After a long flight from L.A. to Geneva and a short shuttle from Geneva, Mary and I arrived in Chamonix. We popped in to this Cafe for lunch.
We were fairly well off kilter with jet lag, so we strolled around town for a bit then retired early.
After an evening of rain down in Chamonix I was excited at the prospect of skiing powder up in the big mountains. A fellow at one of the ski rental shops thought the skiing would be good at any of the nearby resorts, so I chose Brevent since it was an easy walk from out hotel.
Unfortunately Brevent's lifts are low and so I spent the day skiing 2" to 4" of thick snow over a firm base in the clouds while folks were skiing 8"+ of powder off the Aiguille du Midi and at Grand Montets above the clouds.
I enjoyed myself nonetheless. Took a break at the mid station chalet and was treated to a little band practice. Middle age guys playing french grunge/punk. Quite good actually.
An espresso with apple pie pastry brightened my mood too.
I took a few pics walking back to the hotel apres ski. St. Michel church.
The next day dawned clear in town so Mary and I headed up to Grand Montets ski area for a day on the slopes.
Kinda in the wrong place at the wrong time again as much of the snow was firm/refrozen and the north facing slopes were slow to soften.
Managed to find a few nice turns on wind drifted snow along ridges though. Of course the views were astounding! The Aiguille du Chardonnet with our eventual Haute Route angling up from right to left.
and the view back towards the Mt Blanche massif.
The cafe scene was not as quaint as at Brevent, but quite pleasant.
Another short stroll through Chamonix brought us back to our hotel.
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