We had Peter the Canadian with us, as we would be going through Grenoble later on, we would drop him off at his hotel, so the skier would have to ride with the boarders, not the boarders with the skiers!!
As we fueled up at La Grave, we looked up to see four climbers going up one of the frozen waterfalls in a very steep chute, quite incredible, also at the top of the chute was one hell of a lot of snow that could go at any time!
The journey back down was slow, we still had chains on. We passed by where the road was hit by an avalanche the day before, they had to dynamite to clear it, about 12 metres either side. The traffic coming up the mountain was at a standstill, as cars were stopping to put chains on, and no one could pass, we just got through before the whole road would be gridlocked. This was just up from the Deux Alpes turn, by the damn.
So we were going down the mountain, but we still had not made up our minds as to where to go for the day. The amount of trafic around suggested that Deux Alpes / Alpe D'Huez would be busy, however the snow right down to Bourg D'Oisans meant that we go get some serious vertical in, if we went high. We opted for Vaujany, a village linked to Alpe D'Huez by a huge cable car from low down in the valley, as it transpired this was a superb decision. The road to Vaujany is very fast, from the main N91, we got up there very quick, and there was hardly any traffic. The only negative, was due to high winds the top of the mountain was shut, this didnt matter as we spent all day piste crusing, really letting the boards fly, and hitting all the untracked along the edge of the pistes. Peter the skier had a job to keep the pace with us, and he wasn't quite used to heavy traffic on the conjested parts of the slopes leading back down, we just went high above every one and went down the edge of the piste taking no prisoners!
At one point most people were on the side of the piste watching a helicopter circling overhead & pisteurs searching an area off the piste, evidently there had just been a slide taking some people out who were on quite an exposed slope, I didn't find out the exact details. In those conditions, with warnings being 5 out of 5 for maximum avalanche risk who knows what was going through their minds as they ventured off the ridge.
One of the best runs of the day was over near the beginers area, where there are big open motorways similar to Courcheval 1850, there was loads of untracked light powder beteween the groomed parts, you just let the boards run, effortlessly carving & flaoting down, brilliant! Well after chucking yourslef down steep chutes and over tree stumps, a bit of easy riding feels good, and great for the pose factor!
We cruised all over the place, getting back to Vaujany by 16:30, the wind up top was really cold and about force 6-7. The temp in the car read -13 again, so imagine the wind chill. We dropped Peter off in Grenoble around 17:30, that was really very quick to Grenoble, worth bearing in mind for the future.
From Grenoble drove up to the Voiron, and stayed the night with my brother, where Jes and I were very tired, left there after a good meal and a good sleep, and I'm writing this as we blast up the Autoroute with cruise control set at 100mph.
A damn good break, I can only rave on about the guides from La Chaumine, the options available are brilliant, the snow they found for us and the many and varied routed we took were awsome.
We now look forward to the family holidays, Jes is
going back to Andorra with his sons in a couple of weeks, and I'm going to Claviere with
three other families and loads of children. The pace will not be quite as vigourous, but
I'm not far from La Grave, and the guys come up to Claviere quite often so we're already
making plans.....might be a family holiday, but I can still get a couple of hours hard
riding in each day!!!!
Ice Climbers on one of the Frozen Falls
Zoomed in to see the scale involved!