Haute Route Day 4 - Valsorey Hut to Chanrion Hut

This one of the big days of the Haute route, its not the longest and doesnt have the most altitude gain (only about 900m vert) but it covers the most technical ground and has some of the more challenging nav (except when you have perfect weather and tracks to follow).

Straight out from the hut it is 600m vert of steep boot packing to the Col de Plateau du Couloir then a steep (40º plus) and icey drop onto the plateau itself a short skin from there to the Col du Sonadon followed by a section of death crust skiing to traverse between 2 icefalls. A short drop of perfect powder, some more crust on the Glacier du Mt Durand before another short skin, some perfect corn, some avy debris and just for a change more crust skiing. And finally a few hundred vertical metres of skinning to the Chanrion Hut.

A great day and everything went very smoothly (especially the sitting in the sun drinking beer and watching the rest of the teams trickle in behind us).