Col de Bel Oiseau and Col de Fenestral

Adam George, Mike Bromberg, and I drove up to Finhaut, Switzerland on a guide's day off. Our goal was to do about 2000m of touring. I was just getting over the flu, so I hardly took the camera out of the bag - especially on the uphill battles. Adam has been training for the Patroulle des Glaciers - the Zermatt-to-Verbier mother of all ski-rando races. There was no way I was going to try and keep up.

Without incedent, we arrived at the Col de Bel Oiseau at 2553 meters, and enjoyed a nice 600 meter powder descent back into the Bessons drainage. We then skied up and over the Col de Fenestral, which was ruined by a nasty sun-crust and a lot of ugly tracks. We descended a contrived and overly steep entrance couloir into the Comba Rossa drainage but this could have been easily avoided by just climbing to the tip-top summit of the Dent de Fenestral and descending the North East face. Once past the crusty, 45-50° entrance gulley, we enjoyed good powder pretty much all the way to Finhaut. Of course there was some pesky bushwhacking at the bottom, but it was all in good fun.

Mike Bromberg side-slipping a 185cm couloir with his 180cm skis. Lucky him. descending into Comba RossaWe didn't get first tracks, but we were able to get 18th, 19th, and 20th tracks, respectively. Mr Bromberg finding first tracks not far above FinhautAdam George finding good, cold, powder snowMike probably thinks tree skiing is fun. With the light getting low, it's time to find our way back to Finhaut

Afternoon tour to the Beaugeant - where's that col?

You pay a hefty price when you begin an early February tour at the Brevent at 1:00pm. Mike Bromberg, Ben Mitchell, and I suffered from a morning session of extreme Admin (or was it just malaise?) and finally hit the lift after lunch. Our goal was the Col de Beaugeant - or perhaps the North face of the Encrenaz? We traversed from plan-praz to the Index via the Cornu and Liasion Brevent-Flegere. We passed the Refuge de Lac Blanc at about 2:45 pm with another 600 meters to ascend, a rappel or two to figure out, and 2000 meters to ski into Buet. We followed a fresh skin track up the Beaugeant, but then the french skiers who came back down told us they had chosen the wrong col, and were going home. It turns out they had actually chosen the right col, but the wrong length of rope. We followed their advice and went to the wrong col ourselves. It was late, and headlamps would not be a fun way to arrive in La Buet. We turned tail and skied back from whence we had come. At least the snow was pretty good.

Fellow crack-of-noon club members, Ben Mitchell and Mike Bromberg. A nice skin track on the south flanks of the Beaugeant.Oops. We missed the col. But the skiing back down was pretty good. Here's Ben Mitchell, making the first turns.