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Haute Route
This version of the Haute Route offers the most comfortable options with extra hotel nights and fine dining. The tour is designed to maximize the mountain experience without compromising on the quality of food and accommodation. This is a first class mountain experience.
Starting the Haute Route in Zermatt provides us with several advantages. There will be less people while skiing and in the huts. There will be more nights with hotels on the route, so less time without showers. We are also less likely to have cancel or change sections of the tour due to weather or conditions. Doing the ski tour this way means less time walking or climbing with crampons and more time on your skis. There are many options for more challenging ski descents or climbing peaks if weather and conditions permit. Once you arrive in Chamonix why not sign up
for an optional ski accent of Mt Blanc or a day of off piste skiing. You
will be acclimatized and fit from your previous week.
Includes:
Does not include:
Accommodation: The mountain huts on the Haute Route offer clean dorm style rooms, hearty meals, beer and wine. When in the valley, we stay in comfortable family run hotels. At the start of the trip in Zermatt, you will be welcomed by Bruno and Catherine. Bruno is a mountain guide and has worked many years guiding with Larry. On the third night, we drop down into Arolla for another night in a hotel, and ride the lift out of the valley in the morning. This hotel night is missed by most other variations of the Haute Route. Our last night, in Cormayeur, we stay in a beautifully detailed stone building which has been in the family for three generations. The restaurant offers fine dining, with regional dishes of the Aosta Valley. A sommelier, a trained wine professional, will help you to choose from over 400 labels. Requirements: This tour requires good physical condition and advanced skiing ability. You should have previous experience back country skiing. We can and probably will be skiing in all conditions from powder to corn, wind hammered and frozen crud. There is no day that is particularly hard, but doing it day after day for a week takes its toll. Good skiing ability will help you save energy on the descent. Mountaineering skills are not a prerequisite and will be taught as needed on the tour. You must be able to do a kick turn on steep icy slopes and side slip on 40 degree slopes. Guide Larry Dolecki will be your guide for this trip. Since he first visited the Alps as a teenager, Larry has returned to the Alps almost every year to ski, climb and continue exploring this great range. After the mountains of Canada, this has become his second home. The Haute Route offers many variations, alternative ski descents or bad weather options. An experienced guide will ensure you get the most out of your ski holiday. With over 20 complete tours of the Haute Route as well as many seasons in Chamonix and Zermatt, Larry has extensive local knowledge of the mountains and culture. He will provide you with the expertise to make your Haute Route trip the experience of a lifetime
Ski touring in the Alps offers the unique advantage of being able to ski with light packs and arrive at a well-provisioned hut for the night. While food and blankets are provided at the huts we are still in the high mountains and must bring clothing to deal with any weather conditions. We can be baking in the hot sun or on a windy ridge in a blizzard. Many days in the spring start with cold mornings and icy snow, then turn hot as the day progresses especially when we ski down to a low valley. One of the keys to enjoy ski touring in the Alps is to make sure that your pack is light, preferably under 20 pounds. While the weather may be severe, we are seldom standing still in cold weather and the huts are warm. Try to minimize the amount of extra gear that you bring. Each day we will be moving from hut to hut with all of our gear on our back. It is not only safer to have a light pack, but much more enjoyable. There is a luggage room at our hotel in Zermatt, where you can leave extra gear or luggage for the rest of your trip. This luggage will meet us at the end of our trip in Chamonix. There will be two other stops in towns along the way to top up on lunch food. Technical Gear
Personal Equipment
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The Haute Route is the best know ski tour in the
Alps for a good reason. It is a high level journey through the heart of the
heavily glaciated Western Alps. This height of land formed a natural barrier
which became the boundary between Switzerland, Italy and France. Today it is not
so much a barrier as an alpine playground. We will travel from country to
country, between languages and cultures, all on skis.
Our tour starts in Zermatt with a ride up the
ski lifts and a traverse under the north face of the Matterhorn. The next
two days take us from the German to French speaking area of Switzerland. A
magnificent 1400m (4600 ft) ski run takes us down to the tiny alpine
village of Arolla (hotel and hot showers). Again ski lifts to take us out
of the valley and up to high mountain huts. Over the next three days we
wander our way through the glaciers and over the passes, making ski
ascents of the Pigne d’Arolla 3772m (12370 ft) and Mt Blanc de Chelion
3827m(12552 ft). From Mt Avril, it is a long ski descent to green fields
and the tiny Italian village of Glacier. We transfer by vehicle to
Courmayeur, which rests 12000 feet below the south face of Mt Blanc
(4808m, 15770 ft). In the morning we take the lift up for our long ski
descent between the granite spires of the Valle Blanche. It will be with a
sense of achievement that you walk down the main street in Chamonix a week
after leaving Zermatt.
Gear List
Note: People often ask
whether they can do the trip with telemark gear. While it is possible for a
very strong skier to do the trip on telemark gear, it is not recommended. The
sometimes difficult snow conditions, deep heavy snow or windcrust, make it
much more difficult without the heel locked down. It can be done if you are a
strong skier but it takes a lot more energy, especially with your pack.
Another difficulty is finding ski crampons to work with a telemark system. Ski
crampons are necessary on steep icy slopes especially in the morning when the
snow is still frozen hard. Manufacturers do not make ski crampons for telemark
systems. The ski crampons for telemark that I have seen are adapted from
alpine touring systems. One possibility is using a Dynafit binding plate on
your ski, which will fit Dynafit ski crampons. I have yet to see a telemark
ski crampon that works as well or is as easy to change over as an alpine
touring system.
