Heli skiing and touring

In this part of the alps we have some of the highest peaks and some of the most spectacular heli landing spots. Last week we spent two unforgetable days, starting with a classic heli-drop on the Pigne d'Arolla, skiing and skinning into Italy for some fantastic snow, scenery and food.

We were guided by Dominique Fellay of Alpine Dreams, and flown by Heli Alps.

Get your skate skis on...

Skiing downhill is wonderful but not the best for keeping in shape. The answer during the winter months is to do a bit of skate skiing - a fast, dynamic version of cross country skiing. Just an hour and a half from us in Zinal is a mecca for the sport - Goms in the upper Valais.

It's well worth taking a lesson to get to grips with the basic technique. Damian Hischier (in blue, just in case you can't tell the difference between me and him) worked miracles, getting us up and running in no time. He's not quite your standard instructor - in the summer he's not a carpenter but a test pilot...

Damian teaching some tricks to skate skiing.

Just don't over-exert yourself before heading off on one of the wonderful routes that stretch down the valley:
between Oberwald and Niederwald the shortest route is 22km, a journey taking you through ancient villages, across meadows and past chapels. There are lots of alternative trails, twisting and climbing above the valley floor into the forest. But don't forget that what goes up must come down, which is no joke on these skis... There are also plenty of restaurants and bars - some serving the unlikely sounding dish 'cholera' (a sort of Swiss Cornish pastie with onion and apple); and you're never far from a railway station, so when you've had enough (cholera or skate-skiing) you can jump onto a warm train and trundle home. We stayed in the lovely Hotel Tenne, where they serve award winning food and have very comfy beds - perfect after a day's skating.

For our last day we headed down the road to the local downhill ski area of Fiescheralp where we enjoyed the views over the Aletsch glacier and explored with local hero Kilian Volken, a guide who is off to climb K2 this summer. After 30 + years of guiding, it's wonderful to find he's still as keen about skiing the local area, even in perishing cold and with the powder quite wind-blown. One of those inspirational characters you feel better for meeting and a huge pleasure to ski with.

The big chill

Winter has finally arrived across the whole of Europe. Here the temperatures were -20 at the house this morning, rising to -10 by lunch-time. Swiss rail tracks have snapped in the cold and there are wonderful frost patterns on the window, but it's beautiful. The sun is out, the sky blue, snow clings to the trees and there's no wind.

Once out it's fine and the snow is skiing beautifully. We've been exploring some new routes and Eric's been wearing some sunny colours to warm up the pictures.

All or nothing

Storms hit Switzerland and much of Europe at the beginning of the month.

We went over to St Bernard area to explore some of the little know resorts of La Fouly, Vicheres and Champex Lac, and found some interesting stuff, both resorts and snow. Over there the wind had reached speeds of 270km/per hour. Too strong to form any cornices, it left the tops of the mountains scoured back to rock in places, the snow having been shifted and dropped several meters along where it lay up to 4m deep.

Skiing through the trees was interesting too with the ground littered with large branches and whole trees. Still we found some wonderful stuff - a beautiful and quiet area away from the crowds of Verbier.

Back in Zinal, the tops of the mountains are also back to the rock in places, the first coulour on the Chamois is a boulder field and the top 20m down to the dam is exposed rock and grass. The snow has gone somewhere, the trick is to find out where and access how loaded it is...

Snow shoeing by moon light

After all the snow storms, last night was still and clear - perfect for a snowshoe trip by the light of the full moon. We just went up into the forest behind Mottec, and saw fresh snow hare and fox tracks, everything was beautifully quiet and the snow sparkled just like the stars.

Coming back into the village everything looked magical and certainly worthy of a picture or two.

Snow has fallen snow on snow....

After one of the driest autumn in the Alps for (some say) 150 years, the weather finally turned and from the 14th December we've had more snow than we could at times cope with. So much fell on the 16th that they closed the road for 1.5 days as a precaution against avalanche. Things have settled down now and since Christmas we've had more snow but some good skiing too in deep deep powder.

Once dug out, our new outdoor fireplace has made a great venue for some pre dinner vin chaud.

 

You can get an idea of the depth of snow from the garden room's roof.

 

From ice to Nice

photo by: Will Herrington

It's only 2 weeks since the previous post and how the landscape has changed. The resorts are open at weekends and the international race teams are being relocated from other venues and are flooding in from all over Europe to race in Zinal. Us mortals benifit tremendously from all the hard work the lift company has put in and we've been making turns before most. Now the real snow has arrived and we can venture off piste too. This is from Sunday which was before the recent falls. More forcaste for the rest of the week.