Have Liz and I found yet another under-the-radar Euro area that James has missed? On Thursday morning we looked up reported new snow from Wednesday night’s Nordstau storm. I knew we needed to head west down the Upper Rhone Valley to get away from the blocking effect of the Jungfrau peaks. I had tentatively targeted Grimentz/Zinal but the storm did not get that far south except at Verbier which is open to the north where the Rhone flows into Lake Geneva. We are spending two nights at a cute B&B in Les Agettes, which is partway up the road to Arolla and Evolene, and those areas also missed out on the new snow.
Ovronnaz was the big winner on that snow report with 70cm new (plus another 20 Thursday), and Powderhounds likes the place, so that’s where we skied Saturday.
There was still much uncertainty in expectations. Would the powder be wind affected? How much did it get skied out Friday? How busy would it be on a Saturday? Would the pistes be in decent shape with primary east exposure and middling altitude range?
We had minimal traffic driving up the hairpin road through vineyards. We arrived about 9:15 but most of the locals were there already. We got one of the last P2 parking places and got onto a crammed shuttle bus to the base. But tickets and the bottom chair lines were short and we were on the lift at 9:45. We found this drawing near the base Jorasse lift amusing.
Ovronnaz has four conventional chairlifts plus one poma serving its highest terrain. We next rode the Col lift, and its piste was quite busy.
We started skiing around the Petit Pre lift. Despite its SE exposure, we were pleasantly surprised to find good quality leftover low angle powder.
There was minimal wind effect even though the chair rides were breezy.
Several locals were skinning up this north aspect.
By 11AM anything with pitch on Petit Pre was getting heavy in the spring sun, so we moved on with this view on the way down.
We rode Bougnonne and had an overview of the Tsantonnaire poma terrain.
You can see the traverse line and powder tracks below it.
That was worth another 4 runs.
View from the bowl across the poma line and piste:
It became gradually overcast starting about 12:30 thought there were a few sunny breaks. Max temps were low 20’s up high and around freezing at the base.
We had a strudel in the Jorasse cafeteria and then skied the #2 piste 2,100 vertical to the base. These bottom runs are often unpleasant, but the manmade base was well buried by the recent snow. So we rode two chairs back up and skied pistes #3 and #1 to end our day with 16,500 vertical, about 5K of powder.
The lower and more SE facing pistes were in first day softening mode after about 1PM. The lower runs are in thick forest that probably keeps them in shade midwinter but not in spring. We got off the hill about 2:30.
I noticed the knee some today, but it’s still much better since the Thursday doctor visit in Zermatt. This trip is Exhibit A of why not to make lodging reservations in advance. Based on overall season snowfall I expected to be moving on to Serre Chevalier and the Maurienne Valley. But these areas got no new snow from the Nordstau and any upcoming snow is also from the north.
Now it makes sense to go to places that got resurfaced by last week’s storm and may get more snow over the next few days. That will probably start with a couple of days in Portes-du-Soleil, which also has a fair amount of pistes below tree line if visibility is bad. The other point is that if my knee gets worse we can stop skiing anytime and go into Italy for tourism without losing any previously committed $$$.
Ovronnaz was the big winner on that snow report with 70cm new (plus another 20 Thursday), and Powderhounds likes the place, so that’s where we skied Saturday.
There was still much uncertainty in expectations. Would the powder be wind affected? How much did it get skied out Friday? How busy would it be on a Saturday? Would the pistes be in decent shape with primary east exposure and middling altitude range?
We had minimal traffic driving up the hairpin road through vineyards. We arrived about 9:15 but most of the locals were there already. We got one of the last P2 parking places and got onto a crammed shuttle bus to the base. But tickets and the bottom chair lines were short and we were on the lift at 9:45. We found this drawing near the base Jorasse lift amusing.
Ovronnaz has four conventional chairlifts plus one poma serving its highest terrain. We next rode the Col lift, and its piste was quite busy.
We started skiing around the Petit Pre lift. Despite its SE exposure, we were pleasantly surprised to find good quality leftover low angle powder.
There was minimal wind effect even though the chair rides were breezy.
Several locals were skinning up this north aspect.
By 11AM anything with pitch on Petit Pre was getting heavy in the spring sun, so we moved on with this view on the way down.
We rode Bougnonne and had an overview of the Tsantonnaire poma terrain.
You can see the traverse line and powder tracks below it.
That was worth another 4 runs.
View from the bowl across the poma line and piste:
It became gradually overcast starting about 12:30 thought there were a few sunny breaks. Max temps were low 20’s up high and around freezing at the base.
We had a strudel in the Jorasse cafeteria and then skied the #2 piste 2,100 vertical to the base. These bottom runs are often unpleasant, but the manmade base was well buried by the recent snow. So we rode two chairs back up and skied pistes #3 and #1 to end our day with 16,500 vertical, about 5K of powder.
The lower and more SE facing pistes were in first day softening mode after about 1PM. The lower runs are in thick forest that probably keeps them in shade midwinter but not in spring. We got off the hill about 2:30.
I noticed the knee some today, but it’s still much better since the Thursday doctor visit in Zermatt. This trip is Exhibit A of why not to make lodging reservations in advance. Based on overall season snowfall I expected to be moving on to Serre Chevalier and the Maurienne Valley. But these areas got no new snow from the Nordstau and any upcoming snow is also from the north.
Now it makes sense to go to places that got resurfaced by last week’s storm and may get more snow over the next few days. That will probably start with a couple of days in Portes-du-Soleil, which also has a fair amount of pistes below tree line if visibility is bad. The other point is that if my knee gets worse we can stop skiing anytime and go into Italy for tourism without losing any previously committed $$$.
