière - col du Chardonnay - Cabane de Saleina
Lunch on glacier du Chardonnay
The first day for the rest of the group, luckily, Philippe did not forget anything, Our little group was also surely more sober than the one at 2400m altitude.
The day was superb, not a cloud in the sky, not too hot, great day to start a nice week long tour, all o us hoping the weather would hold out.
We skied down from the Grand-Montets, to reach the glacier d Argentière, no problems there, we later learned that this is how Philippe decides if some peoples skills are good enough for the tour. A small break on the glacier where some basic rules are explained !!Never take off the skis unless i mention it is safe to do so!!, a few tips for conversions on steep slopes, which we quickly got to practice (and in my case, mess up) and we are off on the first uphill of the week.
The start of the uphill towards the col du chardonnay was in the sun and soft, the slope ssometimes tricky !rock crossings! and steep, but generally not problematic. We took our first break at the edge of the sunny part.
Then on to the shady part and, as expected conditions were very different, the snow is now ice and the uphills are not so easy, good that we had the knives and great that i
Looking down the Glacier de Saleina towards Cabane de Saleina
de Saleina, the skiing is now in the shade, making the snow crusty and deep at the same time. Spike manages to break a pole in a nice slow motion sideways head dive....
A few choice swear words later and we are all skinning up the last uphill to the cabane de Saleina and to hopefully meet the others. The Others (see Lost) are found to be waiting for us... rather in a happy mood...
It seems their day has been very productive, helping the hut gardian set up the flag and emptying the refuge of almost all the alcohol it contains...way to go.
A Nice dinner, a few drink stolen from the hidden stash of the gardien (as the Others have drunk everything else) and we are off to bed.
Cabane de Saleina in the evening
was convinced to buy new bindings where i can use knives.Some people not from our group seemed to be having problems and not seem to want to listen to the advice given by Philippe... their problem if they don t want to listen.
Lunch break finds us out of the steep part and back in the sun. A nice long gentle uphill takes us to the col du Chardonnay. As there seems to be a long lineup for the absail, Philippe decides to improvise, we will go a bit to the left and go down a different slope, saving some time.
Or so was the theory, in practice, we could not just rappel down as the rope was too short, with the end of the rappel down in a rocky section with not too many options, so we had to get lowered down, which took a bit more time,
Philippe himself had to make 2 rappels to reach the skiable part. We are then off on the Glacier
Philippe belaying and Gisle getting ready to get lowered down the couloir