The Breche Puiseux is a day ski mountaineering trip from Chamonix. Plum and I decided we needed a leg stretch before our trip to Mont Velan on Monday, and we had meant to do this for some time. It was a nice morning becoming more overcast as the day went on.
The route consists of a long ski down the Grand Envers, then we skinned across the glacier by the Requin Hut and started up the glacier towards the Breche. 700m of bashing a track into some quite deep snow and we were quite knackered! Still, another 300m hike up a gully (snow was getting deeper!) brough us out at an awkward step near the top. The snow was badly soft here so we pulled a few mixed moves out of the bag to reach the breche. A lot more desperate than it should have been! Too much soft snow being the problem.
Still, hard work leads to awesome ski descents. There were no other tracks in this whole area!
Plum removing his skins, ready to start the soft snow swim to the top
Hard work, making tracks up the gully
A couple of small abseils later and we were next to the Grand Jorasses with 100m+ of fresh tracks to make
The Grand Jorasses up close
After, we ski'd out to the buvette and ski'd down the VB home run. Pretty knackered by the time we were done! Not quite fit enough yet....
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