Hannah (who many of our guests will have met guiding here over the past two summers) and her partner Ken have been over for New Years doing some snow shoeing and trying their hand at ski touring. Snow conditions aren’t great at the moment and we’ve not had a huge quantity of snow but they still have had some great days out.

Snowshoeing towards the Col des Arazures

The area around Portalet is always a good bet when the snow’s not so good and there are a whole load of peaks that you can do from there – it’s like a winter playground!

It was Ken’s first taste of ski touring and he’s caught the bug already! You can read more about Hannah and Ken’s adventures on their excellent Apple Mountaineering blog.

Approaching the summit of Marboré with Cilindro (3325m) behind

Spent a fantastic weekend ski touring in the Ordesa National Park staying over at Refugio Goriz and tackling the summit of Marborè (3248m). Stunning views into the Ordesa Valley and beautiful weather without a cloud all weekend.

High in the park looking down onto the Ordesa Canyon

Rather than the usual summer route to Goriz from the Pradera in the Ordesa Valley we set out from the cross country skiing pistes above Nerin which is a better route on skis in winter and takes you right to the rim of the canyon.

The southern cliffs of Ordesa from above

The Sierra de Custodia

The park looked fantastic covered in snow and the views just got better as we skinned along the ridge of the Sierra Custodia before descending down to Collado de Goriz and onto the Refugio.

Refugio Goriz is surprisingly cosy in winter with a wood stove heating up the dining room and with much fewer people than in the summer they’ve even set up a ping-pong table!

Refugio Goriz

The objective for the next day was the peak of Marboré – at 3248m on of the 14 three thousand metre peaks in the park. We made an early start with the snow still pretty hard which made some of the steeper sections of the ascent fairly tricky. As we got higher the views got better and better but the snow harder and harder and we reached bullet hard ice about 100m below the summit. With our ‘cuchillas’ (don’t know the word in English but the crampons that fit on your skis) hardly biting and a big drop below we decided to change into crampons and walked the final section.

Hard work on the ascent - just after this we changed to crampons

Glorious summit views from the peak. It sits on the border above the Cirque de Gavarnie and you get views down into the village over a kilometre and a half below.

Fabien on the summit of Marboré

On the way down Fabien got straight onto his skis but the ice high up did not look very tempting to me so I walked the first couple of descents until we got to some softer snow lower down.

We didn’t get back to the Refugio until 3.30 and we still had a long trip back to the car. I have to say I was pretty shattered and could have easily have settled down next to the stove with a glass of wine and stayed another night at Goriz! But on we had to go so we retraced our steps along the Sierra de Custodia where we witnessed a beautiful sunset.

Monte Perdido, Pico Añisclo and Torre de Goriz in the last glow of the sun

The final hour or so were done by moonlight under a fantastic clear sky before arriving back at the car pretty shattered. Great weekend.

Fancy staying at Refugio Goriz? Take a look at Hike Pyrenees Refugio Week which spends two night at Goriz, walks the length of the Ordesa and Añisclo canyons and summits Monte Perdido.

Portalet station at Formigal

Went skiing up at Formigal yesterday and snow conditions were better than expected after last weeks warm weather and rain. It was clear and sunny and I actually felt quite warm as I took the first lift up. I did have a lot of layers on (‘like an onion’ as they say here in Spain) and I was glad for them as the temperature was -13 at the top of the lift!

The red Espelunciecha piste - one of my favourites

The snow at Portalet, Anayet and Sarrios wasn’t bad. Some runs – particluarly the reds – were very icy but coverage on-piste was good. The Sextas zone (the lowest of the four) was a disaster with only the blue Rio run open and the higher Tres Hombres area close.

Slopes were empty as is usual midweek – you never have to queue for a lift.

Off-piste coverage was minimal and all of the black runs that are marked but not pisted were closed. They’ll need a fair amount of new snow before they’ll be in good nick.

In the Sarrios area there was a team out practising avalanche rescue in a fairly large avalanche that looked to have been deliberately created. At first I was concerned this was a real rescue but I watched them for a while and it soon became apparent it was a training exercise. With the low temperatures and lack of fresh snow avalanche risk was set as 2 and there were only a few signs of naturally triggered avalanches although I’m not sure how recent these were.

Team out practising avalanche rescue

All in all a good afternoons skiing. The resort is in better nick than I thought it would be although it could do with more snow. Snowing up the valley today so hopefully conditions will be good for the weekend.

Dian heading up Pico del Chinebral snowboard strapped to his back

Weekend at Refugio Linza – part 2

Woke up on the Sunday to clear blue skies once again. Very cold outside – about -9. Today’s plan was Pico del Chinebral de Gamnueta, skinning up the main ridge and then skiing down the south face down a valley to the road. Made our way up through some pretty woods. Surface hoar covered the ground and trees were all icy and glinted in the sun. 

Fabien making his way up on skins

Conditions on the way up were much easier than yesterday with tracks to follow and the ridge being quite windblown and icy.

Mallo d'Acerito on the left and Pico del Chinebral on the right

Lovely views of the Sierra d’Alano to the south the whole way up and when we reached the summit the views were spectacular.

Panoramic summit views - click for a larger picture

The ski back down was superb – fantastic snow, deepish powder and nice wide slopes. The route made it’s way through an open forest and then to the road. Great skiing. Just a short kilometre walk up the road and back to Refugio Linza for beer and snacks before heading off. Good weekend and looking forward to going back there again as there’s plenty of other routes from Linza.

View from the summit of Petrachema (Pic d'Ansabere)

Refugio Linza lies at a remote roadhead in the Anso Valley. It’s a beautiful wilderness area with not a ski lift for miles and perfect for ski touring, snow shoeing and cross country skiing. The weather forecast was perfect last weekend so Fabian, Dian and myself headed over there for some touring.

Heading out from Refugio Linza

Beautiful blue skies as we headed out Sarurday morning towards the border peak of Petrachema (or Pic d’Ansabere in French). Long ascent making our own tracks and with just sarrios (Pyrenean chamois) for company.

Two chamois watching us from above

As we approached the summit clouds came in suddenly but fortunately we still got fantastic views over a huge area – down into the Cirque de Lescun and across to Bisaurin, Balaitous, Pic du Midi d’Ossau and all of the peaks in the Valle de Tena. Beautiful.

The summit ridge of Petrachema with the clouds blowing over

Headed back the same way through some fairly difficult snow and I lost count of how many times I fell over. Great day, pretty long with 1400m of ascent and we were glad to get back to Linza for a beer around the fire.