While the Retour d’Est storm prediction was a bust, the cold snap materialized a day later than originally forecast. It probably did not exceed 20F all day and it was closer to 10F up on Les Deux Alpes’ glacier at 11,300 feet. Fortunately it was still sunny with no wind.
The drive from Alpe d’Huez took almost an hour with the two hairpin mountain roads and that we parked at the farthest end of Deux Alpes near the Diable lift.
The scenery on the drive is dramatic.
From Diable we skied to Cretes, then a catwalk to Bellecombe.
From Bellecombe we skied to Fee 2200. Most of the Fee 2 run was also a catwalk.
The catwalk ended here with a short pitch down to the lift.
That pitch had quite firm manmade snow in Tuesday’s cooler weather.
More catwalks lead from left to right on the map from the bases of Pierre Grosse to Fee to Thuit. We did not ski those but the open spaces dropping onto those roads would be worth hitting in fresh snow. Liz at top of Fee chair:
We took a lap on Fee 3, then skied to the Pierre Grosse gondola.
Emerging from that gondola we see this short track connected to the restaurant above.
The lower building is the entry to an underground funicular rising about 1,000 feet to the glacier. From there it’s a short walk to the viewpoint Belvedere des Ecrins.
Zoomed view south:
View west:
The highest Lauze surface lift above us runs only in late spring/early summer similar to those we have seen at Tignes and Zermatt. The peak barely visible at center is La Meije overlooking La Grave.
The bowl in the center of the pic above drops away into the deep canyon at right here.
A similar bowl beyond Lauze leads to the Rama couloir I skied with Extremely Canadian in 2008. From Rama there was a 10km traverse down that canyon to Le Relais des Ecrins.
Here’s the view 70miles to Mont Blanc.
Our hands got cold from taking pictures up here. I took a couple of laps on the Puy Salie T-bar while Liz warmed up in the restaurant at its base. It was still winter snow up there and mostly on the Glacier pistes down to the Jandri gondola mid-station at 8,500 feet.
In that same area is the north facing Toura chair, probably the most popular area on the mountain.
There are several pistes including a boardercross slope where we skied its upper half and I diverted into the chalky face left of the lift in the above pic.
To no surprise Liz skied the moguls under the sign.
We also skied the Toura 3 piste and next to the park far skier’s left.
We took a Glacier 3 lap on the upper Jandri gondola before skiing down to Bellecombe.
From top of Bellecombe we took a pass on the off piste below this sign.
It funneled into some bumps where we heard some noisy turns.
We continued on to Vallons de Diable to Access Thuit Cretes. This was a catwalk but we cut its switchback in decent chalky snow after observing another skier there.
We returned to the top of Cretes chair for our last run. I skied down the Diable lift and its NW facing snow remained chalky until very near the bottom where it narrowed into the end of a piste with manmade snow. I was lucky with this as the run was 2,400 vertical and could have been an ordeal if the snow had turned icy soon after I had committed. Views halfway down Diable 1:
Liz skied down the blue Jandri/Diable piste and said it was a complete zoo of flying bodies at the end of the day.
I skied 23,200 vertical. As I have read, Les Deux Alpes skis a bit smaller and narrower than its acreage implies. The layout tends to funnel people into runs that can get scraped and slick. Nonetheless under current conditions Les Deux Alpes has significant advantages over Alpe d’Huez. There’s a big chunk of terrain over 8,500 feet that is still mostly winter snow after 3 dry weeks and even lower down some steeper runs with favorable exposure preserved the snow well.
The drive from Alpe d’Huez took almost an hour with the two hairpin mountain roads and that we parked at the farthest end of Deux Alpes near the Diable lift.
The scenery on the drive is dramatic.
From Diable we skied to Cretes, then a catwalk to Bellecombe.
From Bellecombe we skied to Fee 2200. Most of the Fee 2 run was also a catwalk.
The catwalk ended here with a short pitch down to the lift.
That pitch had quite firm manmade snow in Tuesday’s cooler weather.
More catwalks lead from left to right on the map from the bases of Pierre Grosse to Fee to Thuit. We did not ski those but the open spaces dropping onto those roads would be worth hitting in fresh snow. Liz at top of Fee chair:
We took a lap on Fee 3, then skied to the Pierre Grosse gondola.
Emerging from that gondola we see this short track connected to the restaurant above.
The lower building is the entry to an underground funicular rising about 1,000 feet to the glacier. From there it’s a short walk to the viewpoint Belvedere des Ecrins.
Zoomed view south:
View west:
The highest Lauze surface lift above us runs only in late spring/early summer similar to those we have seen at Tignes and Zermatt. The peak barely visible at center is La Meije overlooking La Grave.
The bowl in the center of the pic above drops away into the deep canyon at right here.
A similar bowl beyond Lauze leads to the Rama couloir I skied with Extremely Canadian in 2008. From Rama there was a 10km traverse down that canyon to Le Relais des Ecrins.
Here’s the view 70miles to Mont Blanc.
Our hands got cold from taking pictures up here. I took a couple of laps on the Puy Salie T-bar while Liz warmed up in the restaurant at its base. It was still winter snow up there and mostly on the Glacier pistes down to the Jandri gondola mid-station at 8,500 feet.
In that same area is the north facing Toura chair, probably the most popular area on the mountain.
There are several pistes including a boardercross slope where we skied its upper half and I diverted into the chalky face left of the lift in the above pic.
To no surprise Liz skied the moguls under the sign.
We also skied the Toura 3 piste and next to the park far skier’s left.
We took a Glacier 3 lap on the upper Jandri gondola before skiing down to Bellecombe.
From top of Bellecombe we took a pass on the off piste below this sign.
It funneled into some bumps where we heard some noisy turns.
We continued on to Vallons de Diable to Access Thuit Cretes. This was a catwalk but we cut its switchback in decent chalky snow after observing another skier there.
We returned to the top of Cretes chair for our last run. I skied down the Diable lift and its NW facing snow remained chalky until very near the bottom where it narrowed into the end of a piste with manmade snow. I was lucky with this as the run was 2,400 vertical and could have been an ordeal if the snow had turned icy soon after I had committed. Views halfway down Diable 1:
Liz skied down the blue Jandri/Diable piste and said it was a complete zoo of flying bodies at the end of the day.
I skied 23,200 vertical. As I have read, Les Deux Alpes skis a bit smaller and narrower than its acreage implies. The layout tends to funnel people into runs that can get scraped and slick. Nonetheless under current conditions Les Deux Alpes has significant advantages over Alpe d’Huez. There’s a big chunk of terrain over 8,500 feet that is still mostly winter snow after 3 dry weeks and even lower down some steeper runs with favorable exposure preserved the snow well.
and redirect to Denver in March, where I need to visit my mother anyway.