Yesterday was a bit of weird one – from so windy and stormy that they shut the FuniSpace to perfectly still and sunny.

We set off in slushy snow and it was cloudy, then a storm really blew in and it dumped down with snow until midday, which was when Olly got stuck at the top of the FuniSpace with his clients as it had closed and the idea of skiing down in a blizzard and a white-out didn’t absolutely fill them with happiness. Fair enough.

By the time we’d finished lunch it had stopped there were about four inches of snow outside Carrrefoure, and by the time we got up to La Chaux the wind dropped and we found pockets of wind-blown powder on the piste up to  foot deep.

(So all those instructors who though they’d magically been awarded Patantes simply because it had snowed didn’t actually need to go off-piste to get some decent turns for their clients – they just had to look…)

Then out came the sun and we spent about an hour thumping up and down the La Chaux Express until it shut. Brilliant.

And by the time we got to Chez Dany for a beer it was slush again.

So, we had the slightly impulsive idea of going up to the highest place we could think of and eating cheese, drinking Seb and Ben’s slightly dodgy Génépi and staying there for the night.

So we headed up to Mont Fort, skied down to the rather dramatic Cabane de Glacier de Tortin and set up camp. Somehow at one point we ended up turning the evening into a massage seminar but that soon passed and we got back to the serious business of finding out exactly what the boys had put in their moonshine. Oh and some weird version of snap Felix forced upon us…

The only thing that might put you off heading up and spending a night in the rather swanky Cabane might be the fact that sleeping at 3000 meters isn’t always achievable. Apart from that it’s brilliant, so get yourself up there.

Spent a great afternoon yesterday hobnobbing with the riders from the men’s Freeride World Tour in the sunshine. And we met Glen Plake. Which was a bit special….

Just had a rather pleasant lunch in the Fer a Cheval and looking forward to spending a little more time in the sun – the odds of putting on ski boots today were always rather low. Oh, and it’s rather warm today…

Yup, Televerbier has been using up dynamite like it’s going our of fashion and blasting the life out of the lower Verbier faces. It’s phenomenal how many have come down and the size of the debris – as well as the proximity to the pistes… But conditions are getting better and the sun made it out today, as did confirmation the Verbier Extreme is running for the men tomorrow…

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Well, considering that we may have had the coldest season that I can remember, it’s now seriously warmed up. Now that may sound like the best thing since sliced bread but in actual fact it can be pretty bad. As soon as the weather warms up the top layer of snow starts to melt. This, in turn, makes the snow unstable and vulnerable to avalanche.

The south facing slopes are particularly susceptible. This is then compounded by rain (that would normally be snow) that has been falling up to 2500m today.

Regardless of your experience you should always be cautious when the weather warms up and it rains above 2000m. Always check the avalance danger on the local resort website or on the National Bulletin.

The picture below is from yesterday on the face if Creblet and Col des Mines. This is always susceptible to avalanches.

Every lift in Verbier was closed today other than the Rouge drag lift. Pretty bad day but the temperature is expected to fall a little over the next few day, so it should stabilise the snow a little. All is not lost

Toby