Morzine Snow Report: 28th December 2011

More sunshine. Four days of blue sky

featured in Snow report Author Phil Smith, Updated 24 October 2014

Another un-broken blue sky day today, slightly milder temperatures but we have had some great skiing these last couple of days. It’s nice to have to use the sun lotion for a change after that intense block of snow we had last week. However, we are all set for another weather change and a return of the snow on Friday – 25-50cm forecast!

Today we headed to the Nyon to avoid the peak holiday week crowds. It’s a great little ski area also with two reds, two blues and a black to keep you entertained. To get to Nyon we used the Super Morzine telecabine, télésiège Belvedere and then a nice blue, Granges, down into the Grand Pre area. This is a link between Morzine, Les Gets, Nyon and Chamossiere so it can get a little busy at times.

The Troncs télésiège out of the Grand Pre had us into the Nyon Secteur blasting down the wide blue Raverettes into the Nyon Plateau. We followed that up with a trip up the TS de la Pointe reaching the high point of the Morzine/ Les Gets side of the Portes du Soleil at 2019. The options from here are the Aigle Rouge and lower down the Aigle Noir, oh and some class off piste when the snow is right.

We started with the Aigle Rouge, fairly narrow up top but becoming progressively wider. It’s a nice little run and great for a warm up but next time around we were after something a little more demanding. If you cut the hairpins between straight aways then you get some great steep terrain. No fresh snow right now, instead the area is growing moguls. It’s steep terrain and lumpy bumpy so demanding on the legs. To add to the pain you can turn right off the red onto Aigle Noir half way down which sticks with the steep mogul theme.

It’s well worth a trip up the de la Pointe if only for the views at the top. You can see back down the valley to Morzine and in the other direction the Dents Blanche and Dents du Midi.

After all that leg pumping we headed to the restaurant on the Nyon plateau, not the big one, which is excellent by the way, but the little one to skiers' left. It’s a little more snack bar in style but very nice and probably just right if you have kids as you can get a great burger and chips. If you want a little more refinement then the big restaurant is the place to be.

After a little break we decided on a few runs down the Chamois red to the bottom of the Pre Favre lift. We found the snow to be a little less skied out down here. The Agile rouge did have a few icy patches, particularly as the morning wore on and more and more skiers had scraped off that fresh soft layer on top. The Chamois gets less traffic, only getting a little busier at the end of the day, so it suffers less.

To finish it was a nice cruisy run down the blue Lievre, the snow was lovely and it was nice to take our time. The Retour des Nantes green took us right to the bottom of the Pleney for a very pleasant end to our ski.

Roll on Friday, bring on the new snow!

Bon Ski