Glacier Rond- Skiing on black ice.

We have been eyeing this line since Clive invited us to ski Cunningham / Passerelle Couloir last week, and the forecast called for 30cm of snow at the Midi, so we figured we would give the famous Glacier Rond a go. We were pretty stoked to drop into West Couloir if conditions looked like it would be good, so the plan was Glacier Rond with a West Couloir exit. Arriving at the Midi around 745 put us comfortably in the first bin up, even though the first bin which was scheduled at 810am, ended up leaving at 900am, we were on it. The line at the Midi this morning was so similar to an early KT morning, people jocking for position and trying to keep calm and quiet about their plans, so no one will poach their line. We had close to 30 people put their skis over the railing in front of ours waaay after we showed up, but the bin holds 65 so as long as you dont get squeaked out by the poachers, it seems ok. Even if you would get shot for shit like this in Squaw. Once everyone gets ready to get on the upper cable car, no one wants to be first in, because first in equals last out at the top. This guy found his corner in the tram and no one else wanted to be that far from the door, so he took a quick nap before his pow run!

Off the bin, haul ass down the arete, no skis on pack, just GO! Then a tedious waiting game of who is going to drop first and head towards cosmiques hut, first guy in just gets passed as the traverse get beat in, so there is a bit of strategy involved. We knew one other group was headed to Cosmiques Couloir, but didnt think we would have any competetion for the rond. Turns out we broke trail with American Dave Rosenbarger, and when his group split towards cosmiques we bid our goodbyes and headed right to the rond. no tracks, stoked, but nervous about the looming black ice. I had never skied on glacier ice under pow before, and doing it on steep terrain above all this cool terrain was a bit nerve wracking....Here is clive getting ready for the turns above the ice.

We managed down the icy bits, just doing my best to stay on my feet for the semi-controlled slide, and decided that the snow was not sticking well enough to try West Couloir. We broke left at the intersection to be greeted by more dense black ice above small crevasses. Happy to be through that mini crux, here is rylan getting his double angle of clive's entrance in the exit couloir.

Loud snow under pow, but managable, Clive getting it done on the entrance to the exit.

The snow on the exit couloir was pretty good for me, but it sounds like i found the best spots to hit, and avoided most of the frozen debris that was buried by the light light snow, Rylan and Clive did not have the same reports as me. Here is a shot looking up the exit couloir at the top station of the midi. AWESOME!

We ended up running into Alex and Jen who were in the Cosmiques as we were making sure that we didnt go into any holes above the exit couloir, and we fouind them naviagting the holy moly zone on the way out. We decided that the snow was too good to go home, and spun a quick one from the mid station to the Gros Rognon variation of Vallee Blanche, and it was banger!!!

Beautiful weather, fresh snow, cool lines and great friends. How am I going to leave this place?