A Steep North Face: Inspiring and Scary

This steep face of Tour Ronde presented an awesome sight. A large slab had swept the whole face, but that aside, it just looked incredible. Could this actually be skied by an expert? It would be very difficult as the skier would have to stay on top of conditions and get to the summit on just the right day. I checked the steepness on the map, which showed an overall average of 45 degrees and a 300-foot section at 58 degrees. One would not want to fall. Our last camp was at treeline on a W ridge of this peak, and from there we reached the W summit (viewer's right) from the easy south side. From the saddle Rob looked down this slope and his feeling was that it could be skied by an expert who chose his day carefully. The second photo below shows Rob looking down the slope from the east side of the saddle.

Our route in this area went from the flat area at the left of the first photo, to the right behind the cornices into a large pass area at the lower right side of the face. Then down into a bowl and back up the other side to a treeline ridge, where we placed our last camp. While we later carried around the south face of Tour Ronde to a pickup spot, a helicopter can easily land at the side of the ridge camp, so that also works as a pickup.