Merinet Snow Report: 6th January 2014

To be more accurate, it was a paradise for skiers who are able to ski deep snow. What is awesome to some is awful for others and less experienced skiers must have found the pistes really quite difficult yesterday. When heavy snow falls late in the night after the pistes have been groomed, the majority of the runs are thickly covered in fresh snow. These quickly become a tricky mix of lumpy snow mounds separated by harder, scraped patches.  The following night, of course, the pistes are groomed to perfect smoothness again, but yesterday they were mostly lumpy and bumpy and pretty challenging to beginners.

But for the rest of us, it was a glorious powder day, one of the outstanding days of the winter when the sun breaks through the clouds, revealing vistas of fresh, virgin snow.  The school holidays are now over, so there were very few people on the slopes with which to share this snowy bonanza. Not many French choose to ski in January, leaving the slopes to the few hardy British and Russians.

After a big snowfall, the ski area opens up progressively, with the booming of the avalanche guns announcing the top lifts won’t open straight away. Only when the ski patrollers are sure that the pistes are all safe from avalanche danger will the top lifts gradually start to run, normally around 10.30 to 11.30am.

The avalanche risk off-piste was high at four on the scale of five so we decided to stay on piste and enjoy the powder there in safety. How can you make the most of these un-groomed pistes on a powder day? The best place to start is by listening to the English-language Piste Report on the local radio station, “R, la Radio Station”. At 8.20 each morning you can hear what time the various upper links are three valley links are due to open, allowing you to plan your day accordingly.

Then it’s worth being ready for when the lower lifts open at 9.00am to be sure you are first down the untouched pistes. I like to head for the lesser-known runs, such as Eterlou or Bosses where you can usually fit in two or three runs before anybody else discovers them.

It’s worth keeping your eyes open for which of the top lifts open first. If you can manage to arrive at the top of, say, the Olympic chairlift or Vallon gondola before anybody else, you are guaranteed a fantastic run down the perfect slope; no rocks, no avalanche danger and wonderful untouched snow. Who needs to venture off-piste when the marked runs as excellent as this?

We managed to put first tracks down Jerusalem red run which as the clouds were just beginning to clear away and the sun starting to shine. The piste groomer had kindly groomed one side of this run, a solution to keep everybody happy. Why doesn’t the lift company do this on all slopes after a heavy fall of snow? That way, both piste skiers and powder skiers would be content.

The forecast is for sunshine this week, so conditions should be near perfect: groomed pistes, fresh snow off-piste, sunshine and a quiet ski area. What more could you want?